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Trees of Life
A colleague this week reminded me of being a child. She reminded me to think about how I learned about trees as a young girl in school. She remembered learning about trees in a way that was all about what the tree does for us humans. She suggested it was a silly example of thinking about how we centre children and, by extension, the rest of humanity. I was reminded about how I was taught about trees and it was similar to her experience. Trees give US life. Trees give off oxygen for US to breathe; they remove CO2 from the air WE breathe. They clear pollutants for US to…
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The Spider Web
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Snow Monkeys?!?
As one child began to look for the snow monkeys we wondered where this came from. Of course, we can never be fully sure, but the guess is that it began with the vines that are intertwined throughout the forest space, tangled around and across the trees (both the living and the dead). The vines are called monkey vines. But one particular walk there was a lot of snow that clung to the trees and vines, and when you shook them the snow fell and hit our faces, bodies, and the ground. Perhaps the movements of hands, limbs (human and nonhuman) and snow together storied the mythical snow monkey. Perhaps…
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Back to the Forest….
Today we welcomed back the research team after a long break for the holidays. A lot had changed while they were gone, and we were all feeling very excited to jump back in and start up our investigations again. While they were gone we still re-visited some of the ideas that we were exploring with charcoal and paper during our morning meetings, and we still went to the forest as often as we could, but there’s something energizing about their presence. On our first trip back to the forest with Carrie, we went to a part of the forest some of us had never visited before. Immediately I noticed connections…
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Paths
Seeing tracks on the ground from animals and others. Making our own tracks in the snow. Noticing and following tracks and paths of tree branches and vines twining through the snow. Trying to follow an auditory track of a bird we hear in the trees but cannot see. Using landmarks like the school, the path, to find our path out of the forest. Looking at a path as a route or course that tracks movement. We see this in charcoal works, in the concentrated energies in some places, then the trickle-out effect where marks and energy are less dense but still there. Following animal tracks that will presumably lead us…
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The Spider Web
In the forest, we stumbled upon an area with large tree trunks, branches, sticks, and vines intertwined. The children stood together on this entangled mass almost in awe, possibly wondering “What is this? Why is it here?” Some of the children started walking towards it and the rest followed. As we got to the edge, the children stopped and seemed hesitant to proceed. We entered slowly at first, ducking under the low branches to go further inside. Some of the children observed how the entangled mass resembled a spider web. Some wished to climb it. A small group began not only ducking under but climbing over top of the branches,…
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Trees of Life
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The Hollowed Log
November 16 Today we walked to the forest. One child offered us a question that inspired our forest visit: Where does charcoal live? The walk to the forest was especially exciting: the first snow of the season! The children are unusually aware of their surroundings because everything looks different with the snow.
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Tracks in the Snow
Poems continue to inspire thought – Wanderings and Wonderings Snow reveals the passing tracks of those that have come before us, if only for a brief moment But I wonder what other tracks go unnoticed when snow is not there to remind us Following, leading, erasing Walking, crawling, slithering, running, leaping Away from and towards Paths converging and pulling apart Prints in the snow How many other humans AND nonhumans have stood where I stand Neither alone nor lonely Waiting watching listening Who/what has walked these place before What might these tracks tell us about the presences of others Being and belonging in a multispecies world “Poetry shuts out the…
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Where does the charcoal live?
November 16, 2018 It all started with a question: Where does the charcoal live? On a cold, snowy November day, the children and educators decide to walk to the forest and venture on a quest looking for charcoal. The children scamper around the forest paths with big smiles on their faces, oblivious to the cold. They’re so well wrapped up in thermal and waterproof layers and so engaged with their outdoor experience, they seem to hardly notice the weather. Snow covers the forest floor in layers. As the children walk up the trail, they come upon a tree that fell a few months ago. We know this trunk. We visited…
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Slowing Down and Embracing the Silence
Working with charcoal and paper was a beautiful, albeit messy, way to slow down and pay attention for everyone. I noticed moments of true connection between the children and educators that I did not necessarily notice before the introduction of the paper and charcoal. I noticed Katlyn slow down and spend serious time quietly making strong connections with the children while they engaged with charcoal. There were beautiful connections between educator and children as they explored how charcoal made marks, how it made dust, how it was messy, but that messy bit on our hands could be turned into new mark making. At one moment it was so calm and…
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We Did This (Leaving Our Mark With Charcoal)
We sit on the floor and revisit our work together. Who did this? Using a finger we trace the marks left on of the page. There are long ones, smudged ones, short marks, dark and light marks. The variety is endless and evolving. Every touch, with or without charcoal, changes the marks. We observe and discuss these communal offerings, sometimes asking who made this? Sometimes we are silent and trace the marks with our fingers. We revisit our experience. We lie on the floor and look up at our work. We flatten our faces to the wall and observe up close. We point out features of interest to each of…
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Disturbance
