Imagine all of nature as a classroom — a space where teachers and students observe, learn, and wonder together.

What creatures and phenomena in nature will you chance upon and witness? What are some of the questions and learnings that could emerge from these experiences?

“Oh! Look how beautiful she is - look at her emerald colour!”

a group of primary school teachers exclaimed as they observed the queen of the red weaver ants (Oecophylla smaragdina) during a short walk in the outskirts of Bangalore city (see Fig. 1).

Twenty minutes of exploring and observing, hand lens and binoculars in tow, brought many delightful creatures and stories into sharper focus for this group (see Fig. 2).

The word ​‘nature’ can evoke different images, meanings, and memories for each of us (see Box 1).

Thus, as part of our nature learning workshops with school teachers and educators, we often begin conversations by understanding and unpacking this word (see Fig. 3).

Going on a nature walk and creating a nature map that reflects the experience of sights, sounds, smells, tastes, textures and memories is a great way to begin such conversations (see Box 2).

It can also help draw attention to the natural world that exists all around us, in every nook and corner. Even a short immersive experience, like the 20-minute walk with primary school teachers, that is focussed on paying close attention to nearby nature can leave participants with a strong, renewed sense of connection to their immediate environment. 

Participants often share fond childhood memories of tree climbing escapades; making friends and having conversations with various creatures; or spending hours watching birds and insects while walking to school (see Box 3).

This is often followed by collective nostalgia, regret, and despair that similar opportunities may not exist for their students.

Nature learning as part of EVS

Environment Studies (EVS) is a compulsory subject in primary education across different boards in India, and provides a wonderful opportunity to introduce students to their immediate environment.

However, an underlying narrative in the prescribed EVS curriculum is that ​‘nature’ exists purely as a resource for people. This creates a false dichotomy of people and nature as separate entities. 

For example, a Grade III lesson on forests discusses the uses of trees for humans and how deforestation would harm human life, but makes no mention of how other plants, insects, and animals interact with trees. 

Similarly, it is not uncommon for end text questions in EVS chapters to ask students to list the different ways in which animals or plants are ​“useful” to people. Secondly, the EVS textbook often presents ​‘nature’ as an entity that can be observed only in faraway forests, high mountains, and deep oceans. 

The fact that our backyards, streets and even buildings and homes are teeming with wonders of the natural world is rarely acknowledged!

Lastly, EVS textbooks are often devoid of examples that are relevant to the local and cultural context of students.

Since students in many classrooms in India come from diverse landscapes, geographies, and cultures, this separates the curriculum from their many unique lived experiences and connections with the natural world. 

For instance, while a child from central India may associate rain with rare relief and a child from the north-east may see it as an everyday experience, the curriculum often does not showcase this diversity or create opportunities for these conversations and reflections.

Since the teaching and learning of this subject also often remains largely confined within the four walls of the classroom, there are few opportunities for teachers and students to discover and observe their immediate surroundings themselves. 

Moreover, while nature education material exists in many different forms in India, school teachers often find it challenging to incorporate these resources in a sustained manner in conjunction with the mandated EVS curriculum. 

This is because many common resources, like anchor charts, YouTube videos, magazine pictures and murals, often have images and information that require thorough fact-checking or are not contextually or culturally relevant (see Fig. 4).

If you go looking for nature and wildlife resources at a local bookstore, even in a city like Bangalore, you are likely to find posters with examples of only megafauna like tigers, elephants, rhinos and lions. 

They also often have visuals of animals, like giraffes, zebras and hippopotamuses, that are not found in the wild in India. These animals are likely to be visually familiar to students because of easy access to television, but how many of these creatures can students see around them? How many can they situate within their own lives and landscapes?

A nature education framework and pedagogy

Enriching and supplementing existing EVS curricula with locally relevant natural history examples, stories, and experiences can help make our and our students’ bonds with nature more meaningful and lasting. 

During school visits over the last few years, we have found that valuing children’s lived experiences and using local examples creates opportunities for independent exploration and sustains curiousity about the natural world (see Box 4).

A child’s observations and serendipitous encounters in nature can make EVS classrooms a fascinating space where questions and new learning is encouraged (see Box 5).

With this in mind, we create age-appropriate resources across various topics that are part of the EVS curricula, and that link and build on each other.

One of these resources is a Nature Learning Framework that has emerged through conversations and consultations with educators, ecologists, and our own experience as trained naturalists and teacher practitioners (see Fig. 5).

This resource provides a starting framework for teachers and educators who want to include nature learning as part of their education interventions. 

It typically progresses from more concrete, experiential activities (for young children) to introduce them to nature that is immediately accessible to offering a more abstract, conceptual understanding of ecology and interconnectedness in nature (see Activity Sheet: Colours of Nature).

We also highlight a variety of ageappropriate tools that can be used to introduce the natural world, like walks, stories, experiments, and interviews depending on the age group and space available. 

One example of this is a poster series on common plants, like the Giant Milkweed, Neem, and Singapore Cherry, and the various creatures that visit them (see Poster: Giant Milkweed).

We also recognise the need for an approach to teaching and learning about the natural world that puts students at the center of learning. 

Our Nature Learning Pedagogy has been developed through our own classroom observations and field experiences and, most importantly, through conversations and ideas generated with experienced teachers and nature educators (see Fig. 6).

Its key features are that it values students’ existing knowledge and lived experiences, and gives them the agency to actively ask and answer personally relevant questions while discovering more about phenomena and concepts in nature.

Our Nature Learning Framework and Nature Learning Pedagogy are living documents, open for review and modifications and incorporate suggestions and lived experiences

Fostering ecological identities

We believe that learning about and forging connections with nature is as essential for young students as early literacy or numeracy. This belief stems from growing evidence that meaningful connections with and awareness of the immediate natural world are often essential ingredients for our physical and emotional health and wellbeing.

As educator Ann Pelo says, engaging with nearby nature is instrumental in a conscious cultivation of ​‘ecological identities’ in young students. Intimate awareness of one’s ecological identity and connection to nearby nature is sure to shape and determine the relationship young people share with the earth. 

A deep love and connection for a place and its various inhabitants can motivate us to treasure and take action on behalf of it.

Therefore, through early immersive experiences in nature, by sharing and telling stories, and through opportunities to explore and develop a fascination for nature, we hope that as educators we can foster love, wonder, empathy and curiousity in all students. 

In time, it is these deep emotional connections that will translate to how all of us treat, respect, and nurture it.

Key Takeaways:

• The current EVS curriculum in the country presents nature as a distant entity that functions purely as a ​“resource” for people and is taught largely within the confines of the classroom.
• Enriching and supplementing existing EVS curricula with locally relevant natural history examples, stories, and lived experiences can help make our students’ bonds with nature more meaningful and lasting.
• Offering students opportunities for independent exploration and serendipitous encounters in nature can make EVS classrooms a fascinating space where open-ended, inquiry-based questions and co-learning is encouraged.
• Nature Classrooms’ Nature Learning Framework serves as a guide for designing age-appropriate nature learning experiences. It progresses from experiential activities that make nature immediately accessible for young students, and builds up to those that offer a more abstract, conceptual understanding of ecology and the interconnectedness in nature.
• Nature Classrooms’ Nature Learning Pedagogy provides scope and opportunities for learners to develop wonder, love, curiousity, and a deep connection to nature.
• The framework and pedagogy are dynamic and collaborative, and based on classroom observations, conversations with ecologists, in-service teachers and experienced educators.

Notes:

1. This article is accompanied by an Activity Sheet on Colours in Nature that can be used to document observations from a nature walk. It is also accompanied by a Poster on Giant Milkweed and the many creatures that visit it.

References:

1. Pelo, A. (2009). A Pedagogy for Ecology. Rethinking Schools. URL: https://rethinkingschools.org/articles/a‑pedagogy-for-ecology/.
2. Sobel, D. Look, Don’t Touch. URL: https://​ori​on​magazine​.org/​a​r​t​i​c​l​e​/​l​o​o​k​-​d​o​n​t​-​t​o​uch1/.
3. Sharma, Pramod Kumar & Menon, Sanskriti. Compulsory Environmental Education in India. Global Environmental Education Partnership. URL: https://​thegeep​.org/​l​e​a​r​n​/​c​a​s​e​-​s​t​u​d​i​e​s​/​c​o​m​p​u​l​s​o​r​y​-​e​n​v​i​r​o​n​m​e​n​t​a​l​-​e​d​u​c​a​t​i​o​n​-​india
4. Position Paper on Habitat and Learning. (2006). National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT). URL:https://​ncert​.nic​.in/​p​d​f​/​f​o​c​u​s​-​g​r​o​u​p​/​h​a​b​i​t​a​t​l​e​a​r​n​i​n​g.pdf
5. Chin, C. (2002). Student-Generated Questions: Encouraging Inquisitive Minds in Learning Science. Teaching and Learning, 59 – 67.
6. Scardamalia, M., & Bereiter, C. (1992). Text-Based and Knowledge-Based Questioning by Children. Cognition and Instruction, 177 – 199.
7. Wells, N. M., & Evans, G. W. (2003). Nearby Nature: A Buffer of Life Stress Among Rural Children. Environment and Behavior.

Nature Classrooms at Nature Conservation Foundation (NCF), Bangalore, develops nature learning resources that correspond to existing primary school Environmental Studies (EVS) curricula and conducts capacity building workshops for school teachers. 

To see more of their work, visit: www​.nature​class​rooms​.org and http://www.ncf-india.org/education-and-public-engagement/a‑nature-learning-framework-for-schools.