How does a child connect to nature?

If you’re interested in learnscape design for children you may be interested in the work of David Sobel, who postulates that attempts to get children to take an interest in ‘saving the environment’ are likely to have little impact if the child has not first had the experience of personal connection with their environment. In order to facilitate this connection, a learnscape can be designed to stimulate the child’s imaginative relationship with their surroundings, providing opportunities for interaction and involvement. David’s book Place Based Education is worth finding.

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Connection in a Community Garden

If you’ve never been involved in a local community garden may I briefly outline its many pleasures! Connection is key here: with people, with skills, with ideas, with nature. Connection with nature is more than just looking out over a beautiful expanse of bushland and saying ahhh! Connection is about discovering your niche in the ecology and to do that you need to engage with nature in an intimate way. And ecology includes human beings, making a community gardens the ideal experiential learning environment for reestablishing and discovering a different way of living within our ecology. For a directory of community gardens in your local area or for support in setting one up, visit the Australian Community Gardens and City Farms Network

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Gardens in Schools

A new book has been released that is a fantastic resource for teachers and school learnscape design teams developing Permaculture style gardens in schools. Co-written by Jude Fanton from the wonderful Seedsavers Network the book “Seed to Seed” covers all aspects of the learnscape design process from principles to site selection, earthworks and maintenance. It also has a great list of resources at the back. Get a PDF copy for free at the website or pay $20 for a bound copy.

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