ecological teaching and learning

Graduates and Their Work

In January, cohort eight of the Ecological Teaching and Learning (ETL) M.S. program introduced their final action research projects to friends, family, ETL cohort #9, and other AEI/Lesley University attendees. Their presentations richly demonstrated how they have enhanced their teaching, deepened student learning, and modeled inspiring ideas and actions to enrich educational discourse and practice. The following summaries indicate the breadth and scope of the work ETL teachers are doing in their workplaces and communities.

Colleen Boddy began teaching at a new school in rural Colorado at the onset of her project. She chose to explore the question: How can I transition from traditional public school education (driven primarily by state standards) to educate my students through place-based/project based pedagogy? In a quote from her final paper she states: “I am a new teacher all over again. I’ve learned to…guide learning versus controlling it. I’ve integrated…feedback from students and have used it to drive changes in my curriculum, assessment, instruction…” 

Kimberly Duncan teaches physical science and biology to ninth graders in South Carolina. An experienced educator, Kimberly chose to explore the stereotyping and biases she brought to and found in her educational environment, and to work to undo their impact on the youth she works with. Her question, “As an effective educator, how can I create a learning environment that all students, regardless of race, can be equally productive and engaged in?” led her to understand the importance of modeling and living the behaviors and values she seeks to promote. 

“It’s not easy becoming green” is the title of Sherry East’s project this fall. A high school science teacher in an innovative new program for overage eighth graders from four middle schools in South Carolina, Sherry wanted to implement new teaching practices based on her experiences with the ETL program. She asked the question: How can I incorporate ecological teaching and learning practices into the Phoenix Bound classes? Her hope was to help students “wake up” to the natural world, and enable them to become better ecological citizens. Sherry found that she needs to begin by creating a sequence of activities that assess where students are, and that creating a bond with students is important to their success.

As Education Coordinator for the School of Discovery Outdoor Education Center in Ohio, Jessica Eynon had witnessed the disconnection between the experiences the students were having at the center and their home places. Her question was: As an ecological educator, how can I use my sense of place to help foster students’ connections to their home places? She created a “Partners in Place” theme and trained new instructors to implement this theme. Jessica unexpectedly found herself reinvigorated as an educator.

Jennie Klein, Environmental Educator with Moosetree Nature Preserve near Detroit, chose to focus on a mentoring program for pre-service teachers in elementary education. She sought to better this program by asking: How can I as an educator and mentor offer opportunities for pre-service teachers to gain confidence in teaching while also showing them the value in taking kids outside to learn? Her work had a profound impact on her sense of herself as an educator as well as fostering the growth and preparation of these new teachers. 

While in graduate school Heather Morin left public school teaching to open a green restaurant in Lewiston, Maine. Guthries, became the subject of her action research and she explored the question “How can I sustain and expand my sense of self as an educational practitioner in terms of our new ecologically and socially responsible family business venture?” Her project explored what it means to educate through a small green business fostering sustainability for “people, planet, and profits.”

Joshua Porter, environmental educator at the Merck Forest and Farmland Center in Vermont, asked the question: How can I come from a place of wholeness and sovereignty in my teaching practice? Inspired by what Parker Palmer calls “the undivided life” he explored community based folk education, ecological interactions in the landscape, contemplative practice, and the ways in which we carry places within us through story.

Jennifer Scranton, a fourth grade teacher at the Spofford Pond School in Boxford, MA, worked with the question: How can I integrate the ideas of a learning community into a fourth grade classroom? Themes that threaded through the research process included developing awareness of each other, improving awareness of self and other beings, letting go of an authoritarian teaching paradigm, being patient, and learning to nurture trust. 

In transitioning from environmental educator to teaching English in a traditional class environment David Seel formulated the initiating question: How will my exploration of Freirian pedagogy impact my teaching practice and students’ learning and perception of education? He and the students came to better understand and put into practice a dialogical learning process, confronting many culturally conditioned expectations around teaching and learning through an exploration of literature, current events, and self-reflection.

Aneiage Van Bean explored methods of assessment in her seventh grade earth science classes at an all-girls private day school in Boston, MA. Her question was:
How can I ensure that my methods of assessment in the seventh-grade science course contribute to and are an accurate representation of the students’ attainment of the learning goals for this course? Her research led her to look at the connection between assessment and grades, the role of student self-assessment, and empowerment of both students and the teacher. 

Tina Wesson teaches high school chemistry in a culturally and economically diverse suburban high school in the Southeastern United States. She formulated her question to address issues that reinforce obstacles to learning: Realizing barriers must still exist within our school system, what can I do to help alleviate these barriers and help young women become empowered so they may be successful in my classroom and potentially later in their lives? Her work led her to become “the respected teacher who cares”, letting go of control and learning to guide students rather than teach to, over, and above them. Together they discovered that by building positive relationships many barriers such as socio-economic status and gender can be overcome.