Make it Place-based, Feet-In and Hands-On

…helping you overcome challenges associated with disagreeable and disengaged students, low achievement scores, and finite time…

…to get your teaching and your students (maybe even your sanity) back on track.

Ready to see some enthusiasm?

As experts in ecological sciences and hands-on education, we are committed to helping educators better understand and use nature study and scientific processes to support STEAM-style learning, social-emotional development, and inspired awareness of common and lesser-known career possibilities.

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Nature-based, outdoor education and experiences are becoming more widely acknowledged as methods for healthily engaging people of all ages. Done with intention, outdoor education can turn disengaged and fidgety students into active, eager learners. They become more motivated and focused, they are more physically and emotionally resilient, and they are more cooperative partners in their learning experience.

Welcome to Your New Strategy

Spend less time planning your curriculum and more time facilitating curiosity, discovery, and growth.

Support holistic student growth through effective outdoor teaching

Acquire the knowledge and skills to integrate curricular subjects through outdoor and project-based learning, build students’ social-emotional competencies, and introduce students to a wide variety of career possibilities.

Mitigate risks in outdoor teaching and learning

Keep yourself and your students safe. Learn and practice how to mitigate risks from the most common hazards, including from wildlife, weather, and student behavior.

Manage learners in the outdoor classroom

Help your students learn to self-regulate, cooperate, and collaborate. Identify best-practice strategies to enhance your routines and brainstorm ways to easily incorporate techniques into your teaching practices.

STEAM-roll the SOLs from your campus

Collectively improve student learning, retention, and recall. Learn about and brainstorm ways to use your own outdoor spaces to simultaneously reinvigorate students and address SOLs with minimal materials or prep work.

Cultivate foundational and valued competencies through nature study

Foster habits and skills to make learning easier and more enjoyable while reinforcing content and supporting emotional growth.

Introduce nature journaling to your classroom

Help your students learn new ways to cope with stress while laying the foundation for and practicing universally valued critical thinking and communication skills. In this session, practice methods for introducing or enhancing nature journaling in your classroom and plan ways to incorporate regular journaling into your learning activities.

Introduce nature study to your classroom

A consistent practice of nature study can help students grow holistically - building attitudes and skills that will help them progress through school, workforce, and life. Learn how and make a plan to incorporate nature study into your teaching & learning habits as a regular interdisciplinary STEAM exercise.

Inspire and motivate through contributive science

Engage your students with hands-on, project-based activities that also introduce them to different kinds of work opportunities and career paths.

Citizen Science 101

What is citizen science and how can you get involved? Learn about projects that are easily adapted to schoolyard uses, and brainstorm ways to leverage them to support learning standards and student growth.

Water Quality Studies with Izaak Walton League of America

We partner with the Izaak Walton League of America to promote healthy watersheds through water quality education and monitoring. We can provide training and curriculum support for Creek Critters and the Virginia Save Our Streams (VA SOS) initiatives. With a certified trainer on staff, we can also certify new monitors who would like to adopt a stream.

Urbanization and Tick Community Composition with the Ecological Research in Education Network

Ticks and the diseases they carry are an increasing public health concern. Due in part to a rise in testing efforts, the central Virginia region is known as a hotspot for multiple tick-borne diseases. We partner with a network of colleges across the country to investigate tick communities at small and large scales. This session discusses tick ecology, disease prevention, helpful resources, and a variety of opportunities to aid researchers and raise awareness in public health sectors.

Request a project

Looking for help with something specific? Or trying to wade through the possibilities?

We are familiar with many different types of projects that cover a variety of topics and range from daily to intermittent to as-you-please commitment. Many projects can be conducted with few or no materials and used as the basis for interdisciplinary studies. We can help you correlate and implement ecologically based projects. Or, if you’d like assistance finding one, we’ll work with you to identify your goals and constraints in order to recommend one to three projects that could work in your space.