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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQrZFRV_jRw

For my on country visit, I chose to visit Attwood Lake, a place I have loved visiting since I was young. I've been there many times to play, feed the ducks, walk my dog, or even just to sit and think. Here I captured all sorts of sounds and movements in this space I chose.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=boGcDpEjNhY

For my creative response, I chose to do a dramatic storytelling audio of my experience. Here is the script below.

As I walked closer to the lake, everything around me seemed to stop to say hello. The water was calm and reflective, like a giant mirror revealing the sky and clouds above. This lake wasn’t just any lake, but rather it was like a magic door to a world different from our own. Observing the ducks at the lake, I noticed they weren't just talking to each other with their quacks. Every quack seemed to hold a secret message to one another that only they could understand. It’s as if they were guardians of the lake whose job was to keep the safety of every creature in it. I imagined the ducks were probably chatting all about the secret underwater castles, mermaids, and cool sea monsters that we would never be able to see under the lake. I believe they were keeping it a secret because they didn't want people coming and ruining their special place. The lake is proof that magic isn't just something to be read about in fairy tales. It's something real, and it's here all around us, in the fresh, cool air, in the quacks of the ducks talking, and in the way the water moves and plays.

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During my on-country visit at the lake, I sat quietly, observed, closed my eyes and used all of my 5 senses smell, see, hear, feel, and taste to really experience the environment. I wanted to let my mind run loose and tap into my inner child inside during this process and documented as many things, feelings and thoughts as I could remember on my walk back home. Through my exploration of this lake, I could see and notice all different things such as a big lake, ducks, birds, trees, bushes surrounding the lake, cars driving past, and people walking/talking. I could smell the fresh petrichor of the moist rainy air and caught the fragrance of grass, and leaves, all of which were adding to the lake's natural aroma. I was also able to hear all sorts of different sounds, such as cars driving past the road across from the lake, people walking by, the heavy wind, water movements from the lake, the rustling of reeds, ducks quacking, and birds chirping. Because of the gloomy weather, it was cold on my visit down to the lake which made me feel unsettled and uncomfortable, but I was eventually able to overcome that and tried connecting with nature, using my senses to get the most out of the experience. I felt nostalgic as if I had tapped into my inner child who was always playing outdoors and exploring whatever nature had to offer. I would most often run wild, and playing with whatever natural objects/resources I found, such as sticks, rocks, leaves etc.

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Artefact:

There were a few spots I could have chosen for my artefact, like the local park that had a playground, basketball court and oval, or a local bridge that crosses the creek near my house, but ultimately I ended up choosing my artefact to be at Attwood Lake. I picked this lake for my walk because it holds special childhood memories for me and I knew it would inspire me for this project.

Creative work:

In my storytelling of Attwood Lake, I delve into a story that transforms an ordinary landscape into the imaginary world that you would expect to see through the eyes of a child. I reimagine the native ducks of the lake as protectors of a lake that secretly holds an unknown world beneath its watery surface. Through this storytelling, I not only express my personal connection with Attwood Lake but portray that engaging with nature can become as deep and immersive as one's imagination will allow it. I aim to encourage people through my storytelling to use natural environments as a setting in their stories.

Connection to unit resources:
My experience at Attwood Lake and dramatic storytelling can be connected with the ideas presented by Wendy Welch (2009) and Ruth A. Wilson (2018). Welch highlights storytelling as a means to shape identity and connect with others (Welch, 2009), which is reflected in how my creative response transforms a simple visit into a shared exploration of nature’s wonders. Wilson however, advocates for the importance of natural spaces to be used in children's development (Wilson, 2018), and my artefact choice of Attwood Lake as a setting for imagination and discovery demonstrates this. Together they demonstrate how an immersive experience in nature, along with the art of storytelling, can enrich children's education by fostering a connection between children, imagination and the natural world.

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Through my experience at the lake, I believe I can inform my early childhood teaching methods by fostering an environment where children are encouraged to explore and express themselves in nature. This may involve getting children to have a deep exploration of places with a lot of natural items present, such as parks, ponds/lakes, forests, and beaches/coastal areas.

This seems to contradict current practices that I know of where the teacher is usually directing the children's play, because this type of play requires children to use their own imaginations, and hence self-direct their own play.

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Children, creative play, and the natural environment

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Children, creative play, and the natural environment

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In this chapter, Wilson discusses the mistaken idea of childhood and aims to challenge the dictionary definition of the child as “a person between birth and puberty; an immature person” or as a “transition period” into adulthood (Wilson, 2007, pp. 1), advocating instead for a perspective that recognizes childhood as a “special time in the lives of individuals” and children as curious, imaginative, and capable beings. She also discusses the importance of creative play as a tool that helps children “learn many critical concepts about [our] world” (Wilson, 2007, pp. 2) that cannot be taught otherwise. From reading this chapter, I’ve learnt to reevaluate how I view creative play.

Wilson illustrates how the natural environment can serve as a teaching ground for the temporal arts languages of music/sound, movement/dance, and drama, providing children with the opportunity for exploration and to learn about themselves and the world around them. The sounds of nature, from the whispering winds of the sky to the playful chirpings of birds, and the movement of flora and fauna, all allow children, as Wilson mentions “the opportunity to be in role, to be in imaginative play” (Wilson, 2007, pp. 5). By incorporating the imaginary world of role play into my teaching, children can teach themselves how to perceive the world through “another persons shoes” as well as learn that things can sometimes represent other things where “a stick can be a magic wand; small stones can be birds; and [even] the children themselves can be veterinarians or wild life photographers” (Wilson, 2007, pp. 2). At a first glance, this may seem to be a waste of time, but reading further into Wilson’s work, I found that this can teach children crucial concepts and essential skills in “reading, writing, drawing, [and] map making”, but most importantly with understanding and expressing ideas as well as planning for the future, something which everyone needs in today’s world.

Wilson’s chapter not only highlights the role of creative play in nature for childhood development but also illustrates the consequences of being disconnected from the natural world. Wilson argues that unless influenced otherwise, children are fascinated with the natural world (Wilson, 2007, pp. 5). Through her reading, I learnt of a term called 'nature-deficit disorder,' which she states had led to a societal shift where children do less outdoor play as a result of TV’s and DVD players in children’s bedrooms, computers and entertainment centres in family rooms. It is evident that today’s technology is eroding “the time children have for creative play” and “separates them from nature”, and so I hope to avoid too much of such things where I can in my teaching career.

Reference:

Wilson, R. (2007). Children, creative play, and the natural environment, in R. Wilson (edn) Nature and Young Children: Encouraging Creative Play and Learning in Natural Environments, Routledge. Ch 1, pp 1-18.

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Welch, W. (2009). Who owns the story? Storytelling, Self, Society, 5(1), 1–22.

Wilson, R. (2007). Children, creative play, and the natural environment, in R. Wilson (edn) Nature and Young Children: Encouraging Creative Play and Learning in Natural Environments, Routledge. Ch 1, pp 1-18.

Wilson, R. A. (2018). Natural outdoor playspaces. Nature and young children: encouraging creative play and learning in natural environments (3rd ed., pp. 18–32). Routledge.