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My On-Country Visit Sensory Experience:  (Step into the bushland and join the orchestra of nature where birds sing, wings dance, and stories of family and love unfold before your eyes). 🌿🎶🐦🦆💧

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My On-Country Visit Sensory Experience:  (Step into the bushland and join the orchestra of nature where birds sing, wings dance, and stories of family and love unfold before your eyes). 🌿🎶🐦🦆💧

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This short video captures my sensory engagement with the natural environment, showing the sights, sounds and movements that inspired my imaginative play.

When I visited the bushland/ park, I was surrounded by the constant chirping of birds, like nature’s own orchestra. I noticed two birds sitting close together on a branch, almost like a couple in love, while others danced in the sky. Down by the river, two ducks and five little ducklings walked in a line like a family on a journey. It made me imagine myself as part of their story, which reminded me of Wilson’s (2007) idea that nature inspires creativity and imagination through sound, movement, and drama.

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The Duck Parade and the Birdsong Ballet 🦆🐥🐥🐥🐥🐥🎶🦆🌿

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The Duck Parade and the Birdsong Ballet 🦆🐥🐥🐥🐥🐥🎶🦆🌿

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When I visited the bushland, I couldn’t stop noticing all the birds singing — chirp, chirp, chirp! 🐦🎶 Two little birds sat together on a branch like a couple in love 💕, and the others danced through the sky. Down by the river, I saw a mama and papa duck leading five tiny ducklings in a line 🦆🐥🐥🐥🐥🐥. I imagined myself as a sixth duckling, waddling and splashing along with them 🌊 and joining in the morning chorus of birds and river sounds.

This experience connects closely with Wilson (2007), who explains that nature offers children open-ended experiences that inspire imagination, storytelling, and creative play. Through my creative response, I translated what I observed into sound (birdsong and river), movement (birds flying, ducklings waddling), and drama (imagining myself in the story, acting as part of the bushland life). It reminded me how play in natural environments encourages curiosity, creativity, and a deep connection with the world and how I can bring these ideas into my future teaching practice. Acting out the duck parade made me see how music, movement, and drama happen naturally and it gave me ideas for how I can bring these playful experiences into my future teaching.

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When I was in the bushland, I felt surrounded by a living soundscape (Schafer, 1977).I noticed the rhythm in the ducklings’ waddling, the melody in the birds’ chirping, the dynamics between the soft calls and louder trills, and the texture of all the sounds layered together; the river flowing, the birds singing, and the little splashes from the ducks. Experiencing all of this up close made me realise how children can explore sound and rhythm through nature and movement, and it gave me ideas for how I could bring these playful, hands-on experiences into my own teaching.

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I danced like a bird, I spread my arms wide and flapped them like wings 🐦🪽. I imagined myself as one of the birds overhead, gliding and circling in the sky. At one moment, I became the bird on the branch, leaning gently toward another, like two dancers moving together in a duet, almost like they were in love 💕. My steps, my arms, even the tilt of my head became part of this little performance.

This reminded me of the Mutton Bird Dance, where movements imitate the birds’ wings and their journeys across the land and sky. My small dance in the bush connected me not just to the birds I saw, but also to the way First Nations people use dance to honour and retell the stories of the natural world which I can use in my future practice.

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Language of Drama 🎭c🦆🦆🐥🐥🐥🐥Story of Love and Family

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Language of Drama 🎭c🦆🦆🐥🐥🐥🐥Story of Love and Family

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As I walked along down by the river, I saw a mama duck and a papa duck taking care of their ducklings. The mama duck is leading while the papa duck is protecting the five ducklings. It felt like observing a little family drama unfold. I imagined I was the sixth duckling, waddling along, and became part of this little bushland drama. The family had a story; a journey of guidance, protection, curiosity, and fun and I got to play along.

I experienced how children can develop empathy, narrative skills, imagination, and creativity through drama in natural environments. This links with Wilson (2007), who explains that nature offers open-ended opportunities for storytelling and role play. It also gave me ideas for incorporating role play, character exploration, and storytelling into my future teaching practice.

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As I stroll in the bushland, I begun observing and imagining. The chirping of the birds and the sound of the river created a soundscape that surrounded me, while the ducks’ movements unfolded like a drama that I could almost join in. In those moments, I wasn’t just watching nature but engaging with it, embodying the kind of imaginative and creative play that Wilson (2007) describes as central to children’s learning in natural environments.  It also reminded me of Victor Wooten’s idea that music is a language we are immersed in, one we learn best by listening and participating rather than through instruction. In that moment, the chirping birds, waddling ducks, and flowing water became my teachers, showing how sound, movement, and drama in nature can become both play and pedagogy. Through this experience, I could see how the language of music (birdsong and flowing water), drama (the duck family’s story), and movement/dance (birds in flight, ducklings’ waddling) come together to inspire creativity and storytelling. 🌿🦆🎶

Like what I have experienced in Dadirri, this experience showed me how powerful nature is as a stage for imagination, creativity, and learning. In my future ECE practice, I want to give children opportunities to step into these kinds of open-ended experiences, listening to soundscapes, moving with the rhythms of nature, and creating stories from what they observe. Connecting with Wilson (2007), I see how natural environments encourage drama, music, and movement in authentic ways, while Victor Wooten’s perspective reminds me to treat sound and rhythm as a language children can “speak” through play. I’ll aim to design experiences where children are not just observers but active participants, finding their own voice, movement, and story in nature.

“I believe children learn best when they are immersed in nature, using all their senses to explore music, movement, and drama.”

Sound, Movement, and Drama in combination:
The birdsong, the waddling of the ducks, and the little family story all blended together, creating a natural symphony where I could move, imagine, and participate in the unfolding drama of the bushland. 🎶🦆🎭

As I moved like the ducks and birds, I experienced a soundscape (Schafer, 1977) that mirrors Wilson’s (2007) idea that natural environments invite open-ended play, while the Mutton Bird Dance reminded me how movement can tell a story, and Victor Wooten’s perspective shows how music is learned through participation.

Sensations:
I smelled the fresh river air, felt the cool breeze on my skin, heard the layered sounds of chirping birds and splashing water, saw the sunlight dancing on the leaves, and sensed the gentle rhythm of life all around me experiencing the soundscape (Schafer, 1977) firsthand. 🌿💧🐦

Feelings:
At times I felt calm and mesmerized by the beauty of nature, playful as I imagined myself as a sixth duckling or dancing like the birds in a Mutton Bird Dance and overall filled with joy and wonder.  💛

While I imagined myself as the sixth duckling, another child might focus on the rhythm of the river or create a completely different story, showing how natural play invites diverse perspectives.

Thoughts:
It reminded me of childhood moments spent most of the time exploring outside, imagining stories, and noticing small details in the natural environment, moments where play, curiosity, and creativity felt limitless. 🌱🦆

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Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies. (n.d.). Muttonbirding and cultural practices. https://aiatsis.gov.au/

Bangarra Education Resources

https://www.bangarra.com.au/learning/education-resources/

Music as a Language: Victor Wooten at TEDxGabriolaIsland https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zvjW9arAZ0&t=22s

Schafer Listen:

https://www.nfb.ca/film/listen/

Wilson, R. (2007). Children, creative play, and the natural environment. In R. Wilson (Ed.), Nature and young children: Encouraging creative play and learning in natural environments (Ch. 1, pp. 1–18). Routledge.