Stepping away from my desk and the computer, to the world outside of my house. A breeze of cold air hits my face, the world moves all around us, w e are a part of this world. Every where we go there is an understanding to grasp, to know, to acknowledge its existence, to become and to be with. Doing so requires us to be hands on, to use our senses to sense the world. What is happening around us? What needs to be done? Place literacy helps us connect, learn and engage with the world, providing us with the importance of how it impacts the bigger picture. The environment is used as a tool for learning, everything becomes connected and intertwined with what children usually learn at school. Learning then becomes fun and engaging as things make sense when learning is connected with everything.
-Jordon Lee

Häggström, M., & Schmidt, C. (2020). Enhancing children’s literacy and ecological literacy through critical place-based pedagogy, Environmental Education Research, 26(12), 1729-1745.

Robin Wall Kimmerer in conversation with Robert Macfarlane. (2020, May 12). Emergence Magazine. Podcast.

 

Margaretha Häggström & Catarina Schmidt (2020) Enhancing children’s

literacy and ecological literacy through critical place-based pedagogy, Environmental Education

Research, 26:12, 1729-1745, DOI: 10.1080/13504622.2020.1812537

Carson, R., & Pratt, C. (1965). The sense of wonder. Harper & Row

Oshrat Zemel

tell us who we are

Who we may be

Who

exactly has been here

will be here

How does this serrated leaf

cut so deeply into 

me

finding my core, my essence

my me

How does this gravelly trail

know my name

my journey

my reasons

 

These places listen and give the opportunity to be heard, to be known. They have stories and histories that we are welcomed into. They don’t just exist beside us, but they help to create us as the humans that we are, that we will become. We reflect nature as nature reflects us, and yet it is always more. Offering more freely, caring more deeply, seeing more closely. 

I have spent most of my life beside one forest or another. On this day I went out to find the first thing that called to me, and it ended up being the bright pink of salmon berry petals. These beautiful little flowers are a welcome hint that spring is almost here, to be patient. When we return in late April/early May to pick the berries we will very mindful to pick only a few because they are one of the first things ready for the bears to eat. Though small, this juicy harvest is always a crisp reminder of good things for me. 

References

Downey, A. M., Bell, R., Copage, K., & Whitty, P. (2019). Place-based readings toward disrupting colonized literacies: A metissage. In Education, 25(2), 39-58.

Haggstrom, M, & Schmidt, C. (2020). Enhancing children’s literacy and ecological literacy through critical place-based pedagogy. Environmental Education Research, 26(12), 1729-1745. https://doio.org/10.1080/13504622.2020.1812537

Macfarlane, R. (2020, May 12). Robin Wall Kimmerer in conversation with Robert Macfarlane [Audio podcast episode]. In Emergence Magazine Podcast. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/robin-wall-kimmerer-in-conversation-with-robert/id1368790239?i=1000474338271

 

This includes using all of our senses to recognize different ways of knowing and being (Macfarlane, 2020). 

 

Thus, we are able make connections with people and more than human beings opening opportunities to hear their truths and find our own evolving place among them. 

 

Over time, as meanings are made, relationships form and have the potential to be deeply felt.  

 

Place literacy understands the importance of recognizing our interconnectedness and how this informs our behaviours and contributions to "liv[ing] well" (Downey et al., 2019) together.

 

 

References

Downey, A.M., Bell, R., Copage, K. Whitty. (2019). Place-based readings toward distrupting colonized literacies: A métissage. In Education, 25(2), 39-58.

 

QayQayt First Nation. (2019, February 23). Thank you to the New Westminster Museum for screening “A tribe of one” on Feb. 23^rd. [Video]. Facebook.

Macfarlane, R. (2020, May 12). Robin Wall Kimmerer in conversation with Robert Macfarlane [Audio Podcast]. Emergence Magazine Podcast. 

 

My footsteps slowly march to the beat of a lullaby, 

Rhythmic, slow and steady they tell a story of patience and presence. I wander through one of my favourite parks. It has changed since my last visit. Rich greens in soft textures that beg to be touched are enjoying their time to be the focal point of an explorers walk. Spring is finally in the air. I take the time to pause, to dwell and attune to the environment around me. I hear the  quiet rush of water from the miniature waterfall that flanks one side of the pond. The steady quacking of the ducks that glide across the water.  The birds that sing and fly overhead once hidden in the canopy of leaves are now on display. The buzzing chirp of a hummingbird alerts my senses towards a nearby tree. I notice a variety of moss and lichen, each with its own hue and texture. Some cling to the branches while others spread like a cushy carpet that I want to walk barefoot across. 

Today I walk alone so that I can provide full attention to the forest around me. I usually come here with my three daughters, drawn to the life, the peacefulness and connection to nature that can be lost living in urban areas. I think of Robin Wall Kimmerer, I too want to share with my children the beauty of the growing world around us.  I want them to be knowledgeable and aware of the plants, trees and creatures that we share our home with. I want them to know when we love the land, it loves us back (Braiding Sweetgrass, Emergence Magazine Podcast, 2010).

In Haagstrom and Schmidt’s article they too define the importance for children to be connected to their environment and the place where they live. If “places define who we are” (Haagstrom & Schmidt, 2020, p.1742) I hope that I have surrounded my children with experiences that will connect them to nature, to the ecologies that we live alongside. Connecting to place enables us all to recognize “how humans are intertwined with place and their natural environments” (Haagstrom & Schmidt, p.1741).
Reference:
Häggström, M. & Schmidt, C. (2020), Enhancing children's literacy and ecological literacy through critical place-based pedagogy. Environmental Education Research, 26(12). 1729-1745, https://doi.org/10.1080/13504622.2020.1812537

Macfarlane, R. (Host). (2020, May). Robin Wall Kimmerer in Conversation with Robert Macfarlane [Audio podcast episode]. Emergence Magazine.

As I listened to Kimmerer’s podcast, this quote spoke the most to me. I embarked on a journey through MacDonald Park to ponder through the liveliness of the trees, birds, insects, leaves, and the whooshing sound of the wind. As I sat down, I reflected on the memories of when I used to come here with my grandfather. This park was a place I came the most frequently growing up because it was close to my childhood home. We would gather and sit on one of the park benches and talk about his histories of when he immigrated to Canada with her to start a new life. This time around, it felt peaceful. The chirping of the birds and the calmness of the environment allowed me to reflect on the memories I once shared with him and how grateful I feel to be able to enjoy this moment again. Even without the physical presence of him here today, I continued to feel the love and connection towards this place.           

- Nikki L

Reference 

Robin Wall Kimmerer in conversation with Robert Macfarlane. (2020, May 12). Emergence Magazine. Podcast.

hello dandelions.

Quiet noise, silent laughters,

maybe sneak a fun.

It’s a trail,

more dandelions, achoo,

tiny path, take a leap, 

birds debate.

Walk again,

birds dance,

hello again, dandelions.

 

“[P]eople create places and places ‘make’ people.” (Häggström & Schmidt, 2020)

 

Walking alone on the same path again in the earliest morning, I smell, hear, and feel things differently. The relationship I have built with this path have been entangled, intertwined, and overlapped wtih others many times. However, each encounter creates my new identity and relationship with the path. As Häggström and Schmidt (2020) suggested, by situating ourselves into a familiar place allows us the opportunity of meaning-making about ourselves, we can form our identities, connections, and entanglements with the place. Listening to Robin’s podcast, I was heavily influenced by the dandelion conversation. Dandelions are model global citizen as it is always everywhere, in the park, in the mud, and in the tiny cracks of the sidewalk. However, people see them as weed because it is always everywhere (Macfarlane, 2020). Yet, given the opportunity to understand where it is located, we can understand its identity differently. Therefore, a place allows us to be different and offers us the opportunity to create meanings. 

Reference:
Häggström, M. & Schmidt, C. (2020), Enhancing children's literacy and ecological literacy through critical place-based pedagogy. Environmental Education Research, 26(12). 1729-1745, https://doi.org/10.1080/13504622.2020.1812537

Macfarlane, R. (Host). (2020, May). Robin Wall Kimmerer in Conversation with Robert Macfarlane [Audio podcast episode]. Emergence Magazine.

 

This place provides a multi-platform that allow me to think with this land and practice embodied engagement. Haggstrom and Schmidt (2020, as cited in Mahmoudi et al., 2012, p. 1730) state that critical place-based pedagogy encompasses identity formation and meaning-making processes through connections to a community as well as to natural environments. Children are educator are learning with the surrounding environment, to feel, touch, to observe to fully situated themselves in the relationship between environmental encounter and language. On the other hand, the place literacy practice is an ongoing process that inherent in reciprocal relationship among people, place, materials and activities (Haggstrom & Schmidt, 2020 as cited in Ross & Mannion, 2012). Therefore, to generate a place-based pedagogy, educators can continually make meaning from in relational ways and allow ecological, digital, visual and printed contexts coexist (Downey, 2019). Chidlren and educators are continually, research, discovery nuances and experiences with the other-than-human world to enhanc language and ecological literacy (Haggstrom & Schmidt, 2020). 

References

 

Downey, A. M., Bell, R., Copage, K., & Whitty, P. (2019). Place-based readings toward disrupting colonized literacies: A metissage. In Education, 25(2), 39-58.

 

Haggstrom, M, & Schmidt, C. (2020). Enhancing children’s literacy and ecological literacy through critical place-based pedagogy. Environmental Education Research, 26(12), 1729-1745. https://doio.org/10.1080/13504622.2020.1812537

Shadow echoes with me.

 

Leaf dances with Wind,

Wind blows forth and back.

 

Branch dances with Trunk,

Trunk mirrors her posture in return.

To see, to be seen. 

To hear, to be heard.

To notice, to be noticed.
To move, to be moved.

To love, to be loved.

 

A relationship emerges, 

Called a mutual flourishing.  

 

I feel connected to Kimmerer’s words when she says, "when you feel that the earth loves you in return, that feeling transforms the relationship from a one-two steer into a sacred bond” (Emergence Magazine Podcast, 2020). Humans are a part of the world, living with more-than-human entities together. Place literacy encourages us to see more-than-human inhabitants in a place, paying attention to the here and now. It is an embodied experience to attend to a place, listen, and notice what others reciprocate. A place with more-than-human entities to “reconnect and interact with the other-than-human world” (Häggström & Schmidt, 2020, p.1732). Häggström & Schmidt (2020) demonstrate that a place can “be viewed as text” (p. 1731) with spatial, visual and embodied ways to engage. Every thing itself in a place is intertwined as an entanglement: language, meaning-making, identity, literacy.

 

Reference:
Häggström, M. & Schmidt, C. (2020), Enhancing children's literacy and ecological literacy through critical place-based pedagogy. Environmental Education Research, 26(12). 1729-1745, https://doi.org/10.1080/13504622.2020.1812537

 

Macfarlane, R. (Host). (2020, May). Robin Wall Kimmerer in Conversation with Robert Macfarlane [Audio podcast episode]. Emergence Magazine.

 

The tree is now supporting new life, new growth, change, and resiliency. The air feels cool and fresh, and there is a faint smell of cedar. I can hear birds chirp and cars hum in the distance. 

From my understanding, a place is a geographic and physical space that holds cultural significance, ways of knowing, and/or ways of being. I see place literacy as a dynamic, multimodal, and multi-sensory framework that disrupts dominant discourses on literacy. As well, I think place literacy is rooted in relationships, and  encourages us to consider how we are connected to each other, non-human beings, and place. Robin Wall Kimmerer discusses relationships to the land, and how nature can foster a sense of belonging and overall well-being (Macfarlane, 2020). Kimmerer invites us to consider: what if the land loved you back? (Macfarlane, 2020). This notion of reciprocity between humans and the land juxtaposes extractive, industrial, capitalist, and colonial practices. 

 

References: 

 

Macfarlane, R. (Host). (2020, May 12.) Robin Wall Kimmerer in Conversation with Robert Macfarlane [Audio podcast episode]. Emergence Magazine Podcast. 

As I momentarily struggled with what I had just realized, I stumbled backwards over a tree root and onto the returning green grass. The grass cushioned my fall as I felt the breeze touch my cheek, and suddenly, my gaze fell onto the “perpetrator” that had caused my fall. I had been almost offended for a moment about the root’s existence, but then I realized how silly it was that I, from a human perspective, was irritated because something was “in my spot”. “My spot?” I caught the thought and I could not help but raise a brow at myself. This tree is older than me– has watched me grow from the year I moved into this complex at the tender age of four, to the young woman I am today. Like a silent friend, or a distant family member who had been lovingly observing your life from a distance. Those roots, I recall suddenly, had been smaller back then. Bulging, somewhat intrusive, but I did not recall them sticking out of the earth so obviously. As I grew, so did this tree. Back then I had marveled over how the roots broke through the crust of the soil; reaching out with wide arms towards the rays of the sun to bask in it the same way I did when I was young and careless and had plenty of free time. I tried to count them in my head, follow where they would lead with my eyes, and imagined what it must have felt like to be partially submerged in the world below. How long ago was this? And though I have always been here, I wondered: where have I been? The world around me changed over time before my eyes, and yet I miss so many things on my journey to and from school and home.

In some sorrow, I thought about the words of Robin Wall Kimmerer: “... I knew it with a certainty as warm and clear as the September sunshine, that the land loves us back. She loves us with beans, tomatoes, and blackberries. With a shower of gifts, and a heavy rain of lessons.” (8:00-8:18). I had thought of her words at this very moment because the land has been with us for so long, and yet it seems we do not pay any real attention to it when we are preoccupied with so much in our lives. School, work, deadlines, what to eat, what not to do and what we have to do… the sound of the bird’s calls, the whisper of the winds between leaves, and the world speaking to us softly, lullingly, is drowned out by the world we have created ourselves to exist in. Oftentimes we do not treat nature with kindness, yet it loves us and still continues to do so. And as Wall Kimmerer reminds us that the land is living and breathing and welcoming, Haagstrom and Schmidt explain that the land is what defines us, and the importance of people/children being connected to their environment being the cause of that (p. 1742). With how easy it is to be swept up in our own lives and the new technology around us (especially as I observe more and more children being indoors with technology than being outdoors like I remember in my youth), I sincerely hope that we as educators can help children to establish a connection with the land around them. That it is something that is not meant to serve us, but is important to us on a reciprocal relational basis.

Reference:

Häggström, M. & Schmidt, C. (2020), Enhancing children's literacy and ecological literacy through critical place-based pedagogy. Environmental Education Research, 26(12). 1729-1745, https://doi.org/10.1080/13504622.2020.1812537

Macfarlane, R. (Host). (2020, May). Robin Wall Kimmerer in Conversation with Robert Macfarlane [Audio podcast episode]. Emergence Magazine.

Trees waving in the wind 

A swift stream carving out its path in the earth

Leaves drift by on the water, ever-spinning

Soil is flushed downstream and deposited into clay

Time passes by

Love stands still

Between the land and its people

There’s a serene stream running through a park in my neighbourhood. When my children were younger, it was one of their favourite places to play. Behind the stream is a tranquil forest with long trunks of trees and dense shrubs. The forest creates a beautiful backdrop for our community. The coating of silt and clay deposited on the sides of the stream where my children would sculpt, or draw on the surface with sticks.

After listening to Robin Wall Kimmerer’s podcasts (Macfarlane, 2020), I ponder the question of what our relationships with land are --“How we are given so much and what we might give back,” Kimmerer’s voice echoes in my mind (9:06-9:11). As Mahmoudi et al. (2012) narrate, place-based literacy creates connection between humans and communities as well as nature, to foster the processes of “identity formation and meaning-making” (as cited in Häggström and Schmidt, 2020, p. 1730). I wonder if this could be a way to nourish our relationships with the earth and sustain the reciprocal love between the land and its people. 

 

Häggström, M. & Schmidt, C. (2020). Enhancing children's literacy and ecological literacy through critical place-based pedagogy, Environmental Education Research, 26(12) 1729-1745.

Macfarlane, R. (Host). (2020, May). Robin Wall Kimmerer in Conversation with Robert Macfarlane [Audio podcast episode]. Emergence Magazine.

Downey, A. M., Bell, R., Copage, K., & Whitty, P. (n.d.). Place- Base Readings Toward Disrupting Colonized Literacies: A Metissage. In Educatipn, 39- 58. elearn. Retrieved April 10, 2022, from https://elearn.capu.ca/mod/folder/view.php?id=1813776

The aesthetic nature color of forest green is various shades of light to dark green mixing with the sunset glow tinted the cloud’s side coral painted a magnificent view. I inhaled the minty smell from the tree and grass and stepped on the grass, delighting in the sound of my shoes sliding through the leaves. With a gust of wind blowing, the branches crashed against each other gently swayed and rustled. I sat on the grass where I just glimpsed the children between leaves. Beaded dewdrops stood upon several leaves; I opened my hand under one leaf silently to wait for the dew. This reminded me what Wall Kimmerer stated the connection between land and nature, and how it can improve wellness and a sense of belonging (Macfarlane, 2020). This is an amazing place for me to feel safe and quiet that allows nature to heal my tiredness.

 

References: 

 

Macfarlane, R. (Host). (2020, May 12.) Robin Wall Kimmerer in Conversation with Robert Macfarlane [Audio podcast episode]. Emergence Magazine Podcast.

 

I am here

Here is with me

We greet each other

with breath

with touch

Listening to and feeling

the invisible threads

that reach out, weaving,

and Entangling with

the strands of my hair

the pores on my skin

Aromas from the star magnolias

Enriching my mornings

and soothing my evenings

An exchange that is

meaning-full 

Full of familiarity

of joy

of hope

 

Words slip off my tongue

Disappearing and intermingling 

with the winds that embrace 

and surround

affecting a stutter

to my ways of knowing

and being

leaving an ever fixed mark

 

The silence is abundant 

a cacophony of lives lived

Lost

Forgotten

Here remembers

Do you?

Do I?

It’s interesting because though this place is familiar, we often take for granted the conversations we have with place, possibly because of the assumption that our walks seem like the same thing, that there is nothing new to learn. Yet, if we take the time to listen and attune, there is still so much to learn. No conversation is ever the same. This ties into the importance of creating a sacred bond, rather than having a one-sided relationship with the world (Macfarlane, 2020). I believe that place literacy is our communication with the relationships and entanglements that we are intertwined with (Häggström & Schmidt, 2020). It is through these conversations that we get to know and form deeper bonds with the land we are on.

Häggström, M., & Schmidt, C. (2020). Enhancing children’s literacy and ecological literacy through critical place-based pedagogy. Environmental Education Research, 26(12), 1729–1745. https://doi.org/10.1080/13504622.2020.1812537

Macfarlane, R. (Host). (2020, May 12). Robin Wall Kimmerer in Conversation with Robert Macfarlane [Audio podcast episode]. In Emergence Magazine Podcast. Emergence Magazine. 

Häggström, M. & Schmidt, C. (2020). Enhancing children's literacy and ecological literacy through critical place-based pedagogy, Environmental Education Research, 26(12) 1729-1745.

Macfarlane, R. (Host). (2020, May). Robin Wall Kimmerer in Conversation with Robert Macfarlane [Audio podcast episode]. Emergence Magazine.

Snow Creek in Port Alberni is a place I visit quite often with family and friends. But this place by the creek is one I prefer to visit in solitude. Walking gingerly and attentively down a narrow dirt path, taking time to slow down and listen to Robin Wall Kimmerer (2020) words about how time can be understood as a body of water, with all things being interconnected under, below, and above the surface. Upon closer inspection of the babbling voice of creek, low waterlines call attention to tree roots, rocks, and stones, changing how creek is heard as I come closer. I begin to think about what stories are held in this space or are carried with creek into the connecting Sprout Lake? Attuning to how “people create places and places “make” people” (Häggström & Scmidt, 2020), and my time in this space challenges and further extends my connections with this place’s truth. This time spent with Snow Creek calls me to think with this space in gratitude and listen to stories being told, even if they can’t be heard by ear. 

p.1742). 

 

 

References:

 

Häggström, M., & Scmidt, C. (2020). Enhancing children’s literacy and ecological literacy through critical place-based pedagogy, Environmental Education Research, 26(12), 1729- 1725.

 

Robin Wall Kimmerer in conversation with Robert Macfarlane. (2020, May 12). Emergence Magazine. Podcast. 

Kimmerer (2015) speaks to the power of our words and how we choose to connect with the Earth. Once we understand that the Earth and its entities are living and being just as us, we are able to recognize the ebb and flows of relationality between one another. Just as the aging log on the beach is covered by algae, stripped of its original bark and is bleached by the sun, we too are affected and affecting all that is surrounding us. Our understanding of place and literacy is deeply woven and interconnected with one another, as long as we are continually asking. "What is this histories are this place speaking to?";"What is this log asking of me?";"What is the algae on this log telling me?". We are surrounded by knowledge and deeply rooted knowings of other, we must simply choose to listen and inquire of ourselves to hear them.

References
Häggström, M., & Schmidt, C. (2020). Enhancing children’s literacy and ecological literacy through critical place-based pedagogy, Environmental Education Research, 26(12), 1729- 1725.

Kimmerer, R. W. (2015). Braiding sweetgrass. Milkweed Editions.

Reference: 

Häggström, M. & Schmidt, C. (2020), Enhancing children's literacy and ecological literacy through critical place-based pedagogy. Environmental Education Research, 26(12). 1729-1745, https://doi.org/10.1080/13504622.2020.1812537

An example would be a simple walk in nature that allows us not just to notice our destination but the buds of springtime, the new nests in the trees and birds that hide as sunshine sparkles through, giving new hope to springtime and a farewell to the wintery dead leaves as they slowly fade away amongst new greenery. 

 

Häggström, M., & Schmidt, C. (2020). Enhancing children’s literacy and ecological literacy through critical place-based pedagogy. Environmental Education Research, 26(12), 1729–1745. https://doi.org/10.1080/13504622.2020.1812537