“Opening the World through Journaling: Integrating art, science, and language arts”, a curriculum written for CNPS by John Muir Laws and Emily Brueunig, teaches children to become keen observers of the natural world by drawing and writing about the plants and animals in situ. In a set of nested exercises, students use games to gain confidence in drawing and writing as a way to gather information. Later, they employ these skills to put together a field guide, make treasure maps, and to write short stories and poems. John Muir Laws says,

“Keeping a field journal develops and reinforces the most important science process skills; observation and documentation. All other parts of the process of science depend on these skills. We assume that we are naturally good observers, but learning to really see is a skill that must be learned and developed. Journal activities tie directly to the State of California science framework content standards and the visual and performing arts framework content standards.”

We would like to know who uses the material and how it is used for grant and goal purposes. In the near future, we will send you a request to evaluate the curriculum after using it. For this reason we request your email address. CNPS will not share your email address with other organizations or entities.

Questions? Please contact CNPS Education Program Director, Josie Crawford, at jcrawford@cnps.org or (916) 447-2677 ext 205.

Alta Peak Chapter would love to have someone join our board who would like to help schedule some children’s events, like special field trips geared just for kids.
Contact us if you feel a nudge about this. You don’t have to be a plant expert, just someone who knows how to make some phone calls and organize a little calendar of events.