"Appareled in Celestial Light": Transcendent Nature Experiences in Childhood 1. Childhood and Nature Design Principles 2. Playing, Plotting, and Potatoes: Preschoolers Learning in the Garden 3. Taking the Classroom to the Forest: Forest Fridays in Vermont Public School Kindergartens 4. Applying the Design Principles in an Urban Early Childhood Center: Innovation at Velma Thomas Early Childhood 5. Being Hopeful in Spite of It All: A Return to Nature-based Education 6. Forts, Land Trusts, and Conservation Behavior: How Building Forts Leads to Environmental Behavior 7. Island Play: Disney World Is Like a Flea Compared to Whitehead 8. Valley Quest: Strengthening Community through Educational Treasure Hunts 9. Look, Don't Touch: The Problem with Environmental Education 10. Swimming Upstream against the Current: Changing the School Improvement Paradigm 11. Global Climate Change Meets Ecophobia: Developmentally Appropriate Climate Education 12. Place-based Education in Guilford, Vermont, 2005: Teaching Locally, Understanding Globally 13. Place-based Education in Guilford, Vermont, 2020: Still Going Strong Finding the Good in the Pandemic: Reviving the Nature Study Movement
Childhood and Nature is a guide for educators looking to foster in their students a love of nature as well as an understanding of complex environmental issues. This second edition brings new material and fresh insights to David Sobel's foundational exploration of place-based education. Sobel articulates seven design principles that teachers can use to build learning experiences: adventure, fantasy and imagination, animal allies, maps and paths, special places, small worlds, and hunting and gathering,. Pulling from recurrent play themes and real-world examples from educators, Sobel details placed-based projects and lessons for each principle. Students learn and develop vital skills through engagement with their local environments and communities. Miniature ecosystems in the "small world" of a sandbox, for example, can help children grasp larger, abstract ideas. A timely and actionable resource, Childhood and Nature shows how centering the world around us in education can create a generation of nature students, explorers, and protectors.
David Sobel is Professor Emeritus at Antioch University New England and cofounder of the Harrisville Children's Center. Sobel is the author of Beyond Ecophobia, Place-based Education, The Sky Above and the Mud Below, and Wild Play.