anytime in nature are astounding there
are physical and mental health benefits
spending time in nature is therapeutic
there’s benefits to the surrounding
community and to the ecology itself but
today I want to focus on the
intellectual benefits of spending time
in nature because nature truly is a
classroom nature can be used to teach
just about every topic mostly science so
physics chemistry biology geology
ecology environmental science all these
things are perfect to teach in nature
mathematics as well because nature is
mathematics but you can also teach
history and language arts and English
just by spending time reading a book
outside or discussing a topic outside in
the woods kids will understand that
information better nature is interactive
it’s engaging and most importantly it’s
fun by spending time in nature instead
of in the classroom kids are just much
more engaged in what they’re learning
with they enjoy spending time out in the
fresh air surrounded by plants and in
the sunlight and nature is a window into
how everything works by learning from
nature we can learn about every other
system around us whether it’s economics
politics science mathematics technology
all these things we can gain insight
into by learning with nature so when I
was a young lad I I loved learning
I loved learning but I uh but I hated
school
I really did not like school and so I
got into a habit early on of faking
illness so in the morning I would I
would fake a cough and I tell my mom I’m
not feeling well mom and and she was
public school teacher as well so she and
she knew how much I hated school so she
would play into it and she would she
would believe me and she’d say all right
you can stay home today and so she would
go off off to her job at the public
school and and once she was gone I would
make sure the coast is clear and then I
would go outside usually barefoot and
and go down the street to Monticello
park which was the local forest and I
would spend all day in the forest seeing
how close I could get to squirrels
playing with sticks and stone
and breaking breaking sticks off of
trees and trying to make bows and arrows
and my favorite thing was to build dams
there’s a stream through this forest and
I would build dams I would see how I
could build the dam and then when I
built the dam up to a certain point and
the stream had filled up I would pull
out rocks one at a time and see it all
come crashing down and it was so much
fun to me and it was a learning
experience and it was way better than
school and one thing I learned from that
is that nature is a damn good
environment for learning but it would
have been so much better for my
education if I had a teacher there with
me if I’d have mentor there with me in
the woods helping me through all this
and helping me connect the things I was
learning in school with the things I was
learning in nature so let’s look at this
Lake Here I am Here I am fishing and if
I had a if I had a teacher here with me
there are so many things I could learn
just from being around this lake for
instance there’s a whole intro to high
school physics here with the elasticity
of the rod and the momentum and the
inertia of the fly there’s biology in
how the fish behave and how they
interact with the flies and the other
animals in this ecosystem there’s
chemistry how interesting would it be to
take a pH test of the lake and then take
the pH of the stream that was feeding to
the lake and questioning why are those
pH is different
there’s mathematics here think about the
probability and statistics of actually
catching a fish so much to learn there
and way more interesting
I could even read a book you know I
could read Walden by this we could learn
about history the history of the
Algonquin tribes that were living in
this region how they lived and how they
how they survived off the land there’s
so much that I could have learned
through this lake if I had a teacher
there an Albert Einstein understood this
he said look deeper into nature and you
will understand everything better and I
realized this I realized this was true
sort of independently of Albert Einstein
while I was studying aerospace
engineering at MIT but it wasn’t at MIT
that I realized this it was while I was
out of MIT studying on a farm so I
worked on a farm for a summer in West
Virginia and and I spent every day
outside ten hours a day outside in the
wood
in the fields down by the river and
while I was outside I was starting to
see things I was learning in school
the aerodynamics the thermodynamics the
structural mechanics I was starting to
see that in the natural systems around
me I was seeing eddies and and pressure
differences and vortices in the stream
that I was learning in aerodynamics I’ve
seen thermodynamics come alive in the
brush fires we were setting from all the
brush we’d collected from prunings I was
seeing structural mechanics as I was
pruning trees and berry bushes Young’s
modulus was truly coming to life for me
so I realized during this experience
over the summer working on this farm
that nature could be such an incredible
learning tool to help us integrate the
things that we were learning in school
so this brings you to systems thinking
because this is a really interesting
concept there’s this this idea that if
we can really understand one system say
a mechanical system then we can start to
apply the concepts that make that
mechanical system work to another system
say an electrical system so you can look
at how a house is plumbed like water
plumbing and you can compare that
directly to an electrical circuit and so
there’s all these systems political
systems economic system social systems
and natural systems that all operate
using the same based principles of
energy flows of inertia momentum of
balance and imbalance of overshoot and
undershoot every system works using the
same underlying principles and nature
works the same way and ecosystems are
incredibly complex systems that we
evolved to understand we literally were
hundreds of thousands of years at the
system we were interacting with was the
natural system so we it’s built into our
genetics to really understand how these
systems work so by spending time in
nature we can start to develop systems
thinking and apply these systems natural
systems to other systems are focused on
whether it be economic political or
mechanical structural any system we face
complex problems everything from climate
collapse
ecological collapse economic inequality
migration human migration political
instability these are really complex
problems that are part of complex
systems in order to solve them we need
complex systems complex systems thinkers
out there and so what I propose is that
we use nature to teach the next
generation of systems thinkers because
this is the complex system that we
evolve to understand the current
academic paradigm of death sitting and
test taking and hand-raising doesn’t
work for a lot of kids it sure didn’t
work for me I was labeled learning
disabled but I always thought that was
weird because I loved learning you know
really was I was school verse I was
academics obverse so this current
academic paradigm doesn’t work for a lot
of kids so we have to rethink how we’re
going to do this and if we look to
Einstein and spend time out in nature we
can shift to a natural learning paradigm
so how do we do this well we all play a
role the parents the teachers and
students and the administrators you’re
important too so let’s start with the
parents so the first thing you can do as
parents is get your kids outside take
them outside on the weekends after
school go with them outside or let them
roam around by themselves find a nice
park a forest to stream a lake just let
them outside and facilitate their
natural instinct to explore and enquire
don’t get in the way too much let them
really explore where they want to
explore and then ask them questions
you know why does the seed stay in the
air for so long this girl is learning
aerodynamics right here find a school
that prioritizes natural learning and
there’s a lot of them out there
Montessori is one of the one of the core
ones dr. Maria Montessori said when
children come in contact with nature
they reveal their strengths and that’s
built into the entire Montessori system
Waldorf is well Rudolf Steiner who spent
a lot of time in nature studying
agriculture and natural systems he built
this whole educational system based on
this concept that our highest endeavor
must be to develop free thinking human
beings
who are able of themselves to impart
purpose and direction in their lives and
he did this through nature in Waldorf
schools the kids spent a lot of time in
nature out in the garden and there’s
wilderness schools for kids who are in
private or public schools this is a
great way to get them in contact with
nature in the summer so there’s a lot of
wilderness schools where kids will spend
spend several weeks to several months
out in the wilderness hiking and camping
and learning the entire way this is
great for older kids as well as you know
they have got a lot of hormones a lot of
energy you know need a lot of
stimulation just get him outside let him
interact with nature over the course of
a summer for the younger kids there’s
Forest kindergarten this is a really
interesting model for for early
education that was based started in
Germany and now is is around the world
where where the kids spend pretty much
every day rain or shine out in the woods
it’s kindergarten but it’s in the woods
and they’re sort of free-ranging they’ll
sit down in circles like this and learn
and it’ll go out and explore and there’s
even some public schools that are really
progressive like CS 55 in Bronx New York
some of you may recognize Steven Ritz
who’s a superhero teacher he’s teaching
his kids through nature with Gardens so
he has gardens inside and outside he’s
got aquariums inside as well and he as
kids are interacting they’re growing
their own food they’re interacting with
plants and with the soil and this is how
they’re getting in touch with nature in
a place where there typically isn’t a
lot of nature in the middle of New York
City so how can the teachers get
involved and the administrators – well
bring the kids outside take field trips
try and get outside once a week and it
doesn’t have to be a place like this you
know this would be a great field trip
but really there’s nature in between the
cracks in the sidewalk you know it’s a
little bit smaller you might need to
bring magnifying glasses but there’s so
much to learn here by observing the ants
and the weeds and the different plants
coming up through the cracks of the
sidewalk so really nature is everywhere
we just need to get outside and start
observing it and here’s an outdoor
lesson plan that I learned I think it
was through Boy Scouts or one of my
early camps and basically you have your
kids go out go outside have your kids
find a spot in the woods sort of
separate from each other sort of spread
out and sit down with a pencil and
notebook have them quietly observe their
surrounding environment in the ecology
around them and record what they see
ask them to contemplate how the
different things that they’re observing
are interacting with each other and how
everything is connected and then after a
period of time maybe it’s 15 minutes
maybe it’s 30 minutes come together and
discuss the findings what did people
observe every kid’s going to have
observed something different and this
will start conversations that you can
tie back into the curriculum
there’s always interesting conversations
that arise out of this practice it’s
also great for the teacher because it’s
some quiet time the teachers you can
start a school garden this is all the
rage these days lots of teachers and
schools are starting school gardens this
is great for places where there isn’t a
beautiful forest next door because a
garden is basically a source of nature
and have the kids growing their own food
interacting with different plants seeing
the aphids and how their populations
rise and fall seeing the ladybugs come
in and eat the aphids there’s so much to
learn here about natural systems or if
if it’s difficult to get outside or
there’s no space for an outdoor garden
teachers can bring nature inside so this
is a living ecosystem that I have in my
living room
it’s an aquaponic system essentially
where there’s an aquarium down below
there’s a garden up top in the aquarium
I’ve got several different types of fish
each one plays its own role its own
niche in the ecosystem there’s frogs in
there there’s two or three different
types of snails or shrimp and aquatic
plants and all of these animals this in
its ecosystem is providing nutrients
that get pumped up to the garden up top
which is filled with edible plants some
that I found outside some that I’ve
planted from seed some that I’ve done
done through cloning and there’s so much
that you can learn through one of these
living ecosystems and anyone can build
this one thing I’ve been working on is
getting these ecosystems into schools so
this is Steven Rich’s school where we
put an ecosystem in
and the kids love interacting with the
aquarium every morning before the bell
rings there’ll be kids sitting on the
ground observing the fish and the snails
and the shrimp seeing how everything
interacts there’s certain kids who love
taking chemistry tests and monitoring
and tracking how the pH and the nitrogen
levels vary over time and some kids
really just love tasting the produce and
trying to grow different things there’s
so much in this one natural or unnatural
living ecosystem to learn so this is an
example of of a natural system where
there are different components
interacting with each other and this is
really the simplest model where you have
the fish food going in the fish are
feeding the microbes the microbes are
feeding the plants plants are cleaning
water for the fish and they’re feeding
the people as well and all this isn’t is
enabled by light and water but it can
get even more complex than this and you
can add in the snails and the shrimp and
the algae and all of a sudden kids are
starting to understand this and see how
things are circular in this system and
they’re starting to think in systems and
a lot of these concepts here can can be
taken to other systems that they’re
learning about in school so how can the
students get involved in this I’ll
remember our quote from Einstein look
deeper into nature and you will
understand everything better the kids
can take this to heart
get outside observe and interact try and
identify patterns and parallels in the
natural world and see and try and find
metaphors to the other worlds that
you’re enacting with your other
interests
I remember the quote from the other
white haired mustachioed man Mark Twain
don’t let your schooling interfere with
your education if you feel like you’re
you’re not getting out of school which
you should be getting out of it find
other ways to learn you know to get out
and explore things that you’re
interested in get outside and I don’t
advocate skipping school but if you’re
going to do that if you have a class
that’s that’s not a you don’t find
productive go read a book in the woods
it’s very productive just don’t get in
trouble
so we can integrate nature based
learning into every student’s education
there are lots of different strategies
but by combining all these strategies we
can get every kid out in the nature or
at least bring nature to them and
through this we can develop the next
generation of systems thinkers because
there was a point in time when nature
was the classroom this is how every kid
learned every kid was out in nature with
a mentor with the teacher and they were
learning the entire time but recently
we’ve really lost that connection in our
schools so let’s bring nature back into
our education thank you [Applause]