Schedules/Calendars

Meetings.

Rather than rely on large, in-person sessions, all grant-related meetings will be held online in the form of relatively brief (30 – 45 minutes) Zoom sessions. Two of these meetings are planned already; the kick-off introductory Zoom meeting is on Wednesday, April 14 from 7:00 - 7:45 p.m., and the closing Zoom session will be held in August or early September.

The project will maintain a large collection of resource materials, lesson plans and ideas, instructional videos, and progress reports on the project website, https://cnrcnaturejournaling.blogspot.com/, and will be advising participants via e-mail of all project-related news and developments.

Crow’s Nest Research Center (CNRC) Workshops.

There will be two workshops onsite at the Crow’s Nest Research Center (CNRC) located at 400 Marlborough Point Road, Stafford, VA 22554. The first workshop on Saturday, May 8 from 9:00 a.m. – 1:30 p.m. will include an introduction to Meaningful Watershed Educational Experiences led by educators from the Friends of the Rappahannock, and an introduction, with hands-on practice, to Nature Journaling. This workshop includes your lunch. Grant materials will be distributed at this workshop.

The second onsite workshop, devoted to Nature Journaling practice and discussion, will be offered on three different dates in June (you’ll choose one date) and each session will last approximately two hours.

Materials/Stipends.

The materials provided to each participant are listed and described on the project website, here. There are three types of materials: a field kit for Nature Journaling, relevant books, and technology that can be used in the classroom to help students learn the journaling strategies and techniques we’ll discuss and practice during the onsite workshops. One important note concerning the technology – since some participants teach at the same school, they might wish to configure their materials in a way that would be more meaningful to that school. For example, if the school doesn’t need so many document cameras, some of the educators might wish to swap out a doc cam for a microscope so they might receive two stereo microscopes rather than one scope and one doc cam. Or, trade in one or more stereo microscopes for that number of digital microscopes.

Participants might also consider switching out an item of technology for something like the Sparkfun weather station, seen here. This weather station could be used to introduce some aspects of coding and data analysis into an environmental project.

We will give training in setting up and using any of the technology provided to participants. In addition to the materials, a $100 stipend will be provided each participant at the conclusion of the project.

What You Will Need to Do.

First, please confirm your participation promptly by reply email to George Meadows who is project leader for this grant program: gmeadows@umw.edu

Second, we need your cooperation in sharing your feedback along every step of the grant program, please. The goal of the grant is to determine how Nature Journaling might best be used in environmental education. Answering that question will be based largely on your input in terms of how you think this technique will work for your students.

We seek your input in the following ways:

 Ideas, thoughts, questions, suggestions based on the first field experience with the Nature Journaling process

 A copy of your journaling work during that initial workshop (May 8)

 Feedback regarding your practice of the process in a different outdoor setting (your yard, the school playground, parks, while hiking)

 A copy of your journaling, and feedback, during the second field experience (June dates to be announced)

 Feedback regarding your students’ work with Nature Journaling and examples of their work

We will depend upon online questionnaires and your e-mails to obtain written feedback.