Look Close!

This week in our outdoor learning, we practiced looking closely on a small scale. Careful observation is a skill that can be taught and one that people can get better at through consistent practice. Kids broke into partners for several observational practices. In the first, one partner found a small square to frame with their hands which their partner was asked to zoom in on. The partner was tasked to look closely at just what they could see through the "view finder" and describe it with as much detail as they could. Then the partners switched roles. The first time we tried this exercise, many kids were looking on a more superficial level. On our next practice, we demonstrated how to look closely at something and encouraged them to keep looking instead of naming one thing they saw and moving on. This second round yielded much more expansive observations, which further ignited some curiosity about what they were seeing.

Later on in the week, we chose a spot to look closely at together, for example, the shrub line by Sargent Field. We stood far back from it and described what we could see. Then we moved closer in and stopped to talk about what we could now notice from our closer vantage point. Next, we stood right at the shrubs and looked intently at what we could observe from this close-up view. Finally, we took out magnifying lenses and used them to reveal other details that we could not see before. The kids noticed that as we moved closer, they were better able to observe the details of what they were looking at. This sparked conversations about wondering - what does what you see make you wonder? Some kids wondered why the shrub greenery was dark on one side and light on the other. Others wondered how the Asian Bittersweet had found its way between the shrubs. Still more kids wanted to know if rabbits lived in these shrubs since we had spotted some rabbit scat close by.

We released the kids into a more independent study of this when we walked to Morse's Pond.  Kids had time to explore an area of their choice with a partner.  Check out the pictures below!