Background and Cross Curricular Approach
My school (within the Pittsburgh Public School System) is an urban school but with some key aspects of privilege and advantage. Although we are part of the larger Pittsburgh Public system, due to our magnet school status, we have a much higher access to visual art, writing, dance, theatre, and music, along with other amenities that many of the other schools in the district might not have as much access to.
Along with the access to the arts, we have, as part of our school campus, access to a well-maintained urban garden and are located within short walking distance of one of the largest public parks in the city. Our garden is home to numerous edible plants and also a variety of different flowers and other plants. There are intentional places that we will be able to use to sit and observe nature as the weather permits.
Even with our privileges and advantages as a school, we still have many of the same issues and challenges as other schools in the district. We still have difficulties with student concentration, academic focus, and other issues that can plague students of all ages. With the constant distance and use of screens, these issues, unfortunately, have seemed to become compounded during and since the pandemic. To be completely forthright, many of the behavioral issues that arise in my class tend to stem from these issues.
To combat these challenges and issues, I am proposing using the arts and their relation to our natural world (specifically the disciplines of writing and drawing) to promote student growth in the areas of focus, deeper levels of introspection, higher levels of concentration, and a more refined approach to observational skills. As an educator who has journaled in some form for most of my life, I have experienced the positive outcome of a routine-based approach to this activity.
By using regular nature journaling and imposing a flexible but consistent routine, this will give me the opportunity to put together an intentional and regular unit for my students to experience both writing and drawing, intertwined, in a cohesive practice using routine observation of the natural world around us.
I like to think that our nature time will be used as a refuge and escape from the often necessary but also distracting walls filled with data charts, number lines, and other classroom and building visuals. Even with the passing of cars and pedestrians, students can hopefully find solace in the act of escaping the confines of the concrete and brick building, even if it’s only for a few minutes a couple times a week.5
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