Article Link: http://exchangepress.com/article/catch-a-falling-leaf-meeting-our-other-mother--mother-nature/5018366/
�" Situation �"The Pre-K teacher explained that today they were going to do a ‘visualization.’ They would close their eyes and imagine pictures in their minds. The children settled onto their mats as soft background music began to play.
“Imagine you are lying on a warm beach,” their teacher said. “You can feel the soft, sun-warmed sand beneath your hands. Beside you is a large, blue lake. Its water makes a bubbly sound on the rocks and shore grasses rub together with a whispery noise. Then a pair of ducks fly overhead, quacking loudly.”
That evening one of the children asked, “Mommy, how big is a beach?”
And another asked, “What is a lake, Daddy?”
A third child wondered how ducks could fly, since the ones at the zoo only floated in their pond.
�" Solution �"
The confusion of these children may seem extreme, like some futuristic science fiction tale �" but how many children experience nature in their daily lives? For many children and adults, daily contact with the natural world is rare. Seventy-year-old Margaret said, “I never had a plastic toy,” and yet few parents today are likely to have childhood memories of climbing trees, catching frogs, or stirring up tasty mud ...