I took this environmental educational resources class as a part of my outdoor education minor requirements. This class mainly focused on the educational aspects of the minor more than the other classes I took by creating lesson plans and learning how to teach about various things we’ve learned. Many of the assignments we were given had us going to our phrenology site, which is where we wrote down the changes of our surroundings over the course of the semester (anything from ground cover, to water level, to animal activity). The phrenology project was the big assignment for this class, following a trend that professor Dolenece likes with having an overarching project for the semester that all the other assignments help with and give more context to. This learning format has worked very well for me and I’ve found it to be great for remembering more because of the inter-connectivity between assignment and project. This class I did at home (for the semester) and professor Dolenece’s directions were very accommodating to people not on campus, or even near nature. Luckily I live near the Dismal Swamp so I was able to have a very interesting place for my phrenology project but it could have been anywhere (like a park, a few trees nearby, or at a river/lake nearby). The class’s material was very engaging and, as with all of my classes with professor Dolenece, very applicable to life any time you are near nature. Whether you are at a park, a lake, a hike, or stranded in the woods, you’ll be able to use the information learned in the class and any other outdoor education class.
This paper was written in response to a research paper we read on how playing in the outdoors, specifically in more wilderness areas, can affect how we interact with the outdoors later in life.
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