Preparation:
Growing Up WILD: Exploring Nature with Young Children (GUW) is an early childhood curriculum developed by the Council for Environmental Education. GUW builds on children’s sense of wonder about nature and invites them to explore wildlife and the world that surrounds them. Through a wide range of activities and experiences, Growing Up WILD provides an early foundation for young children ages three to seven to develop positive impressions about the natural world.
In implementing STEM education, providing a robust professional development opportunity that is sustained is often most effective. (Sanders, 2009). In an evaluation of GUW performed by Joe E. Heimlich, Ph.D. and Renae Youngs, MA, participants completing professional development course viewed the program very favorably. Respondents liked the hands-on nature of the workshops and “doing the activities to help understand them better” before leading them with their students. Also, a number of individuals connected the fun they had in the workshops with their excitement to share what they learned with others.
GUW delivery method supports Sanders assertion for adoption of STEM curriculum as it allows for social interaction between the participants as they learn the activities of the guide in a constructive and experiential process. Since 2011, the Growing Up Wild has been offered by the West Virginia Department of Natural Resources to educators through a half day training program. This study identifies how teachers have reacted to Growing Up Wild Curriculum and how they perceive it impacting on the children that they have taught.
Goal and Objective:
The research was to evaluate the adoption of curriculum by educators both formal and non-formal; including which ...
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...f. WVDNR personnel provided email addresses of past workshop attendees. Following the stated research protocols, I emailed past participants requesting their involvement to complete an on-line survey. I gathered and reviewed the data to develop a report that was presented and decimated to the West Virginia Department of Natural Resources.
As I am approved WVDNR trainer for several of the Growing Up Wild half day workshops and provided five workshops during 2011 and 2012, I had an interest in further evaluating the program. I was quite satisfied to learn the positive results of these trainings. I estimate my time in this research to be eighty hours over the course of this calendar year.
Collaborators and Funding Sources:
This research project was a collaboration between WVU Extension Service in Kanawha County and the West Virginia Department of Natural Resources.
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Burns, Sam. “The Ute relationships to the lands of West Central Colorado: An ethnographic overview prepared for the U.S. Forest Service”. Rev. 2004. Web. 2 November 2011.
Thesis: The population of white-tail deer in Alabama has drastically increased over the past century causing significant damage to property and homeowners, caused by hunters being less active.
White-Tailed deer are a crowd favorite for hunting in Missouri. It is important they keep the forests that the deer live in healthy so that the deer can thrive in them. There are different ways to improve the environment for deer. One of those ways is through thinning of the forest habitat. These means reducing the number of trees in the forest so that sun light can reach the bottom of the forest. This will stimulate diverse plants to grow. Diversity in plants will attract more deer to live there. Besides forest thinning there is also prescribed burning. This is a low-intensity fire that only does a little bit of damage to larger trees. This fire must be maintained and is laid out by natural resource professionals. Many forest landowners today
Coyotes and bears are a common sight in the woods. These animals, along with others, are predators that help to control deer population but also decrease the amount of land allowed to the deer. In Western NC, deer rates have fallen and bag limits have been reduced. In Pennsylvania, biologists have conducted a lengthy study to determine fawn mortality and predation. Predators killed 46% of fawns, (Hart). A study about coyotes in Ohio found that even though they kill numerous fawns, the population of deer continues to grow, (Hart). It would be critical to maintain...
Rain Forest Action Network. (2004). Wake Up Weyerhaeuser. RAN. Retrieved March 30, 2004, from http://www.ran.org/ran_campaigns/old_growth/
My field experience for EDUC 2130 was done at Rabun County Elementary STEM camp. The camp and its instructors had the goal of increasing the student’s awareness, knowledge, and interest in STEM. The student age groups I worked with went from kindergarten to 5th grade which gave me a wide range of behavioral, moral, and developmental stages to observe. The teachers running the program used many of the techniques we have discussed such as whole class discussions, small groups, and observational learning.
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Zhang, Xiaodong, Joseph McInerney, and Joy Frechtling. "Engaging STEM Faculty In K-20 Reforms--Implications For Policies And Practices." Science Educator 19.1 (2010): 1-13. ERIC. Web. 17 Nov. 2013. Colbeck C. (1994, November).
According to Sapona and Winterman (2002) teachers implementing this model in their classroom include six comp...
Savage Girls and Wild Boys by Michael Newton studies children that grew up in the wilderness with animals or who were cut-off from the civilized world as we know it. Multiple ‘wild child’s’ were examined from the early 1700’s to the late 1900’s (Ivan Mishukov). The children Newton went into depth with were Peter the Wild Boy (1725), Memmie Le Blanc (1731), Victor of Aveyron (1797), Kaspar Hauser (early 1800s), and Genie (1970).
Working at the Center for Wildlife had a huge impact on my personal growth in many ways. The center was my first experience other than in classes working in my field, so I will always hold a special place for the center, especially with the ...
Educational institutions today are increasing their emphasis on high standards as a crucial factor in improving the quality of education imparted to their students. They are, therefore, looking at new and better ways to develop such a curriculum that meets all the pre-decided standards. This calls for a change in the way schools are run and the methods of teaching in order to design, implement and evaluate curriculum effectively.
Curriculum is important being it’s the underlying factor that plays a role in determining ones growth, achievement and success. The majority of curriculum con...