written by Nadine Wetzel, St. Croix Guide
As our mission is preparing students for their unique roles as responsible and engaged citizens of the world, we must get them out into the world. For Lower Elementary students, this is a two-night, three-day Key Experience at Eagle Bluff Environmental Learning Center. Upper Elementary students have ventured to a few different places in Minnesota over the years. This year all six UE classes got to experience the glory of Camp Widjiwagan (Widji) outside of Ely for a full five days. Lower Elementary students work toward being ready for their Key Experience at the end of their third year; it is truly a celebration of what they have accomplished over the course of three years. Other levels use their Key Experiences as a launching pad for their year together; the spark that ignites deeper learning.
Students get an immersive experience in nature, take classes with experienced naturalists, support each other during times of homesickness and realize they are capable of managing themselves in new environments. They would also say everyone makes a lot of new friends, tries new foods, laughs a lot and makes new friends. (Listed twice on purpose!) Students connect to peers in cabin groups, on the trail, loading and unloading luggage, on bus rides, and cleaning up after meals. These experiences are very different from the comfort of their smaller, more familiar classroom communities. As such, deeper, more lasting connections are forged.
There are also students who don’t thrive in classrooms doing enormous multiplication problems or researching their favorite amphibian yet who shine brightly catching frogs in a pond or grinding corn for cornbread. A favorite memory is one such student who laid on the ground, arms and legs spread wide with a huge smile on his face after an afternoon outside and proclaimed for all to hear, “this is JUST what I needed!” Students’ bodies and minds are fully engaged, senses full to the brim. There seems to be no need for a fidget or wobble chair when one’s hands are in the soil and feet on the forest floor.
We are charged with “sewing the seeds” of the Universe in the minds of children. Key Experiences afford us numerous opportunities to do just this. Dr. Montessori understood the need for children to learn in nature.
“There is no description, no image in any book that is capable of replacing the sight of real trees and all the life to be found around them in a real forest. Something emanates from those trees which speaks to the soul, something no book, no museum is capable of giving. The wood reveals that it is not only the trees that exist but a whole interrelated collection of lives. And this earth, this climate, this cosmic power are necessary for the development of these lives. ”