Learning Local

By Emily Steward

Getting teens off social media, off the couch, and outside is a difficult task for anyone who has spent any significant amount of time with teenagers. As a high school science teacher, I too have struggled to find ways for my students to connect with and really understand the world around them from behind a computer screen or the confines of an enclosed classroom. But when the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) were introduced in the U.S. several years back, it felt like the first opportunity to change the way science was taught at my school and in my classroom.

The NGSS’s emphasis on investigation, inquiry, and designing solutions made it seem as though creating autonomy and student confidence were finally top priorities in science education. With teachers yearning for innovation and a fresh start, this was my chance to move away from the lessons teachers at my school had used for 10+ years and try something new.

My desire was to find a way to teach my students about our local habitat that both met the NGSS standards and engaged students to develop a relationship with nature. While “innovation” in the classroom usually involves technology, I was looking for a different type of innovation, grounded in teaching my students how to be responsible members of our society and making sustainable choices for our planet by getting outdoors. The approach I had been looking for is called place-based education (PBE) and involves using local examples to teach real-world scenarios[1]. In creating a “place-based” outdoor curriculum, I found that using examples from our own backyard meant positive engagement. Why?