In February 2019, on a walk through UBC Vancouver Campus, TELL 3C teacher candidates and their instructors (Margot Filipenko & Maureen Kendrick) explored and were inspired by gardens that were, that are and that might be.
We began with Wendy Traas, Education Librarian, at the Neville Scarfe Seed Library, moved to the Scarfe Children’s Garden with Joanne Naslund and then proceeded across campus to the UBC Orchard Garden. Our morning of place-based outdoor learning with Dr. Susan Gerofsky helped us understand some of the research and the possibilities related to the garden as co-teacher. At the same time, it inspired the creation of an online map where participants shared the ‘eco-poetry’ they created while outdoors. 
Try adding your own poems to our map by selecting the + button, selecting a location, adding your text, audio, image, video (TIP: it’s a bit easier to do on a browser rather than a mobile device).
In February 2020, we reprised portions of this collaboration for an audience at Westcast 2020 and also for the ‘new crop’ of TELL 3C teacher candidates. This time, our theme was “Flow, change and Movement”… Teacher Candidates were reminded to respond to what they see, hear and smell all around us: to engage through our senses and consider communicating in their home language as they respond to their environment!
The choice of technology and its implementation was deliberate. We wanted to set up a space to which teacher candidates could easily add AFTER their time in place and that would allow us to share our poems more widely (even with family near and far!). We also wanted teacher candidates to experience place and avoid over-mediating it through their digital devices yet we wanted to provide opportunities for collecting artifacts of their journey. Many jotted notes and sketched in paper notebooks while others took photographs or recorded audio. During the walk, TCs were invited to share aloud. Following the walk to, through and past gardens, teacher candidates returned to class and were invited to share their poems and any artifacts on our digital map. You might, in your own classroom, have an analogue sharing space (in addition to or instead of a digital space) – a bulletin board where learners can share their finished, more published works or a whiteboard where they can post sticky notes of work they’d like to share. Learners might add poems to an anthology that sits in the class library or perhaps one that goes home as a gift. I would suggest allowing teacher candidates to elect and select to share… When it comes to evaluation, you might consider having learners reflect on the experience and their poems based on some holistic criteria that the class would co-develop prior to the experience of walking and writing.
*For this activity in 2020, we used Padlet – a cloud based application that now includes a maps feature. Participants can add a marker to the map and share text, images and even audio. Teacher candidates do not need to login or sign up in order to view or add to the map. In the past, we used Google my maps (below) which requires a google login. Given these spaces are not FIPPA compliant, it is important to consider how/if and when you might seek permissions to have teacher candidates engage in such spaces. This can be an excellent opportunity to teach teacher candidates about critical digital literacies including data privacy. Do your teacher candidates know how to turn off location services on a mobile device? Do they know why they may wish to do so? Are they aware of what kinds of information they should/should not share online? Engaging your teacher candidates in learning about, with and through digital technologies can help build their competencies!
How to Get Started
Additional Resources:
School Garden resources: The BC Agriculture in the classroom foundation has many teaching resources open to all as well as programs and grants for BC teachers. See Spuds in Tubs and learn to grow a tub o’ spuds in your classroom!
Megan Zeni is a local teacher who shares posts and resources about school gardens and outdoor play on her blog
The article, Interactive Map Tools for Creating deeper place-based learning, from the University of Vermont shares a few approaches to mapping and digitally enabled place-based learning you might find interesting.
Here are some other ways you or your teacher candidates might share work done in the garden or elsewhere outdoors.
Slides from WestCast Vision 2020 (Feb 2020)
Slides from Investigating Our Practices May 4, 2019 at UBC FoE:
References
Hills, David & Thomas, Glyn. (2019). Digital technology and outdoor experiential learning. Journal of Adventure Education and Outdoor Learning. 1-15. 10.1080/14729679.2019.1604244.
https://www.educationworld.com/a_curr/outdoor-learning-integrating-tech.shtml
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