I was pleasantly surprised at a park visitor centre this fall when I encountered an exhibit heading about repairing your broken Earth relationship, as it posed some very interesting questions worthy of in-depth exploration.
Image courtesy Bill Reynolds
Having a harmonious relationship with the earth could be the answer to many of our existing environmental problems. Assisting visitors to adopt such a lifestyle is extremely important. Without realizing it, people have broken and continue to break their connections with mother earth and these broken connections are causing big problems. The human race needs retraining to improve their earth relationship and begin crafting their lifestyles to lessen their impact.
I was elated to see that a park visitor centre felt it was their job to help humans to do this.
Modeling positive behaviours along a wide spectrum of categories is key, whether that be an individual or a centre. Fundamentally we need more caring role models that treat our fellow living passengers gently and respectfully. Small steps - as in taking spiders outside to watch them or release them rather than stepping on them as a first reaction. Then we can build toward understandings of how life works on the planet.
People need to be reminded that the earth has its own interconnected life support systems to recycle its air, water and soil. Because of this every living thing is connected to everything else (including us) – a fact that reinforces the interdependency between living things- this understanding of critical connections all living things have to each other has been forgotten, due primarily to our living in cities. Out of sight, out of mind. I was intrigued to discover how this park was going to undertake this urgent task.
Can a small text-bound exhibit accomplish this by asking visitors to read a list of action steps for five different components: plants, animals. rocks, sky and water? I think not. There is an assumption that the human visitors need to heal and repair a broken relationship, where they may not feel that to begin with. There was no criteria to help you assess this- what defines an harmonious relationship in the first place?
Image courtesy Bill Reynolds
By reading the do’s and don’ts under each category you get a sense of what the lofty exhibit interpretive goals must have been- the sheer number of changes is totally unrealistic especially with this small exhibit format and no learning situations having been designed. This definitely would lend itself to focusing on one topic at a time with a changing topic format over time if dedicated floor square footage was limited.
Could the goal have been for visitors to commit to do this grab bag list of actions when they leave the exhibit? What were they thinking? “OK. We will break up the 20 tasks into 5 lists of 4 by hiding them behind little doors (see the handles in the images) that the visitor will have to open -this will be the hook to keep the mystery alive and keep them reading and that will get them (magically?) to commit some of these to memory…” Are you kidding me? Please get in touch with us to get our initial feedback on interpretive design ideas to ensure they will match to goal achievement.
Opening the little doors lost interest after the first one when you discovered it was a bunch of black words on white background. Immediate action works best – if the expectation is that the action takes place back home you need follow-up reinforcement. I saw no printed takeaways or pledges with the promise from the site would remind you one month from that visit day.
WHAT WAS THE MOTIVATION? Where was the fun- the challenge?
The choice of positive behaviours as illustrated in the two images, seemed a bit random-what do you think? Some of these points are valid mainly from a park management perspective, some are important takeaways, some are outright strange.
Why rocks were chosen as a heading for one, instead of soil -the placenta of life? Initial learnings on the subject of fertility (a critical missing piece) introducing soil’s role as the basis of food energy and a model of recycling would connect to behaviours about how we treat soil. Additionally, the need for each of the topical behavioural changes to be made, would have more impact if they were encouraging visitors to go to places to see things first hand. In this case, visiting a permaculture farm would reinforce initial learnings.
Do not graffiti rocks and don’t stack rocks in piles as two actions they want visitors to not do has little in my mind to do with having a respectful relationship with a rock. Since time immemorial indigenous human beings have left markings on rocks and piled them for various reasons such as directional aids and to gain good luck in the upcoming hunt. The action of leaving rocks where you find them is respectful not on behalf of the rock but because of the micro flora and fauna that depend on that rock as a home.
Image courtesy Bill Reynolds
In all cases whenever there is an action to be embraced you would need to explain the rationale behind why the action is being recommended otherwise it falls flat as a useless platitude. “Because the ranger said so,“ is not going to wash these days. Of course, simply providing the rationale in words is not usually enough unless you also have some real - life first hand interaction where you see the problem in front of you. However, providing rationale and explanations without an emotional foundation is often not convincing.
Why was sky chosen and not air? Why is light pollution the priority - it certainly is not as important as implementing actions that would keep our air clean.
Read the list they compiled for animals. Are these getting at actions that would heal our relationship with animals? What do you think? At the very least, should we not be thinking of actions that would increase our abilities to observe and treat animals (mega and micro) as fellow passengers who have families and live in communities?
When I read the list for plants, I wondered why there was nothing regarding our dependence on them for oxygen and their taking carbon out of the atmosphere in light of our continuing release of carbon at alarming rates. The native-invasive issue is a good one but certainly subsidiary to the former understanding and reason for an ongoing thankful relationship with green plants (Full disclosure: I used to have a bumper sticker that said “Have you thanked a green plant today?”)
However, none of these actions will build a sense of relationship! They are more a result of having one. We urgently need more dedicated springboard facilities in neighbourhood areas to take this building of an harmonious relationship task on, just as we support recreational facilities and libraries for healthy bodies and minds.
Has anyone seen a good springboard format for having people develop a deeper more personal relationship, learn to live more lightly on the earth and deal with any environmental behaviour change? Let us know.
Book Cover
The development of Earthkeepers Training Centres by the Institute for Earth Education had the building of an harmonious earth relationship as their objective. One of the aspects of the resident program included conducting earthwalks. The Institute produced a book called EarthWalks -an alternative nature experience that has a compilation of activities designed and refined to re-establish a human relationship with the earth by addressing the feelings of joy, kinship, reverence and love. Now we are talking. If you do not spend time outside and you do not reduce your anxiety, increase your comfort and be filled with wonder in fresh air, clean water, while revelling in interrelationships, patterns, smells, and colours- you will never rebuild your sense of belonging and respect for your earth home.
The book Earth Education: A new beginning by Steve Van Matre covers how to create exciting learning situations where heightened feelings for the natural world combined with increased ecological understandings would form the foundation for positive environmental habits. The emphasis is on cumulative learning experiences with specific outcomes in mind.
If you believe experiences like these are critical for our expanding disconnected population then I heartily recommend you absorb these books available on Amazon and at www.ieetree.org