Styles
Nature Journaling
Finding Your Own Way
By Jane
Claire Lambert
Earlier this year, while
attending a homeschool conference, I
had a conversation with
a mother about nature
studies and nature journaling. She had
decided that her students would do nature
journals and had started off with a
vengeance to see that goal accomplished.
She admitted that she had taken her
children to the zoo with their journal books
in hand and when they weren’t completely
enthusiastic, she had told them they were
not going home till they had sketched and
written in their journals. She was looking
at me expectantly, and I replied, “Well, that
would certainly be one way to do it.”
“Not the best?” Then she smiled. I
cautiously began to outline what I thought
might be a better way to elicit genuine
excitement from her students.
When it comes to nature journaling,
have any of you ever faced this? It seems to
me that when you teach nature subjects in
school and even when you engage in
particular field trips for outdoor discovery,
it is a good idea to give assignments with
specific parameters, such as “write a paragraph about . . . ,” “write five fascinating
facts about . . . ,” “draw a diagram or sketch
of the subject . . . ,” “research the classification name of a specimen, . . .” etc. These
assignments, when completed, can be kept
in a science notebook and would be
considered part of routine schoolwork.
However, there may be a more creative
and beneficial way to approach the somewhat different subject of nature journaling.
If you read the article titled “The Love
and Lure of Nature Walking” in the
Summer 2008 issue of The Old
Schoolhouse Magazine, then you were
introduced to many of the important
reasons to lead your children out into
nature—to observe and learn to appreciate
the world the Lord created. You can help
your children begin to make discoveries
that can help them better understand the
world in which they live. Once you’ve been
on several walks, you and your students
may find yourselves wishing for special
