Stumbling upon nature
Monday, 13 August 2012
What I'm loving most about time at our little farm is that nature is easy to connect with.
I struggle to find time to connect with nature when living in the city. It feels unnatural and forced. I have to set ourselves challenges like our Urban Adventure to squeeze a few moments with nature into our day.
Whereas when we are at our little farm, nature is everywhere. We stumble across it, literally....
On our way to the swings early on Sunday morning Little Eco and I nearly trod on this nest of eggs. Can you see it?
The eggs were unfortunately cold and the nest abandoned.
The spontaneous nature study that followed made my day. Little Eco and I spoke about why it would be sensible for the eggs of ground-nesting birds to be speckled and a greeny brown colour. We tried to guess what sort of bird would have laid the eggs and then Little Eco sat down and drew it.
Back home (our city one - it is confusing having two homes) we got onto the computer and searched for egg images for Australian ground-nesting birds and discovered that the eggs were most likely that of the Masked Lapwing (Plover).
We listened to its call , which we recognised as the birds that hang out around our neighbours dam. You might have even heard them around your local sports field? They like hanging out in urban parks.
We also discovered how to 'be a buddy to the Masked Lapwing', which was useful because I was a little worried that perhaps we (or our dog) caused the nest to be abandoned.
All up our learning spanned a couple of hours. I love this kind of spontaneous learning. Jumping on an interest and running with it.
I'm certain I've missed learning opportunities like this in the past because I was too busy and not living in the moment.
I'm going to notice and embrace these learning opportunities from now on. How about you? Do you grab spontaneous learning opportunities or let them pass in amongst a blur of commitments and chores?