Sunday, October 29, 2006 By Rachel M. Collins
news@seacoastonline.com
Elizabeth Bardwell studied the compass and the topographical map of Mount Agamenticus in York, Maine.
She and her two children, 7-year-old Zoe and 6-year-old Jack, had signed on for the Families Together Orienteering Day sponsored through the partnership of the York School Department and the Kittery Trading Post Outdoor Academy.
Bardwell, a York resident, was one of 100 who turned out a few weekends ago to learn how to orienteer -- or use a compass and map to navigate a trail -- one activity being led by KODA during this school year in Maine and New Hampshire.
"Here I am 38 years old and I don't know the first thing about going out in the woods," Bardwell said. "I don't want that for my kids. If you live in Maine, you need to know how to swim, how to use a boat and how to get around in the woods."
That may be true, but Charles Ek, KODA's executive director, said he has found in traveling around Maine and New Hampshire that most kids do not have a familiarity with the outdoors.
"Typically, in a group of 20, there are maybe one or two who have ever done the activity before," Ek said. "And typically the kids who have done it did it through scouting or in camp somewhere."
In fact, that was the "impetus" for KODA -- a partnership begun a year ago between the Kittery Trading Post and school districts in southwestern Maine and southeastern New Hampshire to provide environmental education, environmental service learning and outdoor recreation programs to K-12 students, Ek said.
"There was a common understanding that kids are not being exposed to the outdoors and we saw an opportunity to do that," he said.
Three of the member districts include the York School Department, the Kittery School Department and Maine School Administrative District 35, which includes Eliot and South Berwick.
"There are kids who can live in the middle of a destination like York and they will never have gone tide pooling," said Christina Caprio, York's service learning coordinator, who works with York High School's Alternative Education program. "It's off their radar screen."
The goal of KODA-sponsored programs then is to provide students with an educational opportunity that takes place in the outdoors, offering physical activity and often a chance for service learning -- or giving back to the community.
For instance, last year the York Land Trust needed a trail mapped on the McFeely Preserve. Students in one of Kevin Wyatt's algebra classes at York High School set out under Ek's direction with global-positioning system receivers, digital cameras and flagging tape. They downloaded trail route data from the receivers into a geographic information map to create the final map and trail brochure, complete with text and photos.
The brochure to be made available to the public will have involved collaboration among the high school, the Land Trust, the York Planning Department, the White Pine Programs -- a nonprofit educational organization of Cape Neddick, Maine -- and KODA.
"We want to get kids into the community so they become an active citizen engaged in the community and giving back on their own," Caprio said. "We're developing avenues so that they can contribute and feel like they are making a difference in their own town." Jenifer Van Deusen, curriculum coordinator for the Kittery School Department, said taking students out of the classroom also jump-starts learning.
"We find that kids who don't shine in a regular classroom are extremely good at grasping these hands-on concepts," she said.
For instance, she said with the help of a $2,500 grant, Kittery offered students in their summer program a week of orienteering and outdoor education skills in which they studied the estuary, Spruce Creek, and the beach's environment.
Last February, more than 100 sixth-grade students at Marshwood Junior High School in Eliot learned about winter camping, snowshoeing, cross-country skiing and orienteering during their Winter Survival Day.
In May, 40 York High School art students spent a day at Long Sands Beach creating sculptures from natural materials -- like rocks and seaweed, Ek said. Then they recorded the precise location of each piece with a GPS receiver into a GIS map marked with red stars. "Hot links" on the map allow viewers to click on each sculpture's location to see the images stored on the high school's computer network.
"It's a virtual outdoor art museum that only exists in a digital format because all of the sculptures were created below the high-tide mark and were washed away," Ek said.
In addition, many of KODA's sponsored activities have an added bonus. Orienteering sessions may teach students how to use maps and compasses, but they also require students to walk or hike a couple of miles or more in 45 minutes to an hour-and-a-half, Ek said.
"It's all about blending their (KODA's) expertise with what we want the kids to learn," Van Deusen said. "We're giving them authentic experiences from which to learn from."
Maryann Minard, York's curriculum coordinator, who also serves as vice president of KODA's board of directors, agreed.
"This really helps us to focus on the very important pieces of physical activity, service learning and enjoying the world outdoors," she said. "Teachers can approach environmental learning in a way that helps the community."
In fact, Caprio noted on Oct. 24 that York hosted a service learning workshop for teachers in its district to help them start looking at the potential of linking service learning to their curriculum.
In addition to programs at the schools, Minard said the monthly Families Together activities set for the upcoming year will include fishing, hiking, snowshoeing and geo-caching. Geo-caching is an outdoor treasure-hunting game in which GPS or navigational techniques are used to hide and seek containers called "caches." Ek said he also is working on developing a wetlands-oriented curriculum for Marshwood Junior High School and expanding KODA's outdoor courses to include paddling on inland venues with canoes or kayaks. Another goal -- to create courses focusing on the range in climate zones from Mount Washington to the ocean, he said.
In addition to the structured activities, Ek noted that it is equally important for students to just simply appreciate being in the great outdoors.
"We let them just enjoy themselves outside," he said. "Just to be out and feel it, hear it and touch it means a great deal to these kids who might not have that opportunity."
Bardwell agreed. "It's great free fun," she said. "It's kind of a shame to live in Maine and not take advantage of these opportunities."
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