Cherish Nature
A few years ago when I returned home to Utah after some time away while living in Manhattan I worked as a substitute teacher. Before I could start my job I had to go through a District mandated week of training. Besides being very informative and definitely beneficial to my future role in the schools it was also fun! The instructor leading the course was a veteran teacher who had given up a successful financial business to embrace her passion: helping form young minds.
Recently I read a story in Idaho’s Standard Journal about a retiring principal who had procured a $1,000 grant so that she could take a group of 4th Graders on a field trip to nearby Yellowstone National Park. On the trip the students got to experience a newborn elk calf, more buffalo than you can count, a bald eagle on its nest, geese and their goslings and an eruption of the most famous geyser in the world.
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Truly this trip had to be the highlight of many of these young people’s life. For many of the 43 students it was a first, and as the park spokesman said, hopefully not their last. The National Park Service encourages young people from around the world to visit parks across the country with the hope that these experiences will “grow the next stewards of these wild lands so they will understand and care and love them;” to love them as much as the principles, teachers and parents of these youngsters love them.Â
National Parks are some of the only places that provide a synthesis of growth in many areas including physical, mental and spiritual. It is incumbent on the adults of this generation to share with and teach the next generation to respect, value and care for our natural world. It is a great gift to give.