Upcoming Sessions
Introductory Earth Education Workshop
Earth Education is the process of helping people live more harmoniously and joyously with the natural world.
Our programs motivate learners in understanding basic ecological processes, developing positive feelings about
the natural world, and using their new understandings and feelings to begin making changes in their own environmental habits.
If you recognize that we need a more structured educational response to our environmental problems,
believe in providing direct contact with the natural world through adventuresome learning experiences,
and want to assist people in developing a deeper personal relationship with their home planet, then this
workshop was designed with you in mind.
In an introductory earth education workshop you will receive:
+ an overview of the history and methodology of earth education
+ an explanation of how environmental education went “astray”
+ exposure to dynamic techniques which captivate learners
+ an introduction to concept-building and -structuring
+ a step-by-step description of a model earth education program
+ participation in both the understanding and feeling components
of earth education
For over 40 years this workshop has received outstanding reviews from participants in countries around the world.
If you have not experienced this introduction to the earth education alternative to agency- and industry-sponsored
supplemental environmental education, then you owe it to yourself to do so.
Even more important, the earth needs you to do so on behalf of all its passengers.
Date: March 16-17, 2012
Where: Mengla, Yunnan (China)
Location: Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanic Garden
Contact Person: Hu Huizhe (huhuizhe@fonchina.org)
Leader: Mike Mayer
Date: May 7, 2012
Where: Koli (Finland)
Location: Mattilan tila
Contact Person: Kaija Jolkkonen (et@elontila.fi)
Leader: Ilkka Aula
Interpretive Design Workshop
Interpretation is the craft of enriching the experience of leisure visitors in places established for the public good.
Such places are the jewels of our societies, set aside because they represent the natural and cultural treasures
we want to celebrate today and share with others tomorrow. As a result, they are mission-driven places which also need
to justify and garner support for what they are protecting. An interpreter translates the natural and cultural language
of such places for its visitors, while immersing them in the essence of its purpose.
Interpretive designers create the leisure journeys that interpreters implement. Just as we have designers today for the
buildings, signs, grounds, exhibits, and other components of our mission-driven public places, we need “interpretive designers”
who focus on the most important component, the actual experience of the visitors who come. This is a new profession which
works with the whole experience that other designers only facilitate in part. Interpretive designers create the interrelated
experiential vehicles of interpretive service.
Interpretive Design is for all those who assist visitors in getting to know their public jewels – leisure sites from
Aquaria to Zoos – and who aim to enrich those visitors’ experiences in meaningful and memorable ways. From this workshop,
you will take home:
+ Why interpretation is neither art, science, nor communication
+ Three essential elements of the Language of Place
+ Practical exercises for extracting essence (the alchemy of interpretive design)
+ Tools for mapping the forces, features, and facets that make up any place
+ 15 Developmental Steps for structuring the dance of experience
+ Key Password Questions interpretive designers use daily
+ How to develop an Interpretive Matrix for the outcomes of any site
Date: June, 2012
Where: Sandy Lake, Pennsylvania (USA)
Location: McKeever Environmental Learning Center
Contact Person: Fran Bires (info@mckeever.org) or 724-376-1000
Leader: Steve Van Matre
Flyer: Interp Workshop
Website: www.mckeever.org