On April 8-9 in Creston, Fields Forward, supported by CBEEN’s new ‘Workshop Bursary’ program, hosted Michael Becker for 2 days of interactive learning for 28 educators from across the Columbia Basin to identify easy ways to start school gardens, deepen their environmental education, and explore creative methods of teaching using local community resources.

Michael Becker emphasizes transformative education instead of transmissive education. His message is really inspiring and gives people a process to go forward. He also really pushes the idea that projects and inquiry should be student led, and gives teachers and educators ways to achieve this. By the end of the weekend all the teachers and educators had actions that they are going to take home to do, and a group of people who they are going to check in with about how their projects are proceeding. Participants left the workshop ready to implement transformative education experiences with their classes, schools and communities.

The best part of the weekend:
“Was learning the concept of starting small, get a yield, celebrate and get back to work!!!”
“Was actually going through actionable processes and getting literal teaching tools, a framework and a network to grow/work from.”
“A language and framework for inquiry education in the everyday classroom.”

One action I am going to take:
” Work on having an indoor composting system that the students can be in charge of.”
“Going to have students create plans/ideas for our garden/outdoor space using the same design activity we did on the weekend.”
“Ask the school students for feedback, input and design ideas for our wetland restoration project.”