New book with students debuts: Through My Anacostia Eyes: Environmental Problems and Possibilities!

This book is about sight.
About what the Anacostia High School students saw
with their own eyes,
and filtered through their lived experiences.

This book is about voice.
About what came from the students’ mouths
–rhythmically, poetically, chronologically, with vulnerability —
about what they observed, reflected on,
and processed alone and in community with one another.

And in the seeing and speaking,
they have given us a book to cherish
— a book of poems, essays, reports, and images
that reveals what they felt, emotionally,
what they touched physically,
what they tasted, and what they heard.
And we owe them our deepest appreciation,
because what they have given us is profound!

The book is about journeys,
each of us separately, and all of us together
liberating ourselves, flying, like the birds, free,
dismantling the shackles of fear,
overcoming our insecurities,
touching truth and becoming one with it.

This book is about partnerships.
Many thanks to Conservation Nation
for sponsoring my Nature-Wise program with
the students, to Xavier Brown for
inviting me in to host the literacy
and the environment training,
to Patrick Gusman, UDC, the
Department of the Interior and
NPS for leading the establishment
of this summer internship program
and enthusiastically supporting our efforts
to engage the students as thinkers, readers, writers,
and critical observers of their relationship to nature
and in how to become even better advocates
for sustainability.

Deep appreciation to Gabriela Paola Franco Peña!
She is our designer extraordinaire and without her,
for two pressure-filled weeks, there would be no book.
72 pages, 56 photos, 44 essays, poems, and reports –
all adding up to one story of love, loss, history, mystery,
healing, hope, reclamation, and anticipation
in Anacostia, Washington, D.C.,
accomplished in a whirlwind six weeks!

Stay tuned for more news about the book
and how to get your copy. Email me
(caroline@carolinebrewerbooks.com) about
how to bring Nature-Wise professional
development training to your educators
and/or student literacy and the environment workshops to your school.
For a limited number of schools this school year,
a book like this, on a smaller scale, can be produced
in a day or a week, with me as an Author-in-Residence.
Let’s talk about it!

NATURE-WISE – Connecting the Climate, Environment, Young People And You

YOU’RE INVITED: Leaders at schools, youth, religious and other non-profit or for-profit organizations are invited to book trainings for NATURE-WISE for 2024-2025!  You can host a professional development training or a Youth Engagement Program. Read below for Professional Development and here for Youth Engagement and email: caroline@carolinebrewerbooks.com for more information.

What is Nature-wise? Nature-wise is a professional development training for educators and youth leaders designed to help children and teens understand and practice, on creative levels, that human beings are included in the definition of the environment. Protecting it is protecting us. We can’t protect what we don’t know or understand. The good news is that from our earliest days, we practice literacy and that opens a world of wondrous possibilities and opportunities to explore all the literacies — reading, writing, speaking, seeing, hearing, visual arts, music, dance, games, and so many more – as we dig deeper into the natural world, our place in it, and our power to be climate activists and better protect all living things.

Teachers will enjoy to work with me, a children’s book author, to introduce students to children’s books on the environment; Help students tap into the power of poetry to articulate feelings and observations about the environment; Bring local, national, and global environmental champions into students’ lives through picture books and online resources; Lead students on fascinating nature exploration journeys outdoors; Help students evaluate wildlife (colors, shapes, patterns, textures, and behaviors) in their school and home neighborhoods and create a neighborhood nature encyclopedia — and have fun!

Teachers will have opportunities to address fears about being outside and about various forms of wildlife; Create and play vocabulary games based on books and other literature; Help students write class and individual letters to authors, climate and environmental champions; Help students create interview questions for environmental champions and authors; Help students create artwork inspired by stories and the work of environmental champions. And so much more!

Email: caroline@carolinebrewerbooks.com for more information about how to bring Nature-Wise to your school or organization.

WHAT TEACHERS ARE SAYING ABOUT NATURE-WISE!
Dear Caroline

Just a note to thank you for your workshop last week. I had the most wonderful time and got so many great ideas. I’m a new-ish teacher (switched from journalism mid-career) and am always looking for ways to better my craft. Thanks to your ideas, I’m now using rhythmic poems every day and putting lyrics up on the board for my learners to read. They love it! I’m also halfway through your HTHS manual and am putting more of those ideas into practice. Thank you so much for doing what you do and for inspiring so many of us. It is helping countless numbers of children! All the best.

Art pops the cork on reluctant student’s brilliance

This is the first of my bi-weekly story series call Brilliant Minds, about children who have made quick and remarkable progress in reading and writing through the use of the Higher Way and the Happy Teacher methodologies (Please note the names have been changed)

Nayana was a student of mine at DC school.  She refused to write a word for the first two weeks after I returned to teach at the school from mid-March to mid-June. Instead, this third grader preferred to draw, color, cut paper, or, worse, run to hide in cabinets or under tables. In many ways, she was like a volcano – quiet and serene on the outside, but roiling with intense energy on the inside.

On April 4, the Monday after Spring Break, during a journal entry warm-up, Nayana found her voice. She made an entry for six days. Every weekday, except Friday, however, was misspelled. There were errors in most words. Verbs were missing or used incorrectly. Every sentence was incomplete. Yet, Nayana wrote for the first time. And she wrote more about Spring Break than any other student. I was thrilled and so was she. I had been searching and praying for the keys to ignite the learner in Nayana. After this surprising burst of productivity, I kept pushing.

The next day, I unpacked a bunch of art supplies that came in after my plea to friends for donations. I sought out art supplies with the specific idea that giving Nayana permission to draw, paint, and color in class could open her up to engage in other learning activities.

First thing that morning, before diving into traditional subject matter, I invited Nayana and three other students to sit in front of brand new easels with brand new paint, paintbrushes, and paper. They each received a new painter’s apron. They literally jumped for joy, and instantly fell in love with the freedom of expression through art in our classroom. These daily sessions typically lasted 30-40 minutes. That day forward, Nayana became a different student, and, much to my surprise, grew to enjoy writing.

Three days later, Nayana drafted her first story based on our science vocabulary words about climates. This story also contained multiple errors but made much more sense. Best of all, it boasted a strong, witty narrative. Titled, “The Bad Day,” it was about a boy victimized by every type of climate and climate-related element: an earthquake, the heat of the desert, water from a lake, and even the sun, which thought John “looked ugly.” But John’s bad luck changed to good when, fleeing a blizzard, he ran until he found himself in front of a volcano, jumped in, and survived!

Yes, it made me laugh out loud. It also later occurred to me that Nayana was kind of like John – she had survived the most adverse situations imaginable, and finally, when she owned her only option, her volcano, she fought like mad and survived.  Nayana’s story also helped me to see clearly what had been bottling her brilliance and stopping it up with a cork. I couldn’t wait to see what else was on its way out.

I look forward to your questions about how you can inspire such a revolution in the Nayanas in your lives.