Friday Evening Lecture: STREAMS for Living and Learning

Please join me for this keynote lecture as I share my vision for transforming STEM education to STREAMS. This new acronym is more inclusive of developing whole children, and builds upon a definition of spiritual development useable for all children. It also encompasses children’s need for nature. Friday evening’s lecture is free and open to the public

I’ll also be leading a workshop on Saturday Morning entitled The Relationship between Spiritual Development and Nature.

Nature Based Education Summer Institute is sponsored by the Biosophical Institute, a Maine foundation that provides grants and scholarships furthering character and peace education. For registration information and fees for the remainder of the Summer Institute, please visit http://www2.umf.maine.edu/gradstudies/nbe/nbe_17/

My workshop on Honoring the Whole Child: Nurturing Spirituality will be held on Thursday, November 15 at 3:00 p.m, as part of the 2018 National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) conference, November 14–17, 2018, in Washington, DC.

My co-presenters are Jennifer Mata-McMahon, Assistant Professor, Mata Consulting, LLC; and Michael Haslip, Assistant Professor, Drexel University.

The session is ideal for early childhood educators of children of all ages. Participants will learn about findings from our survey of in-service educators regarding their support of children’s spirituality in early childhood settings; we’ll use those findings to help workshop participants reflect on how to use the recommended strategies in their own educational settings, to nurture children’s spirituality from a holistic perspective of social and emotional development.

NAEYC conferences bring together early childhood teachers, students,  administrators, researchers and teacher educators  to share and explore the latest research in the field, and learn from one another.

Register for the NAEYC conference here

I am delighted to be presenting at this year’s joint TASP and IPAUSA conference!  The Association for the Study of Play (TASP) and the International Play Association, USA (IPAUSA) have banded together to produce an exciting 2019 conference on an important topic –  “The Power of Playful Discourse and Inquiry”. Conference topics will be focused on exploring ”ways of harnessing the innate, joyful, person-driven, and character-building potential of play to overcome the suffering and far-reaching effects of divisive rhetoric, anger and despair.”

This will be a solutions-oriented ​gathering for educators, ​researchers, ​practitioners, ​activists, ​and ​advocates ​from ​a ​wide ​range ​of ​disciplines.  The title of my workshop is: “Spiritual Moments in Relationship to Naturalistic Play Experiences”.

You can register for the conference here: https://www.regonline.com/registration/Checkin.aspx?EventID=2354869

Join me at the 2019 National Council for Spirituality in Education Conference, Nov 3-4 at Teacher’s College of Columbia University in NYC.

The theme of this year’s conference is “The Next Wave in K-12 Education: The Spiritual Core of the Whole Child.”

Visionary teachers, researchers, and even funders gather at this conference to share research, resources and ideas on “building the field”.

I’ll be leading a workshop entitled “Exploring the Duo of Spiritual Development and Nature: Providers of Wholeness, Wellness, and Learning for all Children.
You can register for the conference here.

Please join me online to explore spiritual development as it relates to our work in nature-based settings, Monday June 29, 2020 at 2pm ET.

How does an environment support growth and development for young children?  This question will be explored while participants simultaneously analyze the connections between spiritual development, play, and nature.  The ultimate goal is to help educators support children as they grow into empathetic caring human beings who have respect for all that exists beyond self and within self.

Register here: http://erafans.org/event-3867918

This program is sponsored by Easter Region Association of Forest and Nature Schools ERAFANS under the guidance of Monica Wiedel-Lubinski, Executive Director.

You can find more free webinars on nature-based education from ERAFANS here.