Wondering how to engage your family with the natural world after full days of online classes and work? On Tuesday, Oct. 27, the Education Speaker Series presents a Zoom event with naturalist, educator and artist John (Jack) Muir Laws.
Learn how to open the door to rich discovery, better memory, and more fun in nature. What if you could change one simple thing and make yourself a more astute observer, curious explorer, creative thinker, deliberate investigator, and better naturalist? You can: it is keeping a notebook to record your discoveries and questions, and to help you plan and document your investigations.
A journal is a ubiquitous part of a naturalist’s gear, more important than binoculars or a microscope. No tool has a more profound effect on your ability to see and think. It is much more than a sketchbook. It is a place to map out your observations and inquiry process as you document, explore, or reflect. There are many ways you can use a journal: you can draw, diagram, map, model, list, and write. Each approach changes the way you see and think. A new approach is a new lens on the world. Strategically combining these methods virtually guarantees new discoveries and will delight your mind.
If you have never used a nature journal before, you will learn simple techniques that you can apply immediately with no drawing experience required. If you already keep a notebook of your discoveries, learn ways to expand the scope of your practice and open new doors to discovering the world. You will leave with a rich kit of tools to focus your observations, organize your thoughts, enhance recall of critical details, stimulate creativity, and expand the possibilities for your adventures and discoveries.
Laws is trained as a wildlife biologist and is a Research Associate of the California Academy of Sciences. Jack has taught nature education teacher since 1984 in California, Wyoming, and Alaska. He teaches the tools to help people develop as naturalists and stewards including, ways to improve your observation, memory and curiosity, conservation biology, natural history, scientific illustration, and field sketching all while having fun and falling more deeply in love with the world.
In 2009, he received the Terwilliger Environmental Award for outstanding service in Environmental Education. He is a 2010 TogetherGreen Conservation Leadership Fellow with the National Audubon Society. He was the 2011 artist for International Migratory Bird Day. Laws has written and illustrated books about art and natural history including The Laws Guide to Nature Drawing and Journaling (2016), The Laws Guide to Drawing Birds (2012), Sierra Birds: a Hiker’s Guide (2004), The Laws Guide to the Sierra Nevada (2007), and The Laws Pocket Guide Set to the San Francisco Bay Area (2009). He is a regular contributor to Bay Nature magazine with his “Naturalists Notebook” column. He is the primary author and editor of the curriculum: Opening the world through Nature Journaling. This free teaching guide is kid tested and teacher approved and integrates science, language arts, and visual arts through keeping a nature journal. He is the founder and host of the Bay Area Nature Journal Club, monthly free nature sketching workshops, field trips and events, connecting people with nature through art.
To purchase a ticket to the Education Speaker Series, or an individual ticket to any of the events please visit:
https://piedmontstore.org/products/education-speaker-series-ess-topics-related-to-raising-healthy-children-young-adults
Please note that all Fall events will be held via Zoom, while all Spring events will be live in Ellen Driscoll with the ability to pivot to Zoom if necessary.
Don’t miss Jack. As. 30 yr. docent at the California Academy of Science I knew Jack as a student volunteer who really blossomed. Great joy watching his achievements.