The
sun was bright on a dozen young explorers’ faces as they settled into their
opening circle at Fairhaven Park. Here we introduced ourselves and the new
season of adventures ahead.
As a
new group, it is important to spend quality time establishing expectations and
going over ground rules so that everyone can get the most out of our
explorations. One of our mottos in Explorer’s Club is Safety First. This
means that everyone’s first priority should be safety, and each explorer is
responsible for making safe decisions for themselves and their group!
With
safety as the foundation for exploring, we can build our three-point
philosophy: Explore - Serve - Connect. These three ideas are central to every
adventure. Exploring is our most obvious goal: we want to get to know our big
backyard, develop our observational skills, learn new things, and have fun. The
next step, Serve, is giving back to the place that we explore. And we are
always striving to Connect by developing relationships and deepening our
understanding of nature, community, and ourselves.
The
first step of building our new community is adopting a group name. May I
introduce to you, the Pacific Chorus Frogs! This species, also known as Pacific
tree frogs, are small, green-to-brown amphibians that live as far north as
Alaska and as far south as California, but are the official amphibian of
Washington State. They can survive anywhere between sea level all the way to
10,000 feet! If you’ve heard a frog call anywhere in the Pacific Northwest,
it’s very likely that it was a PCF. They are abundant and act as a keystone
species – indicating the health of their areas of habitation. Like the frog
itself, our boys love to make noise and explore the wet forests of Washington!
In
opening circle, each explorer gets a job for the day. There’s the Medicine Man
who carries the first aid kit; Our TTTPP (totally terrific toilet paper person)
who carries our nature poop kit; the Games Master who carries bandanas and
other supplies for spontaneous fun; the Hunter-Gather who carries our apples,
cutting board and apple cutter; and our Knowledge Keeper who holds our copy of Plants
of the Pacific Northwest by Pojar and McKinnon for field plant identification.
Ask your explorer what job they had on our first outing, and if they didn’t
have a job this time, don’t worry - we rotate jobs every outing, and introduce
more jobs as the season continues.
After
our opening circle, the boys enjoyed an exciting chance to roll down the big
hill. Opportunities to play are important for all of us! With antsy feet, we
set out down the trail to play a name game. Games are important as a framework
for learning and exploring, and one of our favorites is called Hide: it’s a
great way to develop the kids’ observation skills and our concept of
camouflage. Ask your explorer if they can explain the rules of the game to you,
and what strategies they used in order to camouflage themselves during the
game. There can be (and often are) several winners!
Although
we started this game, nature doesn’t always play by our rules, and we got
interrupted by a fantastic nature moment – a Giant Pacific Salamander was
poking our mentor Conor in the side where he lay hidden! Calling everyone over,
we circled around the beast in its burrow. We spent almost 20 minutes in awe of
this animal, who never made it more than head and shoulders out of its hole. It
was a great lesson in keeping still and silent to observe nature.
Finally,
each day is closed with a Circle of Gratitude, where we slice and share the
apples that the hunter-gatherer has carried for us. Everyone shared something
that they were grateful for, and went home tuckered out and covered in bits of
forest. Looking forward to our next outing at Lake Padden!
