Environmental Class Takes Students into the Wild

By Lee Ross Mountain View Telegraph

On Tuesdays and Thursdays, Wildlife West Nature Park is transformed into a 122-acre classroom.

Those are the days that Jim Smith, a science teacher at East Mountain High School, has volunteered to teach environmental science to 10 of the workers there.

The workers are all students at East Mountain High and will receive credit for the course. They are being paid by a grant from the Youth Conservation Corps.

The teenagers are learning about conservation from the park’s founder, Roger Alink, and they’re acquiring the skills to fix tractors, weld, build walls or trails and pour concrete.

On the first day of class, July 1, Smith taught them how alligator, Rocky Mountain and one-seed junipers are different. On the second day, they refurbished birdhouses, pressed plant samples and were finishing up by looking for coyote holes.

Smith said the class follows normal benchmarks for any course on environmental education, but he also sends the students out into the fenced-in park to learn on their own.

“I’m hoping they learn to observe their surroundings more,” Smith said. “(Environmental education) just opens your eyes to what’s around you.”

As Joaquin Garcia picked his way through cactus and tree branches on his way to meet a group of students, he said he’d never thought about where the animals live before.

East Mountain uses an inquiry method in which students ask their own questions, which is one way to keep them engaged in the classroom, Smith said.

“I’m not the sage on the stage anymore, I’m the guide on the side,” he said.

(c) 2008 Albuquerque Journal. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.