The idea of having Bea Martin, an amazing science illustrator, visual storyteller, and educator, come to our school first blossomed when one of our teachers suggested that it would be wonderful to have students and children from the community learn more about nature journaling. Bea had led workshops and lessons for the Mayne Island Conservancy and at the Island’s summer ecological camp, so she seemed like a natural fit for our school and youth community on Mayne.
Living on Mayne Island, it is often challenging to have specialists come to the island because creating schedules around the ferry system can be daunting. We’d done it before, though, so we knew that with pre-planning and a little bit of ferry luck, we could pull it off. Between communicating and working with the school and homeschooling community, we were able to have Bea come to lead 4 sessions on nature journaling. These first started off in the classroom with Bea introducing the kids to the concept of nature journaling as well as some nature journaling techniques. After the basics were done, they went outdoors! Mayne Island school is lucky to have natural areas close by, so they didn’t have to go far to find inspiration for their observations and artistic endeavours.
The result was youth with journals full of amazing observations, notes, and drawings to inspire future creativity. Seeing Bea leading the kids showed us how an educator with true passion, creativity, and flexibility could inspire everyone to try new things and improve on current skill sets. It reinforced that bringing experts to Mayne Island to teach our youth and educators is well worth the extra effort of coordination and finding funding. Thank you to the Victoria Foundation for helping us with their Neighbourhood Small Grant!
