Here is the vast, savage, howling mother of ours,
Nature, lying all around with such beauty, and such affection for her children, as the leopard; and yet we are so early weaned from her breast to society, to that culture which is exclusively an interaction of man on man.
~ Henry David Thoreau
Introduction
Enveloping ourselves in the rhythms and forms of nature can be transformative, educative and healing. A bevy of studies has added to a growing literature on the mental and physical advantages of spending time outdoors. That includes recent research showing that short micro-breaks spent viewing a nature scene have a stimulating effect on the brain. Our identities too are intricately woven with our natural surroundings. The subtle yet powerful influences of place, space and culture mold us, but can often go unrecognized. As much as the natural world not only shapes us, we shape place. Our understandings of these intimate feedback loops are paramount to healthy relationships with the whole community of life. Yet despite this research, our society seems to be teaching people to avoid direct experience in nature and thus it has become difficult in understanding ourselves through the stories of place, not only through awe-inspiring nature spaces, but also wild urban areas, and everywhere in between.
Regrettably, these actions are grievously distributed and effectively frightening not just children but grown-ups straight out of the natural world and beyond. Instead of exploring the outdoors, or experiencing the vivid life stories all around us humans seem to be spending less and less of their lives in natural surroundings and even less time with actual human beings. All this is causing their senses to narrow, physiologically and psychologically, and this fundamentally reduces the richness of the human life experience (Louv, 2008).
Yet, as most of us can attest to, once you set out in nature, even a playground or a city park, the response is immediate – an unmistakable wave of energy comes over us when we step outside and there is an ease and fluidity of acceptance, excitement, and joy. Therefore, it is imperative that a broader healing process takes place between the damaged relationships with the natural world and the inhabitants. This healing is in our self-interest not only because the data suggests it’s better for all humans, rather our own mental, physical and spiritual health depends on it not to mention the future of the Earth. Given a chance to reintroduce and re-raise our youth to absorb the natural world and conceptualize our places and space identity, we will almost certainly change the configurations and conditions of our cities, homes and daily lives. In this written practice, an approach to reawaken our senses is proposed. A model that is not only holistic but also intuitive with children and adults alike. A culturally responsive pedagogy in the form of a theoretical yet applicable concept called the funds of knowledge and identity.
Funds of Knowledge & Identity
The funds of knowledge were developed by renowned scholars (Gonzalez, Moll & Amanti, 2005) who postulated that the historically accumulated and culturally developed bodies of knowledge and skills which all humans share can be traced to one's household. These funds vocalize the experiences of our lives through the processes of everyday in which families, communities, and friends, unconsciously or consciously, engage one another. The aim is to utilize these everyday occurrences as a tool to further understand the perceptions, perspectives, and life stories as they pertain to cultural preservation and transformation. Scholars have likened the term funds of identity to culturally bound stories, technologies, documents, and discourses that people internalize and construct in order to make sense of the events in their lives. Combining funds of identity with knowledge can be used as a method to peer into the dynamic emotional lived experiences of humans, thus these seminal works have provided the foundational tools allowing to delve deeper into the everyday activities of our lives, particularly the hybridity of cultural practices, and to ask what has led us to the place where we find ourselves (Esteban-Guitart & Moll, 2014).
Discovering the sociocultural dynamics of funds of knowledge and identity serve as a means to share history, cultural identities, ancestry, and shared historical experiences, and ultimately create cultural codes for meaning-making. (Gonzalez et al., 2005; Saubich-Esteban, 2011). The implementation of these funds will be addressed via a hybrid form labeled Eco funds and space, place, & cultural funds in which the utilization of the main idea, that people are competent and have knowledge is applicable in multiple iterations.
Eco Funds
Incorporating pedagogical practices that are supportive of students' everyday knowledge is the primary utility of the funds of knowledge. Applying these different types of funds and discourse augment the learning experience of the students and the learning community, as well as the learning outcomes. Joining these diverse funds of knowledge is not an easy task, yet practicing a hybrid version of this method will expose hidden abilities.
Children intuitively have a deep sense, a strong connection and an inherent fascination with the manifestations of the natural world. Weaving the dynamic role between household’s funds of knowledge and the great outdoors is a way to glean those funds in a holistic exploration. Eco funds attempt to develop a learning practice with ecological principles along with culturally responsive teaching that bridges the funds of the outdoors with the cultural flexibility of the group. Connecting our instinctual relationships with the outdoors with the fundamentals of ecology will form the foundation of those “funds” just as an ecosystem functions on Earth. The pedagogy acts as an apparatus to enhance what we understand about the world around us with scientific principals of ecology and basic biology.
In accepting that everyone can describe, articulate and express their experiences in nature these, therefore, become the active layers and the foundational instrument in which a multitude of variations of learning in nature can take place. The distinct difference is they flow from each person’s unique fund, and much like ecosystems that form a complex web of interconnectedness and adaptations so too would such moments — thereby highlighting the educational, the socio-cultural and ecological experiences we share simply by our lived experience. These distinct ecosystem funds act as a reservoir of specific interactions which can then transfer across an unlimited array of learning environments and engagements, and accumulate “funds” that can add to a broader depth of knowledge. What follows would be an intuitive strand of discourse that could be used to apply the biological, chemical and physical understandings of our environmental world by intertwining these natural funds of knowledge or eco funds with scientific fact — thereby bridging two valued elements back into the lives of humans- linking ecological principles with sustainability while also aligning with the cultural assets of the group.
Space, Place, & Culture funds
Funds of knowledge merge with culturally responsive teaching in several ways; one, this form of pedagogy already recognizes and responds to cultures, while also endeavoring to offer equitable access to education for all students (Ladson-Billings, 1994). Extending this theory with the funds of knowledge joined with Ecofunds intends for these cross-disciplines to engage learners while respecting their cultural integrity through communion with the natural world.
It is through the framework of funds where the exchanges of cultural information establish a type of cultural measure by which values and beliefs are held together and molded. Cultural information is the reflection of cultural norms and values and is independent of autonomy and cultural development. Examining our identity in the spaces we live while seeking to answer who we are is a timeless endeavor. The significance of humanity seeking a better perception within these spaces is a valued fund, and by igniting our consciousness, we participate in a collective identity, while at the same time archiving histories. In the case of understanding ourselves through the stories of place, Akhil Gupta and James Ferguson (1997) describe cultural variances by the understandings of how “us” and “otherness” relate to people’s desire for identification. Using this conceptual outline aligned with the funds of knowledge engages students collaboratively in the ‘difficult, chaotic effort of learning’, through explicit ability teaching and guided reflection (Weimer, 2013).
Future Thoughts
Pedagogy is a way of bridging life stories that help us to understand the ways of past, present, and future. If the past is a part of a knowledge base, then looking back can inform our understanding of the present and the future. Similarly, we can look at human behavior and the consequences of that behavior from history. Negotiating identity with the natural world, along with cultural relevance, are the tools for cultural and biological translation. Articulating the hybrid forms of the funds of knowledge through the eco-funds and space, place and cultural funds allow humans to vocalize lived experiences. With the interconnectedness of each of the variables mentioned above, this lens provides a different perspective of our communities, whose absorption of the familial and communal may reveal added levels of the ways humans adapt ecological, educational and cultural values that can transform our world.
By developing a new language within the framework of funds of knowledge, the relationship between theory, society and nature may bridge the gap between understanding and representing the wider world. It seems only fitting then, to view our global interactions as a symbiotic relationship in which we are reliant on each other for the success of our collective future. The growing revulsion against the endless wars, the military machine, has manifested in mass protest. We see this around the world, such as the Arab Spring, the Green Movement, and the Occupy Movement, as well as protests against brutality directed toward people of color, notwithstanding the insistence of women and the LGBT community all over the world who no longer tolerate abuse and subordination.
It is our duty, our human right, and our requirement, to be a voice, a movement, a picture, a story, and a media outlet and to remember and remind ourselves that inequality and hegemony are grossly present in the world today. We need to awaken a higher consciousness of class conflict, racial injustice, economic inequality, environmental, and international arrogance. There is the past and its continuing horrors: violence, war, prejudices, monopolization, political power in the hands of liars and murderers, building prisons instead of schools, poisoning the press and the entire culture by money, to name a few. Instead, we can choose to make a difference, ensuring a dialogue that includes the voice of educators, students, parents, and the entire community. This is where innovation and resolution will be birthed.
References
Esteban-Guitart, M., & Moll, L. C. (2014). Funds of identity: A new concept based on the funds of knowledge approach. Culture & Psychology, 20(1), 31-48. F.,
González, N., Moll, L. C., & Amanti, C. (2005). Funds of knowledge: Theorizing practice in households, communities, and classrooms. Mahwah, N.J: L. Erlbaum Associates
Gupta, A., & Ferguson, J. (1997). Culture, power, place: Explorations in critical anthropology. Durham, N.C: Duke University Press.
Ladson-Billings, G. (1994). The Dreamkeepers. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Louv, R. (2008). Last Child in the Woods : Saving our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder. London: Atlantic Books.
Saubich, X.. & Esteban, M. (2011). Bringing Funds of Family Knowledge to School. The Living Morocco Project – (“برغملاشيع”). Multidisciplinary Journal of Educational Research, 1(1), 79-103.
Thoreau, H. (2009). Walking. S.l.: The Floating Press.
Weimer, M. (2013). Learner-centered teaching: Five key changes to practice (Second ed.): John Wiley & Sons.
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