The 2009
Virginia Project Learning Tree Outstanding Educator is
Elizabeth Burke of Vienna. Elizabeth wears a number of hats.
She has her own consulting firm called Mud Pie Planet that
provides curriculum writing services and environmental
education programs for grades K-12. She is a certified
environmental educator in North Carolina and a Board Member
serving as
Communications Chair for the Environmental Educators of
North Carolina. Elizabeth is a Fairfax Master Naturalist, a
volunteer with the Audubon Society of Northern Virginia, and
a Boy Scout merit badge counselor. But she caught our
attention when she organized the first-ever environmental
education program at Wolftrap Elementary as a parent
volunteer. In 2006, Elizabeth and Sheri Soyka, a former
national PLT staffer, convinced the Parent Teachers
Association at Wolftrap Elementary to offer hands-on
environmental
education lessons during school hours. The program was
called HOWL, which stands for Helping Our World by Learning.
The HOWL program involved parents leading PLT activities in
the classroom, specifically Web of Life, Pollution Search,
and Have Seeds Will Travel. Fifty-three teachers and parent
volunteers participated in PLT training in order to prepare
for the classroom HOWL sessions. Handouts explaining each
HOWL lesson also went home
to parents of the 630 students at Wolftrap Elementary.
Simultaneously, Elizabeth spearheaded an effort to improve
the school grounds at Wolftrap called Growing Together
Gardens. Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts planted
100 trees; 4th graders grew radishes; parents installed a
bluebird trail with four bluebird boxes; cub scouts built a
woodland trail, planted more trees and shrubs, and installed
a butterfly garden; boy scouts planted 2500 square feet of
native grasses; and 5th and 7th graders painted a “skyscape”
on a large portable classroom. The school received a PLT
GreenWorks! grant in June of 2007 for “Bird-by Bird
Gardens,” which involved additional food and habitat
plantings along the woodland path. Elizabeth also mentored a
former Wolftrap student who earned her Girl Scout Silver
Award by creating a comprehensive Field Guide to the Gardens
of Wolftrap Elementary in binder and CD format. The teachers
at Wolftrap have taken advantage of these
grounds improvements and their Project Learning Tree
training to create exciting outdoor learning opportunities.
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Photo:
Left to right: Lisa Deaton, Elizabeth Burke and
Kathy McGlauflin. |
A HOWL
lesson on dendrochronology was written to make use of the
newly planted trees. The second graders
study insects in the native grasses, and the butterfly
garden provides nectar for the butterflies released by the
third grade. One second grade teacher attached a birdfeeder
to her window after lessons on food webs and food chains. A
squirrel found the feeder first, and the students ended up
writing a book about their visitor called “Sir Eat-a-Lot.”
Students have also collected over 600 pounds of native tree
seeds from their community as part of the Potomac
Conservancy’s Growing Native program. Elizabeth’s children
are now in middle school and high school, but the teachers
at Wolftrap continue to contact her about appropriate
lessons and outdoor activities.
Elizabeth has experience in public relations and marketing,
so she took time to publicize the HOWL and Growing Together
Gardens programs in school newsletters and press releases to
local news outlets such as the Vienna
Connection newpapers and Fairfax County Public School’s
media relations office. Elizabeth also wrote a ten-page
article about the HOWL program for the Journal of Virginia
Science Education. In addition, the May 2008 issue of
Virginia Wildlife ran an article about Wolftrap Elementary’s
efforts. Elizabeth has also participated in gatherings of
schoolyard garden coordinators in Fairfax and Arlington to
compare notes on their successful programs.
Overall, Elizabeth’s work brought several groups together to
support Wolftrap Elementary: Brooke Rental Center, Cub
Scouts, Boy Scouts, Earth Sangha, Girl Scouts, Girls on the
Run, L.F. Jennings, Inc., Meadowlark Botanical Gardens, the
Potomac Conservancy, Project Learning Tree, the Vienna
Moms Club, the Virginia Bluebird Society, and the Audubon
Society of Northern Virginia. Project Learning Tree has long
recognized the value of community partnerships in creating
lasting, high quality environmental education programs, and
Elizabeth has created a model program in Vienna. |
