Lauren Pyle

What does she do? I am an Education Naturalist at the WNC Nature Center.

What was her favorite part of earning EE certification? My favorite part of earning the certification was getting to attend all the Criteria I workshops. As a working educator, I am always looking for new ideas for lessons to help inspire and engage my students. I still find myself going back to the Project WILD, Project WET, and Food, Land and People books (among others!) when I start designing new lessons. I may not do the lessons exactly as written, but the resources from those workshops help inspire me to keep trying new things.

What certification experience stands out for her? The parts of my certification experience that stand out to me the most were the climate change and air quality workshops I did in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. These are hot issues in environmental education, and ones which I really did not know much about. The workshops were held in breathtaking scenery and not only demonstrated lessons but really helped me to understand the scientific concepts surrounding each issue. Now that I more fully understand the scientific implications, I feel much more confident designing lessons and answering students' questions.

What was her community partnership project?  For my community action partnership, I worked with a local private elementary school to help incorporate more environmental education into their school. I collaborated with a teacher to help create an "environmental education trunk" that the school and school community could utilize. I prepared lessons and made small teaching kits so that anyone could go out and teach an EE lesson by following a one page set of instructions and using the materials provided. I also worked with the students in one grade to identify trees to make a tree trail at their school that will be launched during their Earth Day celebration.