John Muir's inspiring life makes for a wonderful organizational theme around which schools, youth organizations, or Sierra Club chapters and groups can promote environmental awareness. John Muir as an inspirational concept encompasses several kinds of activities:
Because he was unusually famous as a writer, the idea of an essay contest is perfect. Students could be asked to write an essay about one aspect of nature they care about and want others to care about, after first reading Muir's pieces on the juniper tree or grasshopper or lying on the ground looking up at the stars; they could be asked to write letters to the editors expressing their own value of the environment in their communities; and so on.
Students could look at examples from Muir's journals, with both sketches and observations, and take them on trips, hikes, excursions, or even into the schoolyard. It was said that he was such a keen and enthusiastic observer that it took him ten hours to walk a mile. People could stake out 100 yards with a journal and write on what they see going on in the environment, everything they see going on at once; advanced work on this could be theories of how whatever they are looking at came to be (using Muir's observations on glaciers, for example, as a model). See Keeping a Nature Journal by Bonnie J. Gisel.
After a reading from A Thousand Mile Walk to the Gulf, or Chapter 5 of The Life and Letters of John Muir, for example, students could design the contents of their own backpack if they were to undertake a similar botanical - geological - wilderness expedition -- or any kind of expedition in life.
The contents might include:
After completing this exercise, students could bring their backpacks and discuss what is in them and why. There could be a kind of gallery show of the backpacks, with people explaining the contents of their backpacks.
Read of Muir's enthusiastic responses to nature, and develop dramatic skits, songs, and programs in which people express responses to the environment.
Read some of Muir's inspirational passages, and note his use of words to inspire value for what we see in the environment. Make blank journals with some of these quotes from Muir on the tops of pages. Then walk outside in a park or garden, preferably a place with trees. "Behold" the trees and write your own thoughts alongside Muir's. People could then write in other people's journals their thoughts about the trees, so they could go home with a book which includes not only Muir's words and their own but those of their friends and schoolmates and members of their communities.
What if there had been a Sierra Club when Muir was growing up? He essentially experienced one through his readings that inspired him to get outside and behold nature and educate about it and advocate on its behalf. Consider a library project in which people contribute titles or actual copies of works that have inspired them to value and/or work on behalf of nature; community groups and schools could show these as exhibits, and additional projects could emerge from those.
There are so many ways from pre-K to adult, to use Muir to inspire activities; as someone himself who is shaped by his educational experiences, he is a terrific model on which to base activities to inspire leadership, science, and arts and humanities about the environment. Today we see how closely related these are to the Sierra Club's educational mission and values.
See many more project ideas in our John Muir Lesson Plans.
Dr. Barbara Mossberg
Professor Integrated Studies
California State University
Monterey Bay
100 Campus Center Seaside, CA 93955