Circling the Sun, Racing the Wind
Active Games and Creative Dramatics to Introduce Youngsters to their Fellow Beings in North America’s Northeastern Forests
This is an extensive collection of outdoor games (many based on traditional forms such as racing, relays, tag, and singing circles) that are active, sociable, and fun. This book will help youngsters increase their understanding and appreciation of the temperate forest bioregion of eastern North America, its creatures, and vital processes. At the same time, they will exercise their motor muscles, executive functioning skills, in addition to developing creative imaginations and social emotional learning/SEL capacities. Also included are correlations with the Next Generation Science Standards, a variety of supporting visuals, and some simple creative dramatics for the very young. The projects and text highlight the benefits of lively, evolutionarily consonant, arts- and play-based learning.
Edith Pucci Couchman is an award-winning educator and visual artist dedicated to helping youngsters learn more about the amazing Earth Community to which they belong. She encourages children to play active games inspired by ecology and natural history, and offers them opportunities to build their capacities for creating art in many genres. She is on the Board of the Northeast Organic Farming Association of New Hampshire. She is blessed to be the mother of two grown children and a grandmother as well.
