During my time in the field, I always found it interesting to observe the variety of responses provoked by children’s encounters with insects and animals on the playground. Throughout my career in early childhood I have seen many examples of children—like Khaled—who are intrigued by nature and also many examples of children—like Richard—who are perhaps, fearful of it.
As I wondered about young children’s seemingly contradictory relationships with and perspectives toward the natural world, a question began to loom in my mind: Could my graduate teaching assistants (GTAs) and I deepen children’s curiosity about and empathy toward the natural world without letting our ambitions as teachers get in the way of what the children really want to learn?