Introduction
THE BIGGER PICTURE
"[Photography] is a way of feeling, of touching, of loving. What you have caught on film is captured forever...it remembers little things, long after you have forgotten everything." --- Aaron Sisking, photographer
Children are rich, competent explorers who need to use real tools to capture traces of their explorations. At Blueberry, the children learn to use a wide variety of beautiful materials and expressive languages such as poetry, photography and music as tools to communicate their undertandings of the world. As scientists exploring the trail with CNI, we used magnifying lenses and atomizers to examine our discoveries and to test our theories.
In cameras, we discovered an essential tool to fortify the children's ties to the natural world. Through photography, the children were able to capture and revisit the thousands of tiny miracles that nature revealed. We marveled as our young photographers captured the intimate details of the petals on a flower, the tail of a lizard, a single drop of sap: these were the seeds of wonder that led to a sense of place.
After taking many photographs, the children were invited to choose an image which represented what was most significant to them about the canyon. Carefully reviewing their photographs, each child picked a specific image of their emotional connection to that photograph, Whether they chose a flower, lizard, or spiky cactus, a river of words flowed from the children when revisiting their photos. As they dictated, their words became poetry.
These photographs and poems illustrate out children's bonds with nature: to the world not only as a place, but also as our home. Perhaps they saw the bigger picture even before the shutter snapped.
