Too many city kids who visit Columbia Springs Environmental Education Center find the experience weird and overwhelming.
They’re afraid to touch things, climb things, explore things. They’re afraid to get dirty, said event and volunteer coordinator Kaley McLachlan.
One child McLachlan can’t forget stepped off a school bus, gazed around at all the trees and whispered in trepidation: “Is this the forest?” Another kid started screaming about spotting an eagle. It was a common crow.
And then there was Irving, who wouldn’t scream or whisper — because he was a recent emigre who spoke virtually no English. He stepped off the bus at Columbia Springs earlier this year friendless, speechless and “terrified,” McLachlan remembered.
If You Go
• What: Family Nature Fest.
• When: 9 a.m.-1 p.m. Saturday.
• Where: Columbia Springs Environmental Education Center, 12208 S.E. Evergreen Highway, Vancouver.
• Featuring: Fish hatchery tours, instrument making and singalong with Recycle Man, nature comedy-magic show, Oregon Zoo animals, bilingual hikes, scavenger hunts, games and crafts.
• Cost: Free.
• More information: 360-882-0936, www.columbiasprings.org
So education coordinator Jenna Kallestad, who’s been south of the border and speaks Spanish, tried a really sneaky trick: She smothered young Irving with kindness, including lots of friendly talk in his own language. By the end of his visit, Irving was happily participating in activities and excitedly describing the “great bird” he’d glimpsed — a resident heron.
All of which has inspired the Columbia Springs staff to “reboot” a favorite autumn event that’s now headed for Saturday morning, Oct. 17, McLachlan said. The Family Nature Fest used to be the “Family Field Trip,” she said, but folks found that name confusing. Did a field trip mean a school bus ride? On a weekend? That wasn’t the idea, McLachlan said.
Now, the renamed retreat into that awesome forest — yes, it certainly is — aims to meet kids like Irving where they are, and ease them past their fears. That means splitting them into small groups for lots of one-on-one attention, and it certainly means welcoming them in their own language.
“We really need to be doing that,” said McLachlan. “We want to be getting to know the kids and their families. The kids have more fun, and kids who wouldn’t work together or even talk to each other come out of their shells.”
So get ready for “Los Arboles de Columbia Springs” — “The Trees of Columbia Springs” — a bilingual nature hike through the lush 100-acre property in East Vancouver, to be led by Kallestad at 10 a.m.
Even better, McLachlan added, event sponsor On Point Community Credit Union will provide several volunteer staffers who are bilingual; they’ll be on hand for the whole event, helping out with anything Spanish speakers need — including additional bilingual guided tours of the grounds for small groups.
More easy hikes and tours are planned for the Family Nature Fest, too: fish hatchery tours, a “story and stroll” for toddlers, a fungi hike and even a “forest pharmacy” hike where you’ll be able to learn about traditional medicines and forest edibles. One of Kallestad’s great passions is ethnobotany — the study of relationships between plants and people.
“Our culture has become so health conscious. Parents seem to get really engaged about that,” said McLachlan. And kids, she added, seem to just want to taste and smell and touch everything — once they come out of their shells, that is.
“We’re in the city but we have all these forests and steams and wetlands here,” Kallestad said to a group of arriving elementary school kids who were stepping off a bus one morning last week. “We have 100 acres here — for the fish, and for the animals and for you.”
