Nature Narrative

Questions to Think About

Has there been anything outside in your neighborhood that has caught your attention? If so, what is it?
What strategies do you use to help answer questions you may have about something?

What Caught My Attention

Here are some of the things that caught my attention during one of my nature journaling sessions. These were things that required me to stop and take a closer look at. I was surprised that I never noticed these things before!

I found this lone rock next to the side of my house.

Where did this rock come from? There weren't any other rocks like this around. I wonder how it got there?

I noticed what looks like to be some sort of track that came from an animal.

I wonder who or what made this track? I saw a couple more imprints similar to this one.

I found this big vent a few yards away from my house.

I wonder what it's doing here. What's its purpose?

Time to Make a Story!

What stood out to me the most was the big rock I found right outside my house. I decided to come up with a story of how it might of got there from some of the ideas I had written down in my nature journal.

I first started off by using a story web to put my main ideas down on how the rock got there. This is one of many ideas that came to mind.

After filling out my story web, I crafted my story! I decided to put my story in a comic format. There are many other formats you can use to make a story, like writing it in words, writing a poem, recording it or even making a film about it.

Could this of really happened? Maybe! This is one idea I had of how that big rock got there. It definitely was a fun way to think it through. There might be some other reasonable ways...

Now It's Your Turn

Go outside into your neighborhood and use your observation skills to find something that stands out to you, or catches your attention. Take some time to have look closer look and make as many observations as you can.

Use the "I notice, I wonder, It reminds me of " prompt from Artisan Nature activity page to help learn more about what you observed. Find something that makes you question it!

Start creating your story about what you observed/found/saw. Use a story web to help organize your ideas and to turn it into a story of your own!

Story Web.pdf

Animal Tracks You May Find in Your Neighborhood

After finding animal tracks right outside my home, I was curious to see what other tracks I could find and did some more research. Here are a few tracks of creatures you may find in your neighborhood. Try to match the picture of the animal to the picture of tracks they make.

Animal

Raccoon

Eastern Gray Squirrel

White Tailed Deer

Coyote

What animal above does each pair of tracks belong to?

Click the drop down arrow to reveal the correct answer

???