Community involvement

WORKSHOPS AT ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS

An important goal of this project is to involve local communities, since they are ultimately responsible of maintaining and taking care of the native forests. In this aim, we made workshops with children 8-12 years old at two elementary schools on the neighbouring area of the field site.

Workshop at Chaihuin Elementary School

Workshop at Huape Elementary School

We also asked children to draw a monito del monte, its native habitat, and its current habitat:

INTERACTING WITH THE YOUTH

Recently we had the opportunity to interact with a group of young scouts that have visited the Valdivian Coastal Reserve. We had the chance to present and discuss our current research project with them, stressing the importance of conserving both habitat and ecological interactions, aiming to conserve biodiversity and restore degraded lands.

EDUCATION AND OUTREACH IN SANTIAGO

During the "Week of the science" (October 7-13, 2013), we gave three talks about the monito del monte and its importance as seed disperser and forest regeneration agent for Elementary School children (6-12 years old). As part of the EXPLORA program 1000 Scientists 1000 Classrooms, we were able to share our research with the community at the Chilean capital city.

OUR 2013 INFORMATIVE POSTER

As part of the community involvement strategy, we designed, printed and distributed a full-color poster with key information about Dromiciops gliroides and its role as forest regeneration agent. We expect to reach children and adults from the local communties with this visual approach, as well as children of urban schools at southern Chile.

You may download this poster in PDF here, feel free to print and share it!

2014 EDUCATION & OUTREACH

Thanks to our second Rufford grant, we are preparing a set of educative materials for being distributed freely among children of rural and urban schools during 2014. The goal here is that children learn more about Chilean biodiversity, ecological interactions, and the effects of human disturbance on them. We intend to reach as many children is possible with a series of informative and visually-compelling materials.

This year we prepared an educative chart on plant-animal interactions, using native species of the Valdivian temperate rainforest as example, stressing the importance of pollination and seed dispersal mutualisms on this biodiversity hotspot.

You may download this chart in PDF here, feel free to print and share it!

2014 SCIENTIFIC FAIR: TALKING ABOUT PLANT-ANIMAL INTERACTIONS

We were kindly invited to show our work in plant-animal interactions in a scientific fair of a local elementary school in Santiago. We spent the morning showing kids how seeds are dispersed and flowers are pollinated, using examples from native species, a couple of pictures of our participation are below: