Facilitating Joyful Adaption: Dr Cathrine Floyd
What conditions in our current learning systems may be hindering our young people's ability to thrive, and how might we address these barriers to foster better learning environments?
See some of Cathrine’s projects at www.trustforlearning.org and her nature-based learning report published in April 2023, found here.
This conversation features a longing to expand into capabilities that make us really human and help us in the new reality of the marketplace, for example, to be problem solvers, risk takers, collaborative, critical thinkers, all important skills of adaption.
As an educator with over 30 years of experience in the field of early care and education, Cathrine Floyd PhD (pronounced “Katrina”- it’s Norwegian) brings her experience in quality improvement, programming, policy studies and education finance to Trust for Learning and our partners. Cathrine holds a Master’s Degree in Early Childhood Education and Special Education from the University of Colorado at Denver and a doctorate from the University of Denver in Educational Leadership and Policy Studies. Her passion for social justice and equity building guides her work to create systems change and positive outcomes for children and families, particularly those from historically underserved populations. Cathrine is a coalition builder with experience in state and federal systems, public and charter school districts, non- and for-profit community organizations and family child care. Her joy in learning and hearing different perspectives enables her to authentically partner and support all voices in collaboration. When not engaging in her work in early childhood, Cathrine enjoys spending time with her family and travelling.
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This Season is done in partnership with Salzburg Global Seminar. https://www.salzburgglobal.org/
Please check out our partner’s publication advocating for education transformation: https://www.diplomaticourier.com/issue/transformed-the-case-for-education-transformation
[TRANSCRIPT AUTO-GENERATED]
00:00:06:02 - 00:00:24:04
Louka Parry
hello, friends, and welcome to the Learning Future podcast. I'm your host, of course. Look up Pari. Thank you so much for spending some time with us today. And it's going to be really time well spent because we're in this interesting moment now when we think about, you know, how do we create the right conditions for our young people to thrive?
00:00:24:04 - 00:00:25:05
Louka Parry
And so if you're a parent
00:00:25:05 - 00:00:46:05
Louka Parry
or an educator or leader or an innovator, someone working in this space around thriving in particular to do with well-being and cognition and nature and the influence that it has, you're very much going to enjoy our conversation today. We're speaking with Katherine and Floyd, and she's an educator with over 30 years of experience in the field of early care and education.
00:00:46:07 - 00:01:08:03
Louka Parry
At the moment, she's the director for Ideal Learning Initiatives at the Trust for Learning, and she comes to us with this really deep understanding of the role of nature and and how it can influence the way that we educate our young people, the role that it has on our cognition and on our mental health, but also kind of she'll share her passion for social justice and equity building,
00:01:08:03 - 00:01:20:15
Louka Parry
as we just talking about Katrina, you know, I'm just so curious about some of the work that that you're doing there in terms of, you know, how do we look after our youngest humans and and kind of really set
00:01:20:15 - 00:01:27:07
Louka Parry
them up to thrive in this rapidly changing, digitizing world. So thank you so much for joining us on the LINEAGE podcast.
00:01:27:09 - 00:01:29:21
Cathrine Floyd
Absolutely. I'm excited to be here.
00:01:29:23 - 00:01:38:09
Louka Parry
First question always is what's something that you're learning as a learning as a learner right now, but something that you know is really interesting.
00:01:38:09 - 00:02:20:22
Cathrine Floyd
You I think what is really interesting that I'm learning about right now is more and more about the benefits of children being outside and learning outside and really diving into the research around how children can thrive, flourish, have better attention, have better academic outcomes. And I think that surprises people sometimes when I say actually having children outside while they're learning leads to increase standardized test scores, increased high school graduation, decreased dropout rates.
00:02:20:24 - 00:02:40:22
Cathrine Floyd
So there's a lot of things that might not seem natural to use that word to people who are educators and families and the general public. But there is a lot of research around the benefits for being outside and engaging in nature.
00:02:40:24 - 00:03:02:00
Louka Parry
Like we've spoken about this on the podcast previously with Nicholas Carlisle. The idea that young people now are kind of living a predominantly digital life. And so what's the case like? What does the research tell us about the benefits of nature based learning? Because clearly, you know, you see young kids kind of playing in the same field or just, you know, engaging in nature.
00:03:02:00 - 00:03:16:14
Louka Parry
There is this almost natural things that would natural explorative element to our humanity that kind of really does seem to come out. But, you know, that's that's been changing over the over the generations. So yeah what do we what do we know.
00:03:16:16 - 00:03:39:18
Cathrine Floyd
Now and you think about maybe experiences you had a as a child, maybe at a lake or a beach with the sand and the water and the sun, and maybe all you had was an empty bottle that you were using to build sandcastles. And if you've ever watched a child engage in sand and water and mud, you can see their attention.
00:03:39:18 - 00:04:04:08
Cathrine Floyd
You can see that they focus. Maybe they're building just a big tent where they want the water to flow into and make a pool and on the contrast that you look at a classroom where there are rows of chairs and you see the amount of fidgeting that happens, you see the lack of concentration and the inattention. And so how do we merge these things?
00:04:04:10 - 00:04:40:17
Cathrine Floyd
How do we take the best of pedagogy and the best of technology, but then also make sure that our kids are having feet in the sand, mud in their hair and, you know, just just come home dirty and and happy. So there's just a lot going on, especially for young children with with COVID and the amount of that's happening for young children and all that happens in nature, there is healing to the human soul, to the cognition, to learning, to all of those things.
00:04:40:19 - 00:05:10:17
Louka Parry
And so, Katrina, I'd love because I think many of us know this intrinsically, like, you know, as adults that lots of you listening to this podcast, you know, we we can recall all these experiences when we were growing up and, you know, you know, for some for some of us even, you know, before mobile phones were just ubiquitous and kind of in our hand always and kind of that that picture of people being outside, but actually still being kind of on, you know, on a screen.
00:05:10:19 - 00:05:38:21
Louka Parry
And so so what do we know? Because this idea of healing or attentional restoration or perhaps even engaging, you know, parasympathetic nervous system and Polly vagal theory, like what is it? What is it about the benefits of nature? Like why is it that we can go outside and kind of look at the fractals of a tree or, you know, listen to the ocean and it will somehow karma or help us co regulate what's really going on there around the emotional and social skills or the childhood development space.
00:05:38:21 - 00:05:41:10
Louka Parry
Because I've always been very curious about.
00:05:41:12 - 00:06:12:21
Cathrine Floyd
What, you know, it's really interesting. A lot of it has to do with colors. So for as an example, the human eye can detect more colors of green than it can of any other problem. And so our brains are hardwired to thrive in nature. They're hardwired to be able to look at the leaves and see the different colors and watch a squirrel run up or down and learn about gravity and learn about all of these wonderful things.
00:06:12:23 - 00:06:46:10
Cathrine Floyd
And so it's really about creating these spaces and children are able when you're outdoors, there's more collaboration, there's more cooperation, problem solving. They've seen instances of mental health disruptions go down, which should be them. And when we look at the fact that we are educating children that are citizens of the future and we don't know what the jobs are going to be like, we don't know what the environment is going to be like.
00:06:46:12 - 00:07:14:23
Cathrine Floyd
And so rather than focusing on these sort of rote memorization of things that you can measure on a test, yeah, we need to be looking at critical thinking and executive function and all of those things that are hard to quantify, you know, But when you sit down and ask an industry leader what what they want in their employees, they're not mentioning that they've memorized their ABCs and they know how to add 1.1.
00:07:14:23 - 00:07:49:08
Cathrine Floyd
They're not mentioning any of those skills. What they're mentioning are all these other things. You know, can they go into a situation that is completely new to them and use the skills that they have to solve a problem that's maybe never faced before? And those are the things that outdoor and nature based learning does for children. That's why it's become so important here as we're building these little, little people that we're going to be leaders in the future.
00:07:49:13 - 00:08:16:19
Louka Parry
Absolutely. I mean, it just feels like to me it's been it's the perfect environment. And yet for some some reason, I think we've as as you said, the kind of industrialization of our society and in all systems, including educational ones, seems to be thought, actually, no, it's going to be better for us to, you know, to really teach to teach the children as well as, you know, this distinction between teaching and learning, I think, is what I reflect on often as a as an educationalist.
00:08:16:19 - 00:08:37:07
Louka Parry
It's well, actually, sometimes, you know, we don't need to be directly instructing or explicitly instructed. What we need to do is for there to be an A like learning is as as a principal of a as a as an emergent principle, if we put it that way. And so, you know, nature is always about problem solving or discovery or curiosity.
00:08:37:09 - 00:08:50:21
Louka Parry
And yeah, this idea of like, you know, everyone to come back inside so you can now learn such it's kind of a strange framing, isn't it, really. Okay, recess is over. It's now time to go. And yet the learning never stops.
00:08:50:23 - 00:09:17:24
Cathrine Floyd
Even the word teacher. I've sometimes said, Wow, you know, I wish we didn't call them teachers. I wish we call them facilitators or something similar to that, because what we do then is we set up the environment, set up activities. We give this freedom, but freedom within safe parameters so that they are doing risk taking. But it's an acceptable risk.
00:09:18:05 - 00:09:19:08
Louka Parry
Yeah.
00:09:19:10 - 00:09:49:23
Cathrine Floyd
And so how do we think about ourselves as educators, as more of a facilitator to learn, as how do I help draw that out in a child's life, excite their natural curiosity? How do I bring out that little scientist who wants to understand why the answer going in a row and why not then create learning experiences based on their interests?
00:09:50:00 - 00:10:12:09
Cathrine Floyd
Because I can teach 1.1 plus one equals two. But if we find one acorn and then we find two acorns, and then you talk about that, we had one, and then we had another one, and now I have two. Yeah. And how much more then is a child's brain able to attach to that concept and it becomes more real to them?
00:10:12:11 - 00:10:41:15
Louka Parry
Absolutely. Katrina. I mean, I feel like this is this might be a constant struggle for parents. It seems like something has changed in our society about kind of how much time people spend with their young people. And some of the research on that, you know, people are working so much and so and then, of course, with the existence of digital technology, you know, the idea that screen time is so it's often used as a way in some ways to kind of give the young person something to engage in.
00:10:41:17 - 00:10:57:12
Louka Parry
And so like, how do we optimize the co-existence of of that digital world, which of course is is a reality and we don't want to shy away from, but also the physical nature spaces, spaces in terms of the way that we design our early childhood education.
00:10:57:14 - 00:11:20:01
Cathrine Floyd
Absolutely. And you know, you think about a parent who is working, maybe a parent who doesn't have transportation. So not only do they have to take the bus to work, they may work. So they have to come home. And the ease of having a child in front of a screen, I can I totally get it. I absolutely understand that sometimes you just need to decompress a little bit.
00:11:20:03 - 00:11:46:19
Cathrine Floyd
And so having those few minutes with your child, maybe watching their favorite television show or something on PBS, absolutely understandable. But I remember listening to kind of a guru on brain development and he said the one thing that parents always ask me is how do I help my child become smarter? And he said, my answer is put away the phone.
00:11:46:21 - 00:12:17:24
Cathrine Floyd
And he really talked about the interactions, the the serve and return of those conversations. And, you know, how frequently now do we see mom pushing the baby stroller and maybe she's on the phone or she's watching some videos and all those missed opportunities from watching all of those conversations. And I think it's really easy to to use technology as that time to be able to celebrate.
00:12:18:01 - 00:12:39:01
Cathrine Floyd
And I definitely commend anybody giving himself a break when they really need it. But the amount of learning that happens from you just having a conversation in the grocery store about what kind of apples you're going to pick out, what kind of cereal should we get? Oh, I love the color in this box. Well, we have four people in the family.
00:12:39:01 - 00:13:11:04
Cathrine Floyd
How many oranges do we need? And all of those conversations that parents think of, you know, just as maybe something is not important, it's critical inequities and the word gaps and the learning gaps. And this idea of any environment can be an ideal learning environment. All it takes is a child and an adult that's interested in helping that child kind of move and grow and enjoy.
00:13:11:06 - 00:13:35:01
Cathrine Floyd
Yeah, And I, I think too, you think about the fact that we're always thinking about children as what they'll be in the future, about enjoying them. Right. You know, how about really just sitting with a three year old in the grass and having an almost nonsensical conversation, whatever it is, or they make up jokes that don't make sense.
00:13:35:03 - 00:13:58:14
Cathrine Floyd
And all of those things that are building those neural pathways in a way that a screen never could. And everybody can do that no matter where you are, you know, in church or at home or on the playground or in the grocery store, all all of those places can be these ideal learning environments where kids are learning and growing and just being there.
00:13:58:16 - 00:14:01:05
Cathrine Floyd
Beauty wonderful themselves.
00:14:01:07 - 00:14:25:23
Louka Parry
I feel like between the the there's so much pressure that parents put on themselves, I think even to do this and I think even in our in our education systems like, oh, we need to get these kids ready or like learning loss is kind of one of the constructs that's come out of COVID, of course. And yet it is hugely concerning where we're seeing developmental gaps in cohorts of young people.
00:14:26:00 - 00:15:00:02
Louka Parry
And I feel like sometimes it's it's not so much it's let's try to cram some more things in. It's just it's like actually how do we utilize this time in the most optimal way possible and yeah, and allow those things to kind of again, to emerge to unfold in my work in schools, you know, going down into the early childhood center was always kind of the place that I would go when, you know, when you want to be reminded of why you do the work you do in education, because the young people are just so dynamic and fascinating and curious about the whole world.
00:15:00:04 - 00:15:27:11
Louka Parry
It's just really I think it's something that we all need. Again, we know it intrinsically, and yet we kind of need to design it deliberately because I want you to to speak to just the reality as well of different communities, because there is something about like access in particular, and even at the national levels, there are different kind of cultural practices where people spend a lot of time outside as opposed to, you know, being in an urban kind of concrete jungle type environment.
00:15:27:13 - 00:15:39:12
Louka Parry
You know, how do we think about nature based learning through an equity lens and think about the, you know, the creative solutions required then to gain access to the nature and the benefits that it has for all of us?
00:15:39:14 - 00:16:02:23
Cathrine Floyd
Yeah, that's it's a fabulous question because it really has come more to light because I wouldn't you know, I would love to hear people stop using learning loss because while children may be still behind on some of the rote memorization that we seem to want to require them to do, they learned a whole lot about germs. They learned a whole lot about washing your hands.
00:16:03:00 - 00:16:07:24
Cathrine Floyd
They I would bet most of them know what six feet is.
00:16:08:01 - 00:16:28:10
Cathrine Floyd
And so I think about the fact that children are learning all the time. And so there's not a learning loss. It's just that they learn different things than we had intended. And so a lot of them became quite savvy with how to talk to grandma on screen or how to do digital homework and all of those kinds of things.
00:16:28:10 - 00:16:57:08
Cathrine Floyd
So really giving credit to kids for how resilient they can be and all of that. But what we saw a lot was an increase in the understanding in the inequities in which we see it all the time. We see it with whatever people want to call it, the learning gap, the word gap, disadvantaged, under-resourced, all of those kinds of things.
00:16:57:08 - 00:17:24:07
Cathrine Floyd
But you know, what it boils down to is that there are kids in our world that don't have access to the same things that other kids do. And so if you are living in a very, very concrete in just realized part of town, you probably don't even have access to a park. So you probably don't. And maybe you have access to a park, but it's not a place where your mom or your daddy or my thinks is safe.
00:17:24:09 - 00:17:58:08
Cathrine Floyd
And so really, it's about the fact that you can take any of these environments and make small but significant changes. So if your child is not, you don't feel comfortable with them running outside and then just coming in when the streetlights come on. So maybe what you have is a small, small metal balcony. And so then maybe it really is about just finding some pots and some soil and putting a couple of things in there.
00:17:58:10 - 00:18:28:05
Cathrine Floyd
And it's those times when the dandelions come up through the cracks in the asphalt, right? There's been some writing about that, about finding nature where you are and pointing it out and say, Well, look at this. Yeah, is everything here is black and it's concrete. So what's happening right there? And so returning them to these discoveries, everything is, you know, nature lovers.
00:18:28:07 - 00:18:57:12
Cathrine Floyd
And it's about this idea, too, of the fact that there are cultural differences. There are differences racially income. And really looking at that idea of risk taking for a person who maybe lives in a place that they don't feel is safe, the idea of risk taking can be really scary. Yeah, what we're talking about is creating appropriate risk taking.
00:18:57:14 - 00:19:28:04
Cathrine Floyd
Yeah. So maybe walking on rocks instead of walking on the pavement because it's it's rocky and it challenges your balance and it does different things with brain. So there's so many different things that we can do that people don't need to too. I want to tell parents to relax. I think if I could get anything through to parents, just really, your child loves you to death, wants nothing more than to just spend time with you.
00:19:28:04 - 00:19:56:06
Cathrine Floyd
And even if that's just small snippets of time, but where you're kind of in that sacred space between my nose and your nose and you're having those little conversations and you're giggling and you're doing all those things, those are the things that are going to make them cognitively strong. And so don't worry about the flashcards, don't worry about the videos teaching them French when they're toddlers and those kinds of things.
00:19:56:06 - 00:20:10:20
Cathrine Floyd
It's really about enjoying that time because you talk a little bit about the difference between early morning and early childhood classic, the joy, the curiosity. All of this will contrast that with a sixth grade classroom.
00:20:10:22 - 00:20:12:03
Louka Parry
Yeah.
00:20:12:05 - 00:20:44:21
Cathrine Floyd
And how much more learning happens when you are engaged and enjoying and the teacher realizes that you have a love of monster traps. And so the whole thing on gravity or how fast it goes depends heavily on an inclined plane, but you're doing it with monster trucks and how much more of them children are taking in when we can see them as individuals and is just really capitalize on all of those things.
00:20:44:23 - 00:21:04:06
Cathrine Floyd
And so there are definitely ways to create more equitable access. And maybe it's just bringing in a big bucket with dirt because you don't you don't have a place outside. Maybe it's too hot. I mean, we have places on this planet, 120 degrees, right? So we certainly can bring in buckets of water.
00:21:04:08 - 00:21:05:14
Louka Parry
Yeah.
00:21:05:16 - 00:21:26:06
Cathrine Floyd
We certainly can do those kinds of things. And so not really worrying about these. It's wonderful if you can get a grant and you're going to completely transform the playground, but that's not always a reality. Yeah, but it's a reality that you can have every child who has to walk to school, pick up the pinecones, and you're going to make a big tub full of pinecones.
00:21:26:06 - 00:21:43:18
Cathrine Floyd
And we're going to talk about the snap you have on the fingers and and you know, what happens to the climate bonds. So there's just a lot of possibility out there. And so really helping parents and educators find the joy because when you join something that contagious.
00:21:43:20 - 00:22:04:11
Louka Parry
Yeah, absolutely The joy, you know, the the delight that young people have in their life in the sense of being alive and exploring, you know, asking questions after questions, you know, we sometimes we can feel is exhausting. But the point is, you know, it is this this beautiful curiosity that seems to be such a part of the human spirit.
00:22:04:13 - 00:22:22:07
Louka Parry
And yet for a range of different factors, as we've spoken about this idea of, okay, we're going to school, you now in a place that has four walls, that actually is enclosed and has maybe maybe some windows, maybe, you know, like even even the construction of the schools to be kind of inwards. Mr. Albert is such an interesting design decision.
00:22:22:07 - 00:22:59:13
Louka Parry
And I often reflect Katrina about, you know, outside of the challenges of access, really, so many of the challenges, the design problems now, the things have just been poorly. We've got a playground in the middle, but it's it's like the McDonald's type plastic playground where really there's there's very little breadth for exploration. And again, to our point about, you know, what's what's all this education for to expand into all these capabilities that make us really human and they really help us in the marketplace, for example, to be, you know, problem solvers and risk takers, collaborative, you know, critical thinkers, all these kinds of skills.
00:22:59:15 - 00:23:18:17
Louka Parry
And it somehow seems like we we in a well-intentioned, somewhat problematic way, remove them from the most ideal learning that there is, which is in the natural world, which of course is also the name of the subtitle of the report that you've authored, you know, at Trust for Learning, you know, nurturing all children in nature. I do. Learning in the natural world.
00:23:18:19 - 00:23:41:09
Louka Parry
And I mean, one of the things that really struck me looking at that was that today's children spend less than half the time playing outdoors than their parents did. And I mean, that's that it kind of feels really sad at some level, knowing that if you just, as you say, a couple of couple of six some leaves and it can be this entire kind of expansive piece.
00:23:41:09 - 00:24:06:21
Louka Parry
And I think, yeah, maybe sometimes that's what you said, that, you know, for the educators, it's kind of the design of a learning environment and the learning experience and then allowing the learning to emerge beautifully instead of having to. All right. We're going to work through textbook from page one to page 200. We've got to get your, you know, literacy, numeracy, which is critical skills, but to allow those to emerge through other other mechanisms of of cognition.
00:24:06:23 - 00:24:38:13
Cathrine Floyd
Absolutely. And allowing that environment to be a teacher, nice environment itself and the things that kids can do and engage in and touch and smell and taste and you know, you think about the talents of young children and the amount of mac and cheese and French fries and pizza and you growing carrots and and how likely is a child to try a carrot if they've watched it grow?
00:24:38:15 - 00:24:39:18
Louka Parry
Yeah.
00:24:39:20 - 00:25:02:11
Cathrine Floyd
So there's you know, there's just a lot of things that that parents can do that educators can do. And, you know, when you're designing these environments, we just we take all the grass out and we take the big rocks out because they're they're not, quote unquote, safe. But one of the best playgrounds I ever saw was just this big pad.
00:25:02:13 - 00:25:18:07
Cathrine Floyd
And they had put sand in it and two big boulders. And even and even though there was a big plastic red and green and yellow playground within sight, the kids wanted to play on the boulders with that.
00:25:18:09 - 00:25:19:10
Louka Parry
Interesting.
00:25:19:12 - 00:25:59:10
Cathrine Floyd
You know, And so why can't they why can't they the hills, why can't they climb trees? And yes, of course, sometimes things will happen, but they happen on those playgrounds, too. And so, you know, those playgrounds don't help kids navigate. Yeah. Things being unbalanced, things know all of those kinds of things. And so we really got to look at what is safety, what's appropriate for risk taking, because we can't put our kids in a in a bubble months and
00:25:59:10 - 00:26:06:09
Cathrine Floyd
things, you know, there's so much there's research on health and that children are healthier when they're outside.
00:26:06:11 - 00:26:35:14
Cathrine Floyd
And you hear parents and they say, you know, like, you know, my my, I can't let my child go out because it's cold and they're going to get a cold. Well, actually, being trapped in a classroom with 20 little people breathing on them is much more likely to give them the virus. That is a cold being outside. And so we've seen that that that whole idea that Norwegian say with there's no such thing is as bad weather, there is just bad clothing.
00:26:35:16 - 00:26:37:10
Louka Parry
It's a great it's a great principle.
00:26:37:10 - 00:26:49:08
Louka Parry
Again, some of the other cultural principle, I think it's freely, freely live like, you know, like in the Norwegian concept of fruit, like fresh air life, I think it translates as something like that, you know, and.
00:26:49:10 - 00:27:05:22
Cathrine Floyd
Look and preschools where they don't go inside. And it's interesting to work, particularly here in the United States, where there are states where it is nearly impossible to have an outdoor preschool because of the licensing requirements.
00:27:05:22 - 00:27:07:08
Louka Parry
That's interesting.
00:27:07:10 - 00:27:30:12
Cathrine Floyd
Places where you could be outside, you know, 300 days a year, but you can't because it's being inside those four walls that people consider safe. And rather than being outside and getting that fresh air and learning all those things about how you persevere and, you know, how do you how do you solve it.
00:27:30:14 - 00:27:57:01
Louka Parry
Just so it's just really obvious if you step back far enough and look look back at the construct of the system, you're like, Hmm, that's curious that this is one of the design features. And so my like my question, Katrina is as, as we design these systems of the future, as these early childhood environments and experiences like where are we, where are we going, what do you hope that we end up?
00:27:57:01 - 00:28:19:03
Louka Parry
So if we have this conversation at seven, 15 years and you think about the advocacy work that you're doing, the work that many kind of people are looking around the future of learning and trying to humanize that. Think about the multi dimensionality of human growth and development. What do you hope that reality is for us? And, you know, 2035 when we have a whole new cohort of young people, you know, in these settings?
00:28:19:05 - 00:29:01:22
Cathrine Floyd
We are. And I always I always like to tell people, you know, this isn't an emergency, but it's urgent because every cohort of three and four and five and six year olds that we miss, we missed that cohort. And so I just love the idea of policymakers, lawmakers, municipalities and counties and states and countries really looking at how are we moving this world so that children understand things so that they understand the whys about where it comes from, and why do we need animals, Why do we need these things?
00:29:01:24 - 00:29:27:06
Cathrine Floyd
And so there's just there's just ways of looking at the future and looking at what is it really that we want the kids, what do we really want for children? And then designing things that way and really starting to look at particularly education. Because now that the world has become more dangerous for you to just let your children go outside.
00:29:27:08 - 00:29:51:12
Cathrine Floyd
Education has a bigger and bigger response to the ability towards what used to happen at home and what used to happen out when you were across the street on the empty lot, learning all kinds of things about how much weight a branch could take if 15 children were sitting on it and all the things that kids don't always have access to.
00:29:51:14 - 00:29:58:02
Cathrine Floyd
We need to get some of that slack. We really need to be looking at why can't we teach lessons outside? Yes.
00:29:58:04 - 00:29:59:10
Louka Parry
Absolutely.
00:29:59:11 - 00:30:33:23
Cathrine Floyd
Why can't we teach math by using rocks and sticks and and things that happen in nature and learning what happens when you get a splinter and learning about what happens when you get stung by a bee or there's a spider and all of those things you're learning. You're learning that every living thing needs care. Yeah. And we want to make sure that these kids of the future are also able to look at the environment and feel a sense of joy, responsibility, stewardship.
00:30:34:00 - 00:31:05:01
Cathrine Floyd
You know what's going to happen if we don't have more bees? Well, let's talk about let's talk about what's a pollinator and what does that mean and what happens if we don't have pollinators. And so, so much learning that happens just in this everyday enriching world of being outside textures, the colors, you know, that flavors, all of those things that you can't get in the building that you can't it's sitting behind the desk.
00:31:05:03 - 00:31:30:18
Cathrine Floyd
And so I would love to see parents, educators, policymakers take a step back and think about what is it we really want for kids and is the memorization of the multiplication tables and whether or not a three year old knows all of their alphabet? Is that really what we want to get at? And when I ask people, what do you want for your children?
00:31:30:20 - 00:32:04:06
Cathrine Floyd
They want children who are engaged. They want children who see injustice and can fight it. They want children that are joyful, that find can find a job that they really love, that will be good parents. Those are the things taught in agencies. They really aren't. And so we're focusing on something that when we sit down and think about it and it's not really what we want for our kids and more language they know, the more experiences they have, the easier it is for them to pick up on academic concepts.
00:32:04:08 - 00:32:44:14
Cathrine Floyd
And so that's why people are surprised when I say to them, Actually, you can boost standardized test scores and it's not by using flashcards. It's all about engagement, it's by getting kids interested. And let's turn sixth grade into a place where children enjoy them. We can do it. We really can do it. And so we who know better and have looked at all of this research, really being vocal and really helping families, other partners to understand that there's a there's a lot at stake, but it's not a lost cause.
00:32:44:14 - 00:32:55:07
Cathrine Floyd
There is just many things that we can do, particularly in early childhood. And we have a conversation with four year olds. The world is a good place.
00:32:55:09 - 00:33:32:00
Louka Parry
We can learn a lot. We really can learn or remember a lot from our youngest learners. Katrina's been a delight to speak with you. I love the passion and. I think this is again, there will be a moment where I often wonder about how we'll be judged by, you know, the current design or the current principles. And I think we'll look back in 15 time, in 15 years time, hopefully, and go like, Oh yeah, we we kind of lost lost track of, you know, what we know intrinsically and the evidence overwhelmingly telling us it what's best for our young people and actually for the adults that teach them too, is kind of to be in
00:33:32:00 - 00:33:44:10
Louka Parry
these spaces, to be exploratory and to be playful. And so my last question is, what's the take home message that you'd like to leave us with here? You know, ruminating on thinking about.
00:33:44:12 - 00:34:09:08
Cathrine Floyd
No, I know. Talk a little bit about it. But I think for parents, what I would love to tell parents is want to stress, you know, there are just so many wonderful things that you can give to children, regardless of your circumstances or your income level or any of those kinds of things. You learn so much from us.
00:34:09:08 - 00:34:37:14
Cathrine Floyd
And so don't worry so much about, you know, all of those things that in the end kids are going to be able to Google on their phone. So so really, it's about, you know, teaching them how to do access services. It's not teaching them to memorize things. And so so parents enjoy your children. I think if we if parents could do that, you're going to see everything blossom from there.
00:34:37:16 - 00:35:06:00
Cathrine Floyd
So just enjoy watching them. And I think for educators, too, we have to be willing to stand up and say, Yes, I understand that. We want you to have these good standardized test scores, but let's also talk about those things that aren't as easy to measure. Let's also talk about those things that are important to the future. So if you're if you're an educator or even family's out there, I would love to hear you go to trust the Learning Board.
00:35:06:02 - 00:35:35:07
Cathrine Floyd
My information is there. If you've got questions about things, particularly for young children and their families, you know, we'd love to engage with you because there's so much out there, there's so much possibility, there's so much hope, there's so much you know, you don't have to be pessimistic. You don't have to worry as much as we do. Take that time to have that conversation with a two year old who's just now.
00:35:35:09 - 00:35:39:15
Louka Parry
It brings him joy, some joy and predictability back into life.
00:35:39:17 - 00:36:05:13
Cathrine Floyd
Well, kids are hysterical, like tap into that. They're you there and they're joyous and they're just everything is new to them. And they can sit look at a dandelion for an hour and just sit there with them. You know, there's there's really there's really no end to to what you can do and just follow their lead and enjoy life with them because they see that.
00:36:05:15 - 00:36:29:09
Cathrine Floyd
And and children with joyful families are much more likely to be joyful themselves in the house or you look around, look around. Is there a way that you can reduce inequity in a community? Is there a way that you can talk to the local hardware store about getting some pots and some dirt? There's a lot we can do, so never, ever despair.
00:36:29:09 - 00:36:37:08
Cathrine Floyd
We can really play leads, learning. And so the more you play with your kids, the more learning that happens. So enjoy.
00:36:37:10 - 00:36:56:10
Louka Parry
It's beautiful. And it really, I think, calls on the principles of ideal learning that that all the research and the reports that you've also created Katrina, I think really insightful for all of us. Look, thank you so much for joining us for the Learning Featured podcast in the beautiful natural environment I see behind you as well. It's been a.
00:36:56:10 - 00:37:08:06
Cathrine Floyd
Better time than you can see the the trees. And we plant a tree every year, even in our little suburban area and trying to bring as much nature as possible.
00:37:08:06 - 00:37:21:10
Louka Parry
Oh, it's beautiful. Well, you know, we forget we are nature so often. And so when we say we're disconnected from nature, we're often disconnected from ourselves. It's a beautiful Andy Goldsworthy quote, I think so.
00:37:21:12 - 00:37:23:03
Cathrine Floyd
Take a role grasp.
00:37:23:05 - 00:37:26:07
Louka Parry
Absolutely is to a role in the grass. Thank you, sir.
00:37:26:09 - 00:37:28:20
Cathrine Floyd
Thank you. I appreciate your time.