Logistics

Signing Up to Lead a Walk

During the heavy walk season, Audubon’s program director will email you a list of upcoming walks – dates, times, school name, and grade. You can email back or call to sign up to observe or lead a walk. If you are at the Center, ask to see the calendar and we’ll get you signed up in person!

Preparing for Your Walk

On Your Mark: Your preparations begin at home. Check the weather and dress appropriately. Don’t forget your watch! Keeping track of the time is very important!

Get Ready: Plan to arrive at the center at least 30 minutes before the scheduled walk. This allows time to talk with the staff, pack your bag, and make a few mental plans. Some Trail Guides prefer to arrive even earlier and walk their route just to see what’s out. Things change so quickly, especially in spring.

Get Set: When bus arrival time is imminent, staff will pass out the signs – Ants, Bullfrogs, Catfish, and Dragonflies – so that students can quickly organize when they get off the bus. There may be a slight delay while lunches are being stashed. If so, use this time to chat with the children. Also, check with staff to make sure there have been no changes to the schedule. Make sure you know what time you must be back and what is happening after the walk!

Go: Once everyone is settled into a group, off you’ll go.

The Rules

Establish Guidelines for Behavior: Take your group aside and form a circle. Introduce yourself and go over some basic rules. Here are some examples of things you can say:

This is a wildlife sanctuary. It is home to many interesting plants and animals. We are visitors here. It is up to us to make sure the plants and animals are safe.
You can’t take anything home with you. We see thousands of people here every year. If each one took something home, there would be nothing left! We will explore feathers and pinecones and rocks. But we will leave everything here for others to discover.
Stay on the Trail. At some point along the walk, we may go off the trail just a little when we are doing an activity. When we are walking, it is important that you stay in the center of the trail. We have plenty of Poison Ivy and brambles and we don’t want to send you home with a rash or all scratched up!
Stay with the Group. I am responsible for bringing back the same number of children that I started with, so please help me by staying with us. Also, if you let me go first, I will set a pace that hopefully won’t scare the wildlife and we will have a better chance of seeing animals. (Count the people in your group and make sure you don’t lose anyone!)
Encourage the adult(s) to participate in all the activities and model good behavior.

The Walk

(There are ideas on other pages for what activities and lessons to include in your walk. Here, I’ll just describe one. Check Tools To Help You, Activities and Games, Audubon Destinations and other pages for more ideas.)

A Flow of Activities: Once the rules have been established, introduce your first destination. Your walk should be a series of stops and activities that flow nicely together. Perhaps you have planned to explore the Herb and Butterfly garden first. Say something that will make the kids curious and excited about what they might see… or smell.

For example, you might say something like, “OK, let’s get started! Our first stop today will be a garden full of aromatic plants. Does anybody know what aromatic means?” If no one can guess, tell them: “It means smelly! And this garden has some very interesting smells: toothpaste, jelly beans, pizza, pepsi, mouthwash, furniture polish and lots more.”

Give guidelines for how the children should explore: “You don’t have to pick a plant to smell it. Use your thumb and one finger to gently rub a leaf… then smell your finger. Try to smell at least three different plants.” Enter the garden and demonstrate, perhaps on a mint leaf. “Oh! This one smells like toothpaste!” Interact with the children. Find out what smells they like and which ones they don’t. Allow a certain amount of free exploration.

Once you feel the kids have had enough smelling, draw them away from the garden and form a circle again. Reflect on what you just did. “Let’s go around the circle and find out what your favorite or least favorite smell was. I’ll start: I really did not like that one plant that smelled like Listerine mouthwash!”

From here, introduce your next destination and start down the trail.

Try to model each stop/activity after this example – (1) an introduction that gets the kids curious, (2) an activity that involves some guided and some free exploration, and (3) a wrap-up. Not every stop will be like this. For example, if you are showing your group how to monitor a bird box, that will be a little mini-lecture and there will be no free exploration!
Teachable Moments: Be flexible enough that if something catches the attention of one of your students you can stop and include it in your walk. You may have been heading to the Stump Garden to look for worms and sowbugs. But if one of your children notices a chipmunk hole, gather around it to talk about chipmunks! Go with the flow and the interest of your group.
Time: Keep close track of the time. It is really, really, really important to have the children back on time… whether it is for lunch or to board the busses. Don’t be the group that holds everyone else up. In order to get back on time you may have to change your planned route, or do fewer activities.
Sharing Circle: One of the items you should always pack is a half-sized clipboard with pencil and sheets that say at the top, “We went to Audubon and we saw…” At the end of the walk, gather your group into one final circle and tell them that you are going to make a list of all the things they saw. The list will go back to school with them so they can remember everything and maybe write about it, or do an art project about their fieldtrip.

Go around the circle and ask each child to say just one thing they remember. Ask the grown-up(s), too. Once everyone has had the chance to give one thing, you can keep going around the circle until all the ideas are used up. Usually, everyone shares something. But if not, make a mental note. (Some trail guides like to give the clipboard to the adult in the group. This allows them to better facilitate the sharing circle, staying focused on the children, rather than on the writing.)

After The Walk

Sometimes, a group will have to get right on the bus after the walk. Other times, they will be staying for lunch and a self-guided building tour. Once you have situated your group either on the bus, or with their teachers for lunch or a self-guided portion of the walk, you are no longer responsible for the children. But, you’re not done!

Empty your pack: put things back where you found them, clean items first – if necessary.
Discovery Walk Evaluation Form: Record the date, school, number in your group, number who shared during the Sharing Circle, and the number who showed respect for nature.
Debrief: Find a staff member for a short debrief on how things went. Report any incidents of note – positive or negative.
Future Walks: Check the calendar! Sign up for another walk!
Volunteer Records: Record the date, your name, and number of hours on the volunteer sign in sheet. Include prepartion, cleanup time, and debrief time.
Thank you! Sometimes we’ll be busy with the next group when you are ready to leave… and we won’t be there to thank you in person. Know that you are loved and appreciated for your dedication to Audubon. Pat yourself on the back. Eat a chocolate Kiss.