Forest Educator with Ricardo Sierra | A Podcast for Revolutionary Conversations about Nature-Based Education
Welcome to the Forest Educator Podcast hosted by Ricardo Sierra. Join Ricardo as he engages in enlightening conversations with educators from across the globe who are revolutionizing nature-based education. Drawing on his 35 years of experience in wilderness education, Ricardo shares practical insights, tools, and best practices to inspire and support forest educators and camp staff worldwide. Tune in twice a week for interviews with passionate educators and skill spotlights that delve into the challenges and triumphs of the field.
- Update frequency
- every 3 days
- Average duration
- 54 minutes
- Episodes
- 164
- Years Active
- 2023 - 2025
Episode 123 - The Discovery Process at the Walden Project with Andy Webster
If you could learn or study anything, what would you choose? If you had ample time, space and a little support, could you learn and grow as a person? Can you develop your own style of creativi…
01:03:16 |
Thu 08 Aug 2024
Episode 122 - Forest Educator Spotlight: When Things Go Sideways
If you haven't been in a situation where something happens that is unexpected, then congratulations! You probably have an amazing overworked program director who is really NAILING IT as far as logis…
00:49:46 |
Mon 05 Aug 2024
Episode 121 - Adventures in Ethnobotany with Zak Baker
To many (most?) people in our current culture, nature is a literal 'wall of green' that contains plants, trees, vines, bushes and shrubs, all interwoven in a way that is virtually indistinguishable f…
01:10:56 |
Thu 01 Aug 2024
Episode 120 - Forest Educator Spotlight: The Power of Slowing Down
I'm pretty sure we could all benefit from reducing the frenetic pace that seems to go hand in hand with our modern culture. It's a great topic, but it's not what I'm describing in this episode! Inst…
00:51:21 |
Mon 29 Jul 2024
Episode 119 - The Value of Soft Skills and Deep Land Connection in the Canadian Shield with Chris Gilmour
Life in the Great White North can be cold and hard at times, but that makes the warmer seasons all the sweeter, from Maple Syrup Season to Sumac Gathering and so much more. The power of nature is re…
00:55:40 |
Thu 25 Jul 2024
Episode 118 - Forest Educator Spotlight: Survival Trek, 1986
It was early August, in Harlemville New York. It was a six week immersion into the natural world, in one of my first 'wilderness skills learning intensives', with just a few tools, a blanket and a d…
01:04:10 |
Mon 22 Jul 2024
Episode 117 - Forest Educator Spotlight: The Value of Goals, Metrics and Evaluating Your Outcomes
In the olden days, before the internet, when you ran a workshop or a skills class or wild foods program, you could usually skip the student evaluation forms and questionnaires. Participants just 'go…
00:42:07 |
Thu 18 Jul 2024
Episode 116 - Forest Educator Spotlight: Navigating the Inner Barriers of Visionary Work
It's one thing to have a 'vision' or idea that is inspiring and exciting and full of hope and promise. It's also a WHOLE other thing to actually bring it into the real world, grounded and fully expr…
00:53:41 |
Mon 15 Jul 2024
Episode 115 - The Visionary Work of with Monica Eastway, Eco-Geriontologist
There are literally piles of research about the benefits of contact with nature for human beings, and most of the time, we think of 'forest experiences' primarily for children. Monica Eastway shares…
01:16:54 |
Thu 11 Jul 2024
Episode 114 - Forest Educator Spotlight: Harnessing the Nature of Time
Ever since I was a kid I was always fascinated by the concept of 'time'.
I know I am not alone, because it's a pretty popular theme over the last four decades or so. Madeline L'Engle's Wrinkle I…
00:50:45 |
Mon 08 Jul 2024
Episode 113 - Change, Adaptation and Evolution- How Alderleaf Wilderness College is Responding to the Pandemic and Cultural Shifts with Jason Knight
If there is a defining moment for nature education in the past five years, it always seems to be found during the Covid Pandemic. It was in this time that we see major shifts in the way we work, tea…
01:13:30 |
Thu 04 Jul 2024
Episode 112 - Forest Educator Spotlight: Preparing our Children for Climate Change
There is one thing that is certain in our world, whether or not we 'believe' in climate change, and that is that our lives and the lives of our young students, is going to change. A lot.
Being ad…
00:53:55 |
Tue 02 Jul 2024
Episode 111 - The Origins of Nick Hulley, Social Forester
I've always been able to quickly tell the difference between someone with years of actual hands on experience in bushcraft, nature skills or crafts, from those with just a little. It's seen mostly i…
00:56:41 |
Thu 27 Jun 2024
Episode 110 - Forest Education Spotlight: What's in a Name? The Challenge of Choosing Program Names
Some Forest Educators seem to create amazing program and organization names effortlessly, with titles that evoke strong feelings, qualities and almost magnetic pull that draws in people excited to pa…
01:05:20 |
Mon 24 Jun 2024
Episode 109 - Community Supported Nature Programs with Jen Smith, MS
In a small town in Texas near Fort Worth, there is a program that seems to do everything. On the surface, they seem like a typical summer camp, but they do so many other special things that serve th…
00:57:46 |
Fri 21 Jun 2024
Episode 108 - Forest Educator Spotlight: Portals Into the Unknown
When it comes to nature awareness and personal awareness, I've found it useful to see and perceive it in a few different ways. Sometimes I see it in a mythological or 'rite of passage' perspective…
01:03:50 |
Mon 17 Jun 2024
Episode 107 - Understanding the Challenges of the Developing Child's Brain, Part Two - with Wendolyn Bird
When we remove all of the 'non-teaching stuff' that surrounds our profession, we educators are left with an opportunity- to connect with the 'still maturing' mind of our young students. We can have…
00:45:49 |
Thu 13 Jun 2024
Episode 106 - Forest Educator Spotlight: Are Nature Educators 'Healers'?
There is no question that being in nature is 'healing' in both a practical and therapeutic sense, because this has been demonstrated in an impressive list of nature focused studies by researchers in …
00:51:02 |
Mon 10 Jun 2024
Episode 105 - Understanding the Challenges of the Developing Child's Brain, Part One - with Wendolyn Bird
When we remove all of the 'non-teaching stuff' that surrounds our profession, we educators are left with an opportunity- to connect with the 'still maturing' mind of our young students. We can have…
00:39:03 |
Thu 06 Jun 2024
Episode 104 - Forest Educator Spotlight: The Alchemy of Food
There are so many powerful learning elements that are part of the expansive topic of 'Food', it's hard to know where to start. When it comes to nature based learning, campfire cooking and 'hearthc…
01:03:08 |
Mon 03 Jun 2024
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