Field visiting attentively with the wisdom of Pooh Bear… (and friends) @Attention2Place #GAConf21 #fieldvisiting

Or … A lively workshop, in which Helen Clarke, Sharon Witt and some of their friends go ‘visiting’ the Geographical Association E–Conference … April 2021

Welcome … Entrances should entrance. From garden gates to opening lines in a book, openings should take readers … into new worlds. They draw us in and take us on new journeys of the mind’ (Aalto, 2015: 94). On this journey, in our virtual space, we aim to:

• attend to and with the everyday • propose a shift FROM fieldwork TO field visiting as curious practice • explore how to respond with the more-than-human world • demonstrate compassionate field visiting • share enquiry ideas for place, landscapes, and belonging • be guided by Winnie the Pooh and his friends. Come along with us for an Adventure…

‘ was putting on his Big Boots. When he saw the Big Boots, Pooh knew that an Adventure was going to happen, and he brushed the honey off his nose with the back of his paw and spruced himself up so as to look Ready for Anything.’ Winnie the Pooh Written by A.A.Milne and illustrated by E.H. Shepherd A Curriculum Adventure! With a focus on the everyday The National Curriculum for England: local: Geography (DfE 2013) • Locational knowledge – characteristics of place, A high-quality geography features, contextual education should inspire in information pupils a curiosity and • Place knowledge – real and fascination about the world special places and its people that will • Human/Physical Geography remain with them for the rest – features and vocabulary of their lives (DfE, 2013). (river, forest, soil, weather, house…) • Fieldwork and geographical skills - maps & photos, directions, skills of observe/measure/record/pr Curiosity always leads its practitioners a bit too far off esent, response, the path, and that way lie stories (Haraway, 2015: 5-6). stewardship ‘More-than’ the Wisdom is more than the product of accumulated knowledge, National Curriculum it is ‘an activity of knowing’ Experiences that open fieldwork spaces, (Hart,2001:7) where children come into relations with the world, deepen understanding and develop intimate connections with the everyday local. Winnie the Pooh … Imaginative tales in real places The stories started close to home – with a walnut tree in Milnes’s garden (Aalto, 2015:95). • 1924 • 1926 Winnie the Pooh • 1927 • 1928 • 1966 Disney …

• 2020 Dolan, A. Winnie the Pooh: inspiration for geographical and outdoor learning, In Touch April 2020, 49-50 In the company of characters Characters: • connect children & teachers with the intricacies of their local place • animate children’s real world geographic encounters • inspire opportunities for lively, spirited enquiry • develop alternative perspectives and offer different views ‘From beloved blankets to threadbare stuffed animals, children – in Western cultures especially –carry and caress • extend observation skills. soft objects for comfort and for play’ (Aalto, 2015: 112). Characterful, imaginative geographical learning

Children’s geographers should acknowledge the importance of play and be more playful in academic work themselves (Woodyer, 2012).

Playfulness involves paying attention, deepening understanding, strengthening geographical awareness and fostering ethics and care (Pyyry, 2013).

Cuddly toys are examples of material and popular cultures which are not written about by children’s geographers … yet have importance in the everyday lives of children (Horton, 2015; Woodyer, 2018). Location: Ashdown Forest, . A map of

Use directional, locational and place specific vocabulary

Winnie the Pooh Written by A.A.Milne and illustrated by E.H. Shepherd Where in your local area?

Create a map inspired by E. H. Shepherd

• The North (Pole) • Bees? • Big stones and Rox! • Friends’ houses (real or imagined)? • Raletions houses ! • A floody place ? • Boggy places • A nice place for picknicks? • A gloomy place • A river ? A wood? • A place to play? • A trap for ? • A place where the Woozle wasn’t! OWL MAPS AND PATHS SPECIAL PLACES Maps , directions Is a place-maker of dens, aerial views he loves corners and gloomy places POOH SMALL WORLDS HUNTING GATHERING Finds small worlds to Loves collecting, play in, curates tiny foraging, helping, sharing things

RABBIT ANIMAL ALLIES ADVENTURE Has many relations and Moving around- jump friends, he understands scamper balance, climb communities slide

KANGA & Sobel’s 7 Design Principles for Children and Nature FANTASY AND IMAGINATION … adapted for Winnie the Pooh (Clarke & Witt 2021) Places to play, childhood, stories and puppets Pooh loves adventures… Piglet is curious … Eeyore loves place-making…

Tigger likes to bounce and take a bird’s eye view …. Kanga keeps her feet on the ground for baby Roo

Rabbit digs and burrows underground … And you?

Owl takes a different view Triangulation pillars are always fun … just because! In which Pooh and friends visit the …

Adapt deep mapping ideas for your location, for your contexts and for the everyday experiences of your children In which Pooh and friends stay local and find everyday curiosities in … Knowle Village In which Pooh and friends visit… Lee-on-Solent and they ponder seascapes In which Pooh and friends visit someone else’s forest … and compare what’s different In which Pooh and friends discover what’s under their feet and explore geology In which Pooh and friends watch as a river flows by … … In which Pooh and friends make connections between local and global events In which Pooh and friends share an Expotition to the North Pole … with student teachers • Getting our bearings and using maps • Thinking about why every primary child should climb a hill (Jeremy Krause) • Coming to know the features of chalk landscapes • Playing Pooh Sticks to observe river flow • Place-making - finding Eeyore's gloomy place • Getting to know each other with a picnic and honey biscuits To be compassionate is to feel deeply for other beings (and more than human kin) … resilience, wellbeing

To be compassionate is not just to care, but to show that you care (about and with the world) Compassionate … reciprocity, gratitude, non-colonising, geographies… non-exploitative AND To be compassionate is to be empathetic compassionate (in relation with the world) geographers … tolerance, individuality, uniqueness

Piglet: ‘The things that make me different are the things that make me’ (Milne) Response-ability

re-tuning one’s ability to sense and respond Responsible, responsive, we are all response-able in AND different ways response-able response-abilities are geographers strengthened in stories

after Haraway (2015) From curriculum fieldwork To Field-visiting

Field-visiting – Compassionate, expansive, generative, curious response-able practices geographers ... • Attending & attuning • Thinking-with, in collective relations • Slowing down, being polite Field-visiting • Being open to possibilities • Asking interesting questions • Responding and creating stories after Haraway (2015) with place Rabbit stopped and listened …‘and everything stopped and listened with him..’

‘And Tigger, who had been hiding behind trees and jumping out on Pooh’s shadow when it wasn’t looking …’ Field-visiting with Pooh and friends ‘The wind had dropped, and the snow, tired of rushing round in circles trying to catch itself up, now fluttered gently down until it found a place on which to rest…’

A.A. Milne Landscape Wisdom:

Attending & attuning Embodied knowing… moving through a landscape

Can you spot: • Owl flying? • Tigger bouncing? • Kanga jumping? • Winnie the Pooh ambling and looking up for honey? Landscape Wisdom:

Thinking-with, in collective relations finding, curating, the fascinating in the mundane

#fortheloveoftinythings • Noticing the material elements of a place • getting to know whose company you keep • curating museums of found objects Landscape Wisdom: Slowing down, being polite

‘Don’t underestimate the value of Doing Nothing, of just going along, listening to all the things you can’t hear, and not bothering’ (Milne).

‘Rivers know this: there is no hurry. We shall get there some day’ (Milne). Place meditations S-L-O-W-I-N-G D-O-W-N Soulful geography – well-being Downland Meditation Landscape Wisdom: Meditative, Soulful Geography

Value quiet moments as: • an opportunity to be with the natural world • a chance to wait… to see what reveals • a moment to listen • a time to be still • a spiritual space to ponder ‘ …a hide-and-seek landscape, with woods and treehouses providing refuges and places to be small’ (Aalto, 2015: 154) Landscape Wisdom: Being open, to possibilities

‘A slow and intimate way to navigate a new place, walking adventures, as we also see with Christopher Robin, connect children with nature in wonderful ways’ (Aalto, 2015:13). Drifting with characters …

Experimental walking practices • encourage children’s noticing • offer invitations and prompts • stimulate enquiry, to investigate the school grounds, a familiar area in the locality or an unknown location • provide opportunities for voyages of discovery in a spirit of playfulness • develop children’s skills as ‘living geographers’ (Mitchell, 2009) Drifting:

letting the landscape lead

lookingup # Landscape Wisdom: Thoughtful spots… Asking interesting questions ‘Often when Pooh visits his Thoughtful Spot, he sits down, taps his head, closes one eye, and says, "Think, think, think." That is a sign that he is thinking hard’.

From the V and A Museum Winnie the Pooh Exhibition 2017-18 In Which Piglet Is entirely surrounded by water …

Enquiry : How can Pooh and his friends save Piglet from the flood? In Which Pooh spies bees high in a tree …

Winnie the Pooh’s favourite food is honey. When Pooh hears a loud buzzing noise coming from the top of a large oak tree, he decides to take a closer look. He climbs and he climbs, and he climbs when CRACK! – the branch breaks. But there is more than one way to reach the top of the tree… If he had a balloon, perhaps he could drift up and fool the bees into thinking he is a cloud, floating in the blue… A.A. Milne

Enquiry : How can Pooh reach the honey? In Which Pooh goes visiting and gets stuck in a tight place

So he started to climb out of the hole. He pulled with his front paws, and pushed with his back paws, and in a little while his nose was out in the open again … and then his ears … and then his front paws …and then his shoulders… and then – "Oh help!” said Pooh. A.A. Milne

Enquiry : ……How can Pooh escape from this tricky spot? In Which Pooh thinks with other beings

We wonder what enquiries there would be in the beach, in the park, in the town, in the city…? Landscape Wisdom: responding and creating stories with place

narrating field encounters Landscape Wisdom: responding and creating stories with place

creating narratives of response-bility

“Tracks” said Piglet. “Paw marks.” He gave a little squeak of excitement. “Oh Pooh. Do you think it’s a – a – a Woozle?” A. A. Milne Landscape Wisdom: responding and creating stories with place narrating imagination ‘Simply, promoting imagination about our edgy and othered relationships with various versions of natures – our own, others and the others ‘out there’ is, I argue, a pedagogical key to becoming something other beyond our rationally assumed and narrow sense of self.’ (Payne, 2010: 296). From curriculum fieldwork to Field-visiting – as expansive generative curious practice Field-visiting Cultivating curious practices: ❖ Attending & attuning ❖ Thinking-with, in collective relations ❖ Slowing down, being polite ❖ Being open, to possibilities ❖ Asking interesting questions ❖ Responding and creating stories with place Field-visiting: You are never alone in a more-than-human world . (Clarke and Witt,2020) Field-visiting: with a geography rucksack

Attend, Attune, Respond ‘… it matters what stories we tell to tell other stories with … that’s how worlding gets on …’ (Haraway in Le Guin,2019:3) Every child deserves to visit enchanted places in the company of friends.

The Hundred Acre Wood is a storybook landscape…

Any landscape can be your story …

‘The real and imagines places of the Hundred Acre Wood are tender touchstones for the precious time of childhood. Milne’s books remind us that aimless wandering and doing Nothing is actually a very big Something for little ones’ (Aalto1215: 15). Contact: [email protected] [email protected]

@Attention2Place #GAConf21 #fieldvisiting Illustrations from the V and A Museum Winnie the Pooh Exhibition 2017-18 Illustrations from the V and A Museum Winnie the Pooh Exhibition 2017-18 Please use a QR reader to access the files from the session :

Please let us know if you use any of these ideas in school. We would love to know. @attention2place References • Aalto, K. (2015) The Natural World of Winnie the Pooh. Portland: Timber Press • DFE (2013) National Curriculum for England: Geography https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/239044/PRIMARY_ national_curriculum_-_Geography.pdf • Dolan, A. (2020) Winnie the Pooh: inspiration for geographical and outdoor learning, In Touch April 2020, 49-50 • Le Guin, U. (2019) The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction. Newcastle Upon Tyne: Ignota Books • Haraway, D. (2015) A Curious Practice . ANGELAKI - Journal of the Theoretical Humanities, 20(2) http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0969725X.2015.1039817 • Haraway, D. (2016) Staying with the Trouble. Durham: Duke University Press • Horton, J. (2018) For the love of cuddly toys. Children’s Geographies https://doi.org/10.1080/14733285.2018.1457735 • Milne, A.A. (1926) Winnie-the-Pooh London: Methuen & Co. • Mitchell, D. (2009) Living Geography. Cambridge: Chris Kington Publishers • Payne, P. (2010) Remarkable-tracking, experiential education of the ecological imagination. Environmental Education Research, Vol.16, Nos.3-4, 295-310 • Pyyry, N. (2016) Learning with the city via enchantment: photo-walks as creative encounters. Discourse – Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 37:1, 102-115 • Sobel, D. (2008) Childhood and Nature: Design Principles for Educators. Portland: Stenhouse • Woodyer, T. (2018) The Wonderful Thing about Tiggers. Children’s Geographies, 16:4 465-469