Volunteers Keep Hands-On Science Alive in US Classrooms

Program ensures creative approaches despite increasing pressure for standardized instruction

May 23, 2011

Four Winds Director Lisa Purcell leads a science workshop for 1st graders at Barstow Memorial School in Chittenden, Vermont.

When it comes to making science fun, Lisa Purcell is a pro. Mimicking an owl or a foraging squirrel is all in a day's work for the director of the Four Winds Nature Institute. On this particular morning, she’s training volunteers from three Vermont towns, Shrewsbury, Chittenden and Mendon to teach an elementary school workshop on owls.

Purcell and several colleagues founded the Four Winds Nature Institute in 2006. Their school workshops are modeled after a similar program created back in the 1970s by the Vermont Institute of Natural Science.

Community-based science education

Purcell worked for VINS for years as a science educator. But, she says, as VINS focused more of its energy on building its new headquarters, Purcell and others spun off Four Winds to ensure that the community-based science education program remained strong.

That's especially critical at a time when American teachers are under increasing pressure to fit more standardized instruction into their school day. Science educators say that, too often, the hands-on study of natural sciences can get short-changed.