By Rachel Zielinski, QUALITYstarsNY Quality Improvement Specialist, Finger Lakes

In May, the Finger Lakes Quality Improvement Specialists, in collaboration with Monroe County Library’s Children’s Services Consultant Tonia Burton, welcomed family and group family child care providers to the Maplewood Community Library for an amazing day of outdoor learning! The hands-on professional development event, titled “Nature Nurtures Literacy: Books, Bugs, & Backpack Learning,” focused on enriching children’s literacy experiences by embracing nature and the outdoors.

Family and group family providers experienced:

  • Interactive Presentation: Tonia Burton shared developmentally appropriate ways to embed literacy into daily programming, engaging participants with children’s books and hands-on materials.
  • Make-and-Take Stations: Providers created resources and gathered materials to use immediately in their own programs.
  • Diverse Learning Tracks: Stations featured literacy games, outdoor scavenger hunts, recycled material crafts, WXXI/PBS Kids nature-based resources, and active play activities spanning all learning domains.
  • Participants thoroughly enjoyed the day, using the time to network, share creative ideas, and brainstorm strategies to enhance their program quality.

Ways to Explore Nature and Build Literacy with Kids

  • The National Association for the Education of Young Children has some fun, low-cost, and easy-to-incorporate activities for providers and families to engage in that encourage exploring the world around us.
  • Head over to your local hardware store and pick up paint chips of various colors, or better yet, have your kids paint index cards in your art area. Use the cards to seek out items within the environment that are the same or similar color. This is a wonderful activity to get up and moving, decrease stress, learn colors, and build vocabulary.
  • Go on a Rainbow Walk.

Can’t get outside? Reach out to your local librarian to find age-appropriate books that you can add to your daily routine. Nature books for our youngest learners help build early environmental awareness and curiosity about the outdoors.

The Finger Lakes team values its rich, collaborative relationship with the Monroe County Library System and WXXI PBS Kids and deeply appreciates their joint efforts to support local providers, children, and families. This wonderful event was a reminder that nature is a multi-sensory teacher and we can find low-cost, simple ways to enhance our children’s experiences, fostering a lifelong love for exploration and scientific curiosity right in our own backyards.