Advanced Topics in Lifecraft #3 Learning as Transformation

This deep sky is for me a visual representation of the possibility of  deep learning

In this essay, I am taking a somewhat different tact, using by permission, the Learning Model of the Academy for the Love of Learning. This has been developed over many years and is explored through the Academy’s programs. I believe Seton would have understood this approach since observation and experience were key to his view of learning.

We can enter the Learning Model by referring to events from Seton’s life, and then follow up with questions that we can ask about our own. Learning Model components create the basis of all programs offered through the Academy. Even in its simplest form, it brings personal engagement to the learning process, invites creativity and insight, and the establishes the potential for deep learning. Four key elements of the model (below) are also inherent to the meaning of Seton’s Lifecraft.

The Academy’s founder, Aaron Stern, while he was developing the fundamentals of his organization’s approach to education, had no knowledge of Seton or his ideas on Lifecraft. It may be too much to claim convergence of the two sets of ideas, but there are parallels which I mentioned in the previous essay (Lifecraft #2).

When Aaron made an agreement with Dee Seton Barber (Seton’s daughter) to provide the Seton Legacy with an institutional home at the Academy, he saw that Seton’s life illustrated one of the Academy’s core principles: one can become the change that one wants to see in the world. To learn more, we invite you to visit the Academy’s web site (the link is above) as well as the campus at Seton Village to take part in its programs. (In the meantime, we are happy to hear your thoughts on all of this.)

While there is no direct connection between Seton’s Fourfold Path and the four aspects of the Academy’s Learning Model (the number of four being coincidence), you may wish to join me in consideration of the parallels. The Fourfold Path (or Lifecraft Way) summarized:

1.     Service of Love (a waking up of consciousness about oneself, and one’s place in a larger context.

2.     Spirit of Fortitude (courage arising from self-reflection and empathy)

3.     Body of Beauty (recognition of the sanctity of life and standing for the well-being of all life)

4.     Mind of Truth (accepting honesty, reverence, and reasonableness as core guiding values)

As an adjunct to this, I can add, that although Seton was a romantic (in reaction to the mass-war, mass-industrial age), at the same time he specifically rejected the irrational as a legitimate means of interpreting meaning in the world.

The Learning Model of the Academy for the Love of Learning summarized:

EXPERIENCE
Seton hunted wolves, and eventually trapped Lobo. He came to see the nobility and intelligence of the wolf and, as he watched Lobo’s dignity in dying, was profoundly touched.  His understanding of animals was forever changed.

Begin with the experience—either an experience in the moment, or one that can be remembered…

• Experience could come in many forms: drawing or painting, storytelling, movement, group activity, time in nature, going for an outing
• Pretty much anything you give full attention to could be called an experience

Can you recall an experience that was transformative for you?

REFLECTION
Seton spent much of his time alone while he was in New Mexico trapping wolves. He kept a journal of his experience, and thought deeply about what he was seeing and feeling. Writing Lobo’s story was a powerful form of reflection.

 Take some time to think and feel into the experience…

• Reflection can be alone, or with another – can include journaling, drawing, going for a walk
• Tell the story of the experience to a partner
• Include feelings, emotions, memories that were evoked

When you reflect back on your transformative experience, what do you remember most clearly? What were the details, including feelings and emotions, that seem particularly meaningful to you now?

MAKING MEANING
To find meaning from his experiences in New Mexico, Seton made an extensive study of its birds and animals as an artist and naturalist, and also learned from Native American friends and mentors. Over time, Seton formulated an understanding of the interconnectedness of the natural world, including the role and impact of humanity.

Explore learning from the experience and what meaning can be made from it…

• What personal or shared learning came from the experience?
• What other sources of information can add insight?
• How can this learning be applied in life? How can it be explored further?

What meaning does your experience hold for you? What did you learn from it about yourself, and about the world?

ACTION
Seton’s life of activism as a conservationist, naturalist, and educator, grew out of his experience with Lobo, and the resulting transformation of his understanding of the natural world.

Try out the learning…

• Follow curiosity, see where this learning leads
• See if it invites another cycle of learning…

How were you changed by that moment in your life? What actions, or new ways of being in the world, resulted from your experience?

Four Ways to Support the Learning Process

1. This way of learning involves the whole person:
Thinking is only a small part of the picture. Invite the whole of each person into the inquiry.

• Physical movement – can you dance your experience, or explore it with your body?
• Sensations – what textures, tastes, tones are in your experience?
• Emotions – how do you feel? What do your feelings want to tell you about your experience?
• Imagination – what colors are in your experience – what could you name your experience

2. Slowing down helps bring awareness to reflection:
Often our need to reach completion overwhelms the richness that comes with savoring the journey.

• Invite participants to stop for a moment and listen, or feel, what is happening inside themselves, and in the group.
• Encourage participants to relish their stories, take time to speak, and really get into the telling.
• Listen slowly, too. As a facilitator, listen with depth, and experiment with reflecting back what you hear when a participant says something that touches you. Let him or her know how you were affected.
• If things are going too fast, suggest everyone takes a breath, feels their weight on the chair, looks around the room.

3. Follow your curiosity:
What catches your attention can bring guidance as you work with the group.

• Ask questions that deepen and invite feeling: “Can you say more…?”
• Invite the unexpected: “What might happen if…?”
• Allow yourself to be transparent at times: “When you said that, I felt very moved. Thank you for being so open.”
• When strong feelings come up for you, as facilitator, can you follow the thread internally – what is being evoked in your own story? Be curious about that, too.

4. Attend to what goes on in the ‘field’:
When the unexpected happens, it may bring a key insight to the group.

• Notice the tone of the group – is it alive, sleepy, all over the place.  Can you play with that, and make it part of the experience? “Let’s get up and run around the room.” “How about a five-minute nap?” or, “What do you think our sleepiness is trying to say to us?”
• Are there themes coming into the group through reflections? Stories?
• What’s happening outside the group? Are there interruptions? What’s the weather doing? Was there a powerful headline on the news?

Advanced Topics in Lifecraft #1

Seton demonstrates cooking

 

 “All boys [and girls!] are born good, are the children of God, and need only to be developed under sound leadership.”
Ernest Thompson Seton, Blazes on the Trail (1928)

“In our work, we open to the heart of learning itself and rest upon a deep trust that the seeds of basic goodness, love and learning live within all of us.”
Aaron Stern, Founder and President, Academy for the Love of Learning (2012)

Beginning in 1902, Seton set forth his ideas on outdoor education for youth through magazine articles, codifying them in the 1913 The Book of Woodcraft. “Lifecraft” became the expression of Seton’s philosophy, the promotion of which is the goal of the Seton Legacy Project, a program of the Academy for the Love of Learning.

Seton described “Principles” and a “Fourfold Path” (covered in a separate essay) as guidance for personal development that can be best learned and practiced through a close connection to, and respect for, nature. Over decades, the Principles have been reinterpreted and expanded by various authors (including Seton himself) keeping them relevant. Seton set forth as his goal:

I should like to lead this whole nation into the way of living outdoors for at least a month each year, reviving and expanding a custom that as far back as Moses was deemed essential to the national well-being….it is not enough to take men [and all persons of all ages] out of doors. We must also teach them to enjoy it.”

Following each of the Principles (including Seton’s comments from the 1923 edition of The Book of Woodcraft), I have added my own interpretation. On his behalf, I have extended the Principles to apply equally to males and females as well as to persons of all ages whatever their backgrounds. (Seton quotes are presented with tighter margins to distinguish them from my commentary.)

Nine Important Principles of Lifecraft

1 This movement is essentially for recreation.

Many of us, from students moving from one activity to the next (academic classes, band practice, computer study, soccer, music, etc. etc.) to adults moving through the daily routine (listening to the news, working at the office or shop, worrying about finances, transporting kids from one activity to the next, etc. etc.) forget the simpler ways of stepping back. Even vacations—not to mention family reunions—can be work. Recreation is a different concept. It is an activity separate from the routine, something we create for ourselves and which doesn’t have to include (at least, not on a large scale) the consumption or purchase of material things. The very best place to experience recreation: the outdoors! Individuals, couples, families, small groups. This can include anything from a quiet walk to outside sports to activities of personal interest, such as for me, wildflower identification. But fishing, skiing, climbing, quiet reflection, or anything else that puts one in positive contact with nature works just as well. 

2 Camp-life. Camping is the simple life reduced to actual practice, as well as the culmination of the outdoor life…When intelligently followed camp-life must take its place as a cheap and delightful way of living, as well as a mental and physical savior of those strained or broken by the grind of an over-busy word. The wilderness affords ideal camping, but many of the benefits can be got by living in a tent on a town lot, or piazza, or even a housetop.

From time to time, some of us may be fortunate enough to go camping, traveling away from home, enjoying the scenic wonders of the wilderness or the prosaic values of a local park. We may remain out over night, but a daytime picnic will provide much the same feeling. The purpose is to renew our contact with nature. I have done this on Arctic expeditions and other wilderness trips, but also by staying overnight in the roofless ruins of Seton Castle (pictured at the top of this blog)—something Seton could not have imagined, but I believe would have approved of.

3 Self-government with Adult Guidance. Control from without is a poor thing when you can get control from within. As far as possible, then, we make these camps [of the Woodcraft League] self-governing [by the youth participants].

Children (and adults, for that matter) are subjected to many a command and rule, even in their play activities. But given the chance for self-organization, individuals or groups of individuals will find their own way. Leadership does not mean command or management; it has more to do with respect and listening. Supervision is for the purpose of helping others find that path, but not ordering them onto it. Self-governance means taking personal responsibility and personal leadership. As adults, we are more effective and happier in the world if we make these into guiding values. The lessons we take from our time in wild nature can help guide our way through all aspects of life.

4 The Magic of the Campfire. Our [human] race has seen this blessed fire [as] the means and emblem of light, warmth, protection, friendly gathering, council. All the hallow of the ancient thoughts, hearth, fireside, home is centred in its glow, and the home-tie itself is weakened with the waning of the home-fire. Not in the steam radiator can we find the spell; not in the water coil; not even in the gas log; they do not reach the heart. Only the ancient sacred fire of wood has power to touch and thrill the chords of primitive remembrance. When men [and all persons!] sit together at the campfire they seem to shed all modern form and poise, and hark back to the primitive—to meet as man and man—to show the naked soul.

Your campfire partner wins your love, or hate, mostly your love; and having camped in peace together, is a lasting bond of union—however wide your worlds may be apart. The campfire, then, is the focal centre of all primitive brotherhood. We shall not fail to use its magic powers.

While building a campfire is not always practical, appropriate, or even allowed in many public places, the experience of having sat around one is always memorable. The fire may be in the home fireplace, but one outside at night is best of all. Campfires should be intimate, a soft glow in the night, not a blazing inferno meant to defeat the dark Our earliest ancestors, whoever they may have been and whenever they may have lived, practiced their ceremonies within the glow of burning wood. The campfire may create a sense of community. Just as important is one person contemplating the embers alone, or two or three sharing their truth as the last warmth of flame is replaced by cold night. For some reason, the primitive self, the individual soul, may find a way to express itself here where all earlier efforts, in all other places, have failed.

5 Woodcraft [Lifecraft] Pursuits. Realizing that manhood, [or womanhood or personhood!] not scholarship, is the first aim of education, we have sought out those pursuits which develop the finest character, the finest physique, and which may be followed out of doors.

The love of learning, not academics, should be the first pursuit of education. The outcome for the individual is the opportunity to become a fully realized being, finding one’s place in the world, emotionally centered and, in some sense, truly happy. Children are born with a love of nature and the outdoors and a need to engage in physical activity. By encouraging them at an early age to follow their instincts in physical exploration and experiential contact with the natural world, they can be set on a path of learning that lasts a lifetime.

6 Accomplishment by standards. The competitive principle is responsible for much that is evil. We see it rampant in our colleges to-day, where every effort is made to discover and develop a champion, while the great body of students is neglected. That is, the ones who are in need of physical development do not get it, and those who do not need it are over-developed. The result is unsoundness of many kinds. A great deal of this would be avoided if we strove to bring all individuals up to a certain standard.

In our non-competitive tests the enemies are not “the other fellows,” but time and space, the forces of Nature. We try not to down the others, but to raise ourselves. A thorough application of this principle would end many of the evils now demoralizing college athletics [as well as all other levels of the educational system]. Therefore, all our honors are bestowed according to world-wide standards. (Prizes are not honors.)

The worth or power of individuals in society is all too often measured by competition as a zero-sum game where the gain of one can only come at the expense of another. A more positive view of achievement is to measure one’s accomplishments by standards of time and space, and age and physical ability. The lesson is that the measure of our success is in line with what is physically, mentally, and morally possible. Instead of tearing down, we build up. This is an additive-sum game where success drives upward what is possible for us as individuals, and as collections of individuals.

7 Personal Decoration for Personal Achievements. All have a chance for glory through the standards, [Principle #6] and we blazon it forth in personal decorations that all can see, have, and desire.

It is possible to take pride in one’s achievements without being prideful. Recognition of our achievements by others serves as validation of our efforts and as incentive to continue on a path of personal fulfillment, especially where that path leads to outcomes that serve a larger purpose.

8 A Heroic Ideal. The boy from ten to fifteen…is purely physical in his ideals. I do not know that I ever met a boy that would not rather be John L. Sullivan [a sports hero from the 1880s] than Darwin or Tolstoy. Therefore, I accept the fact, and seek to keep in view an ideal that is physical, but also clean, manly, heroic, already familiar, and leading with certainty to higher things.

Personal valor may take many forms for young males and females. It may be the ability to take physical action or moral leadership in a crisis situation. It may mean stepping up into leadership or serving the community or taking on a problem no one else can tackle. It can also mean making personal sacrifice or facing an extreme form of suffering. This does not mean not knowing fear, but, in the face of some great task, overcoming stasis, and taking a needed action or holding to an important principle. In our time—as well as Seton’s had he more clearly recognized it—heroism is a larger genderless concept that includes but is not limited to or by a particular physical ability.

9 Picturesqueness in Everything. Very great importance should be attached to this. The effect of the picturesque is magical, and all the more subtle and irresistible because it is not on the face of it reasonable. The charm of titles and…costumes, of the beautiful in ceremony, phrase, dance, and song, are utilized in all ways.

Aesthetics means sensitivity to beauty. This is the sense we use in our appreciation of the natural world or works of art. It can be a sense of awe. Beauty resides also in mathematical equations and in the logic of philosophy. And, it is also found in the way we see ourselves, both outwardly and inwardly. Without this sense, we are little more than shadows.

Setonian Evenings 2nd Tuesday in November, December 2015 Santa Fe, New Mexico

Ernest Thompson Seton, 1901

Third and Fourth in a series of Setonian Evenings

6:30 - 8:00 pm at the Seton Gallery, Academy for the Love of Learning

Tuesday November 10 and Tuesday December 8, 2015

Free

133 Seton Village Road (off the Old Las Vegas Highway)

www.aloveoflearning.org

Host: David L. Witt 

As an important participant in the 1930s Santa Fe literary scene, Ernest Thompson Seton held evening salons at his home (Seton Castle) discussing Nature, Environment, Life and Lifecraft. The Academy’s Seton Legacy Project is reviving this tradition with a conversational series focusing on our relationship to the natural world. What “learnings,” warnings and inspirations might we find out there—and within ourselves—with close examination and reflection?

We will explore topics suggested by Seton, starting with readings from his stories. We want to hear your stories as we examine what is important about our experience with wildlife, wild places, and life in general.

Our Setonian evenings take place amid the drawings and books of the Seton Gallery. The setting is informal, a perfect atmosphere for the sharing of ideas and insights. We will start with a topic, but there is no set path—the direction of the discussion will emerge as we go along. 

November 10: Connecting Seton to the Academy through Lifecraft

Seton developed a philosophy of outdoor education disseminated through his Woodcraft League. It was about learning and living. Seton’s “Nine Principles” and “Fourfold Path,” for understanding nature and just being in the world appear to complement the “Learning Field” model of the Academy. We will look into the meaning of these.

December 8: The Radical Natural History of Generally True Patterns

Combining the teachings of Seton and Muir with Systems Theory, we find that the dissimilar systems of physics, biology and society work in remarkably similar ways demonstrating our connection to nature (and disproving the prevailing theory of our disconnection). We will consider examples to find which of them may hold up in the real world.

Ernest Thompson Seton Stories #7

More magical sunset light, October 21, 2014

This is the seventh in a series, an annotated listing of Ernest Thompson Seton books covering the years 1913-1916.

1913

Wild Animals At Home

(New York: Doubleday, Page & Co.)

Quote: “Had I asked them to join me killing a man, shooting up the town, or otherwise taking their lives in their hands, I would doubtless have had half a dozen cheerful volunteers; but to carry a box in which was a wild skunk – ‘not for a hundred dollars,’ and the warriors melted into the background.”

This is a work on non-fiction covering many of the same animals featured in Life Histories of Northern Animals, but in a more popular format. All of these creatures were wild citizens of Yellowstone National Park. Seton loved the park because the relative tameness of its animals allowed a close approach and thus a chance to observe and understand them in a way not possible elsewhere. Seton takes the opportunity to editorialize on many subjects from his dislike of high powered hunting weapons to the importance of bats. He continued to ramp up his message of wildlife conservation, including describing himself as an assassin for his complicity in the killing of a moose.

1915

Manual of the Woodcraft Indians, The Fourteenth Birchbark Roll, Containing Their Constitution, Laws, and Deeds, and Much Additional Matter

(New York: Doubleday, Page & Co.)

Quote: “It maintains that true religion fits all days as well as Sunday. That justice and retribution are our certain lot here on earth. That all men are born children of the Great Spirit and may retain their birthright if they have the courage and strength for the fight.”

At the time of publication, Seton was finishing his losing fight for control of the Boy Scouts. He set forward the organizational scheme for his own organization; later in 1915 it was incorporated and renamed The Woodcraft League of America.

1916

Wild Animal Ways

(Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page & Company)

Quote: “If he [the raccoon] has a message, we know it not in formal phrase, but this perhaps: He is symbol of the things that certain kindly natures love; and if the nation’s purblind councilors win their evil way, so his hollow tree with himself should met its doom, it means the final conquest of the final corner of our land by the dollar and its devotees. Grant I may long be stricken down before it comes.”

“Coaly-Bay, the Outlaw Horse.” The life history of in Idaho starts with his unkind treatment by his owners. Eventually he escapes joining a wild band: Live free or die!

“Foam, or The Life and Adventures of a Razor-Backed Hog.” A brave and faithful wild pig overcomes all odds during his challenging life, including his friendship with a human girl and a climatic confrontation with a bear. Courage, Seton writes, is “not to be without fear, but to overcome it.”

“Way-Atcha, the Coon-Raccoon of Kilder Creek.” A lost baby raccoon is adopted by a human family after being removed from a trap, mistreated by others, and finally escapes back to the wild life.

“Billy, the Dog That Made Good.” A brave dog saves his master from a grizzly bear caught in a trap.

“Atalapha, a Winged Brownie.” A year in the life, bat natural history with poetic passages and praise for bat insect predation. The Great Northern Bat is captured by humans who test his flying ability. Nature tests its as well during a long migration. 

“The Wild Geese of Wyndygoul.” Seton’s pinioned mother and father geese cannot join the annual migration; they and their brood spend the winter together.  Another brood comes the following summer; the mother’s flight feathers have grown back. She and her children take off, leaving the anguished father to spend the winter alone.  But his family returns in the spring, setting a pattern for the loving couple’s years together.

“Jinny. The Taming of a Bad Monkey.” Treated with respect and affection by a zoo keeper, an abused monkey goes from vicious to tame before being murdered by an evil man.

Ernest Thompson Seton Stories #6

Seton Castle Library Exterior at Sunset, October 21, 2014

This is the sixth in a series, an annotated listing of Ernest Thompson Seton books covering the years 1910-1912.

1910

Boy Scouts of America, A Handbook of Woodcraft, Scouting, and Life-Craft

(New York: Doubleday, Page & Company.)

Quote: “The Woodcraft and Scouting movement that I aimed to foster began to take shape in America some ten years ago. Because the idealized Indian of Hiawatha has always stood as the model for outdoor life, woodcraft and scouting, I called its brotherhood the “Woodcraft Indians.” In 1904 I went to England to carry on the work there, and, knowing General R.S.S. Bade-Powell as the chief advocate of scouting in the British Army, invited him to cooperate in making the movement popular.”

This book created a model for all the Boy Scout Handbooks that have followed, making the series one of the largest (other than the Holy Bible) printed in the English language. It incorporated parts of Robert Baden-Powell’s Scouting for Boys which itself had been greatly influenced by Seton’s Birch Bark Roll series which premiered in Ladies Home Journal in 1902.

1911

Rolf in the Woods, The Adventures of a Boy Scout With Indian Quonab and Little Dog Skookum

(New York: Grosset & Dunlap)

Quote: “I have especially dwelt in detail on the woodland and peace scouting in the hope that I may thus help other boys to follow the hard-climbing trail that leads to the higher uplands.”

This young adult novel is a values-driven story: self-reliance (both in woodcraft and in personal courage), religious tolerance, and love of nature. By being good at these a scout can overcome any obstacle. This also is a story of heroism based on physical ability, personal integrity, and loyalty. It combines elements of Seton’s own early life with James Fenimore Cooper stories.

The Arctic Prairies, A Canoe-Journey of 2,000 Miles In Search Of The Caribou; Being An Account Of A Voyage To The Region North Of Aylmer Lake

(New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons)

Quote: “In 1907 I set out to journey by canoe down the Athabaska and adjoining waters to the sole remaining forest wilds—the far north-west of Canada—and the yet more desert Arctic Plains, where still, it is said, were to be seen the Caribou in their primitive condition.”

Part travelogue, part natural history, part adventure story, the Arctic equivalent of Jefferson’s Notes on the State of Virginia, this was Seton’s only full account of any of his major trips. Accompanied by field biologist Edward A. Preble and First Nations Guides, Seton explored the Northwest Territories above Great Slave Lake over six months. He gave descriptions of the landscape with its human and animal inhabitants. This was the first in-depth account of an area that was at the time almost entirely unknown to outsiders. 

1912

The Book of Woodcraft and Indian Lore

(Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page & Co.)

Quote: “By Woodcraft I mean outdoor life its broadest sense and the plan has been with me since boyhood. Woodcraft is the first of all the sciences. It was Woodcraft that made man out of brutish material, and Woodcraft in its highest form may save him from decay.

Seton considered this the Eleventh Edition of the Birch Bark Roll; it was the largest of the entire series, combining a large selection of his many interests. It was meant to serve as the guide to outdoor education from ethics to American Indian history to how to organize local groups. It pushed the radical notion that cooperation was of greater moral value than competition. Woodcraft included honoring (or appropriation) if indigenous folkways, practical outdoor skills, games, first aid, herbal healing, general natural history, and forestry. Issued under various titles over the years, it remains in print today. This was the Boy Scout manual as it would have been written without Baden-Powell influence. (There were later revisions not shown on this list.)