In early February, Katie and Clare (ThorpeWood’s program director and barn manager/community liaison, respectively) took to the road well before dawn and headed down to Ocean City for this year’s Maryland Association for Environmental and Outdoor Education conference. It was a jam-packed weekend of Environmental Inspiration. From morning to evening, the days were filled with workshops and presentations all centering on that which is most important to all of us at ThorpeWood – sharing the natural world. Katie and Clare took in wonderful presentations like:
Living Local: Agriculture Education Training
The healthiest food at any scale: the gardens and farms of the future.
Nature-Wise: Reading, Writing, Playing and Probing in the Outdoor Classroom
Using Observation to Engage and Ground
Schools + Outdoors + Counseling = Increased Opportunity
Things that Go “Ribbit” in the Night: Amphibian Call Identification
The Power of Connection: Discovering the Effects of Formal and Nonformal Environmental Education on Students’ Connectedness to Nature
Exploring the Environment through Theatre
In addition to learning, engaging, and taking vigorous notes during these sessions, the ThorpeWood staff also led some of the conference sessions!
Katie led her group of 17 participants out to the beach on a cold (32°) and windy (15mph, with additional great gusts) afternoon. Her session was called Forest Therapy…on the Beach!, during which she introduced her fellow educators to Forest Therapy as a practice before actually heading out to the beach for two hours of mindful engagement. The hours on the beach consisted of a sensory awakening meditation, nature invitations, and tea. The great wind blew sand through everyone’s hair and eliminated hopes for tea as the tea cups continuously filled with sand. So, with some quick adjustments, tea time became an opportunity to taste the salt water of the ocean and appreciate all the sensations and memories that followed.
Upon reentering the warmth of the conference room, the group discussed the outing, how they might incorporate the practice into their work, and generally rounded out the session with gratitude and good company.
On Saturday, Katie and Clare teamed up to run the Social Emotional Learning Community Meeting, an opportunity for those with shared interests to network and share their experiences around the chosen topic. We were honored to be thought of and asked to lead this session. It was a delight to facilitate the conversations through the creation of impromptu expert panels on many Social Emotional Learning topics.
Overall, the weekend was a great success and our ThorpeWood team came home bursting with ideas, inspiration, and pride at their part in the event. Until next year…
So What Else’s mission is to improve the lives of children and families living in underserved communities in the Baltimore-Washington Metro Area by providing food security, access to basic necessities, and high-quality out-of-school time programs in literacy, athletics, and the visual and performing arts while inspiring young people to give back to the community by creating volunteer opportunities for citizens of all ages.
In the past, So What Else has brought young adults for a leadership retreat involving equine assisted learning, a foraging walk, yoga, animal time, and more. On this visit, the children and adults spent two nights in our homestead house and participated in some programs with Clare. It seemed they had a lively time together experiencing a world far outside their everyday city lives in Baltimore. We were particularly touched and sobered when one of the group leads, reflecting on the ladybugs in one of the upstairs bedrooms, said ‘better bugs than bullets.’ We are honored to provide a rural escape for these youth – and adults, too!
Cat
December 3 & 4: ThorpeWood hosted two Holiday Open Houses. Read more about those festive occasions 
December 7: The Maryland Association for Environmental and Outdoor Education had their first ever Green Careers Event at the lodge. It was a wonderful success – read more about the day 
December 10: Last wedding of the year! Congratulations to Melissa Rotella and Russell Tabler!
ThorpeWood was delighted to host three Holiday Open Houses at our lodge this year! Each night from 2-8pm, we surrounded ourselves with neighbors and friends of ThorpeWood. Our 17′ tall Christmas tree, topped by our taxidermied bard owl, dazzled attendees. Live music from local musicians united us in merry spirits. Mulled cider and homemade cookies from attendees delighted our taste buds. Our downstairs filled with crafts and the whole Claus family brought great amusement to visiting children. 
Outside the lodge, all was beautifully decorated in the Christmas spirit as well, with our 1951 Farmall tractor dressed up in lights, countless wreaths, twinkle-light lamp posts, reindeer, and more. A little further from the lodge, we also entertained visitors at the farm – allowing folks to join in on feeding and tucking in the animals for the night.
Earlier this week, we were delighted to host the Maryland Association for Environmental and Outdoor Education’s (MAEOE) Green Careers event at ThorpeWood’s lodge. This event focused on bringing together high schoolers with 30+ green professionals from a huge range of fields – including environmental education, forestry, parks, agriculture, and more. 60 Students from Frederick County High Schools were hand selected by their teachers to attend the event.
day on a hike down our Coffee Hollow trail with ThorpeWood’s program people, me and Clare. After a brief moment of silence overlooking the ravine, we headed back inside to get down to business. Over the course of the next 2+ hours, the students cycled through the green professionals’ presentations. The students learned what the jobs were like on a day-to-day basis, the career path the professionals took to arrive at their jobs, and received advice on how to enter the field (Everyone highlighted volunteerism and internships!)
We are so very excited to share with you the announcement of a fantastic new partnership between ThorpeWood and the Head Start program for Frederick County. Over the course of 11 weeks, with one week off for Easter, ThorpeWood will welcome over their youth – ages three and four – to come to ThorpeWood and benefit from the glorious natural opportunities ThorpeWood has to offer.
Over the years that have followed, we have kept the blog up to date as we morphed the program to constantly increase the amount of time the kids spent with us at the farm. In the many years since the start of our partnership, every one of our seasons revolved around the Head Start students (click on the italicized words to dive deeper into these topics). The 
It has been 9 beautiful years of continual support. However, with pre-k opening up in the local elementary schools, the Head Start population is skewing younger. After giving it a try for over a year, we, unfortunately, have found that our outdoor programs are a bit too much for the three-year-olds. They quite simply are not ready for the big outings and therefore cannot fully absorb all ThorpeWood has to offer. And so, we are now in the process of transforming our programs to more effectively make use of our acreage, animals, and expertise. But don’t think for one minute that we are giving up this beautiful partnership! We are simply scaling back a bit, and putting a larger focus on Head Start staff wellness iniatives and larger-scale family engagement outings. We hope that providing the ThorpeWood experience to the Head Start caregivers (both teachers and parents), we will be able to fulfil our mission of nurthuring therapeutic relationships with the natural world more effectively. 
With that, a moment of apprciation and gratitude for our 9 year relationship with Head Start.
