The Goodness of Rain: Developing an Ecological Identity in Young Children

We must discover our place in the natural world. Together.

To nurture ecological identity in young children, we invite them into relationship with the world beyond walls and with the creatures that live there. We invite them into ethical thinking anchored by the compassion that comes from caring and engaged relationships. We invite them to come home to the Earth, and to live honorably in that home.

Join author Ann Pelo on her year-long journey as she nurtures the ecological identity of a toddler and discovers for herself what it means to live in relationship with the natural world…

…delighting in discovery and adventure

…developing dispositions and skills for being in the out-of-doors

…learning when to speak and when to be still

…knowing joy, grief, reverence, astonishment, and gladness

…embracing the comradeship of fellow explorers

When we turn towards the Earth with curiosity and sympathy, with humility and wonder, our lives fall into place — we fall into place. This is what it means to grow an ecological identity.

AUTHOR STATEMENT:
I was Dylan’s caregiver for a year, from her first birthday to her second. My commitment during that year was that we would spend each day outside, no matter the weather, experiencing the land and sky through the nuances of each unfolding season. I hoped that our days outside would make us intimates of the patch of the earth where Dylan and her family lived. . . . This terrain is where Dylan and I spent our days, exploring what lies around the hill, what grows there and who lives there and how the sky arcs over it.

In each season, every day, no matter the weather, Dylan and I went outside.

My commitment was to both of us. I hoped that Dylan would learn the place where she lived, would take it into her bones and blood so that it would become bound into her identity. I hoped that I would relax my shoulders that hunched against the rain, and open my resistant heart to this place where I make my home at a far remove from the sage scrub and pine lands that are bound into my body as home terrain. I hoped that our days outside would cultivate in each of us an ecological identity.

—Ann Pelo

TESTIMONIALS:
"Reading The Goodness of Rain made my heart soar. With her beautiful descriptions of guiding young Dylan into seeing the details of the natural world around her, Ann Pelo offers us a clear picture of how we can offer children a strong sense of place in their upbringing. Each page reminds us that when we learn to live in a reverent relationship with nature, we will not allow it to be destroyed, but rather, bear “joyful witness to the miracle of this planet and ally ourselves with it, to help life live.”

—Margie Carter, co-author, The Visionary Director, Learning Together with Young Children, The Art of Awareness, and From Teaching to Thinking

"This book, certain to become an instant classic, recounts two parallel journeys through the world of nature around us. I am not sure whose discoveries—toddler’s or adult’s—absorbed and moved me more. I also appreciated the scholarly notes on pedagogical principles, theoretical sources, and word etymologies interspersed gently, sliding among the diary entries that carry their own resonance and literary power. Ann Pelo is a master teacher and writer, and this book enriches and honors the field of early childhood."
—Carolyn Edwards, editor, The Hundred Languages of Children: The Reggio Emilia Experience in Transformation and The Hundred Languages of Children: The Reggio Emilia Approach to Early Childhood Education