Here We Are of fire and fungi - a taster of a Foodweb Education unit and how to develop one.

For a long time I have wanted to share a more detailed account of a Foodweb Education unit of learning and give a bit of insight into the process of creating the scope and sequence for a unit by applying the Foodweb Education and Here We Are framing and approach.

The following blog post will take you through how I developed the unit Here We Are of fire and fungi, a unit that was delivered in the autumn of 2024. The unit was brought to life through the dedication of our passionate garden co-ordinator and volunteers who provide guidance and support to our students as well as nurture our garden, learning space and me. I am so lucky to have a team committed to creating purposeful and inspiring learning opportunities for children. Although we all aim to adhere to scope and sequence of the unit our approach is intentionally flexible and responsive to our students interests, needs and dynamics; the nuances of the season, weather and garden and our own energy levels. The phrase Here We Are also inviting in presence and being attuned and open to the opportunities the children and the garden offer making this a dynamic and responsive program. The ecological patterns and the pedagogical aims of Here We Are provide the scaffolding for framing exploration and change. We aim to model being ‘response able’ that is able to respond to change with intention and care, change that could be emotional or environmental. We are lucky to have a very supportive senior staff who value to the broader aims of our approach.

Planning for this unit begins as the days are getting shorter, the light has softened and the warmth of summer is reluctantly departing with the chill creeping closer and closer each day. The season is changing and the hustle and bustle and abundance of the summer garden will soon be a distant memory. The first frost is lingering in the sidelines bringing bittersweet anticipation of beginnings and endings.

As the Foodweb Educator brought in to deliver a garden based ecological literacy program you are timetabled to have 3 classes of year 3/4’s once a week and the curriculum focus for the classroom teachers from the Australian Curriculum includes:

HASS Year 4 What was life like for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples before the arrival of the Europeans? recognising how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples perceive themselves as being an integral part of the environment and;

Biological sciences Year 4:Living things depend on each other and the environment to survive.

As a means of aligning with the curriculum and hopefully supporting the classroom teacher you let these curriculum points soak in and start to ferment within the framing of Here We Are (see below). This is when the expansiveness of the framework manages to provide a fertile substrate where anything can germinate and grow. It is always a bonus to be supporting the goals of the classroom teacher without compromising your own so I aim to develop a unit that links all the objectives within the context of the garden and hopefully create a meaningful and enchanting learning and experiential unit that both students and staff will enjoy and value. The season provides the context for the curriculum focus and Here We Are of fire and fungi starts to spark and germinate.

“Here -

belonging; brings you into your location and the present and opens up questions, observations, sensations of place, space and time

We -

relational, ecocentric worldview and challenging individualism, identifying who is here (human, more than human) and how are we in relation.

Are (To be, being, becoming) -

being; becoming; process philosophies; captures existential questions from science of living systems through to what it means to be a human. ”

Let’s take a look at our two main elements that have sprouted - fungi and fire -

Fungi: Fungi will be the predominant kingdom of organisms used to discover interdependence, symbiosis, multispecies communication, interconnection, complexity and develop eco/biophilia and awareness and respect for the more than human as well as explore processes of decomposition and nutrient cycling and soil building. Fungi also provides a mythical quality to the garden with their almost magical and mysterious appearances waiting to be discovered. An easy character to capture imaginations.

Fire: The aims will include engaging our students in opportunities to connect with fire on all levels, from delving into the science of combustion and understanding it through the broader ecological patterns through to exploring our personal and cultural relationship, feelings and uses and impact of fire. Content and approach and assistance to the teaching of Tasmanian Aboriginal histories and cultures around fire will primarily be drawing on the fire content from The Orb teaching resource and Firesticks Alliance. Fire will be acknowledged as a vital tool and component both historically and potentially for reconnecting with and renewing and healing Country and reclaiming the custodial role of humanity. We will use this as the basis for how we present perspectives and approaches to fire to the students. We will also aim to connect with palawa/pakana cultural educators and fire practitioners to potentially discuss and/or come and facilitate a fire knowledge and experience workshop with the kids ie. discussing relationships and understandings of cultural burning, fire sticks, cooking techniques etc. Fire is also magical with its transformative properties and human’s innate relationship with it meaning that even the mention of fire lights up children’s eyes and captures their interest with just the flame of a candle drawing and grounding attention and hooking them in.

The student activity rotations provide the space and opportunity to explore, investigate, and get creative and practical in the garden. We offer two rounds of four different acitivites over 8 weeks. Cooking from the garden is a mainstay. The students love everything about the magic of transforming their produce into a simple snack and eating it together at the end of the session, providing immeasurable but life long connection, inspiration and health benefits to the children.

Round 1

Here We Are storytelling opportunity for students to experiment with their own place based stories.
Student led, improvised, free range, place based storytelling in storytelling circle with puppets
Introduction to fire:
Discuss combustion and fire safety through the lens of the fire triangle. Fire drill using hands. Flint sticks to create a spark
Gardening - planting, propagation, weeding, mulching etc
Garden Cooking: Zucchini parcels followed by fresh crab apples, Savoury carrot fritters, Carrot pancakes with cream cheese, Pampoen Koekies.

Round 2

Continued storytelling opportunity introducing musical/song element with instruments as well as puppets. Explore story through personal encounters and observation of native animals
Fire science using the Rocket stove for making herbal tea , Fire as friend - personality, care, respect
Fungi hunt and investigation - feeding and findng our friends underground, Soil organisms, Worm farm, Mycelium/mushroom hunt, Using microscopes
Garden Cooking: Potato rostis, Fattoush salad, Apple cinnamon pastries with vanilla cream, Tostadas with classroom grown fungi salsa (recipe here). This was the best IMO!

Here We Are of fire and fungi - the story.

The theoretical component of each session is delivered through a 10-15 minute rolling oral story that draws on ecological patterns and is embedded in the season and place and told in our story circle in the native garden..

Session one sees students invited in to get comfortable in the story circle nestled in the native garden. Our expectations for behaviour and engagement are established and committed to with the lighting of the story candle. We enter the story with a welcome sound followed by an arrival sound volunteered by a student. It is time to pay attention.

The story begins each week with observations of the current weather conditions and any noticings from the surrounding environment, flowers blooming, leaves falling as noticed by both the students and the protagonist - an adolescent echidna puggle on the cusp of independence.

We meet Eric the echidna as he senses and finds himself grappling with the both seasonal and his own developmental changes. As he encounters his first frost with shock and fear of change his loving mother assures him change is the only constant and to welcome the chill as the contemplative invitation of autumn, rich with storytelling opportunities. As she wraps him in a warm blanket so to our students are passed blankets and invited to snuggle into them and get ready to hear mumma echidna tell the Anansi* story of how stories came to earth. After the story she encourages Eric the echidna to discover more stories in the landscape and its inhabitants and through observing earth’s processes and patterns.

Meet Eric

Our adventurous echidna puggle puppet searching for stories in the landscape

Over the following weeks each session begins with the story following this narrative structure. We begin each session with the same candle and sound ritual but a new adventure ensues as our echidna builds confidence and independence following his curiosity to discover such wonders as how energy flows through ecosystems and that we all ‘eat the sun’, understanding life as living sunlight. The following week packed with his new understanding of the world and growing autumnal shifts he encounters a mushroom and discovers mycelium under the ground and so begins a journey to discover how matter cycles as fungi decomposes, regenerates, and connects the world through branching patterns. He meets a spider who tells him that spiders make webs to remind everyone of our interdependence and the importance of not carelessly breaking the connections or destroying webs. He longs to be as useful and generous as rain finally realizing one of his ecological roles is an’accidental gardener’ - moving tonnes of soil and all it's inhabitants through bioturbatiion. Just when the world around him couldn’t get more interesting and somewhat comprehensible the echidna awakes fearfully to the smell of smoke but realises is soon told reassured it is not a bush fire and not just any smoke - it comes from right fire or ‘patrula nayri’ that is being returned to the land by the palawa people. Eric discovers the role of the two feet (humans) and their cool burning through song and story. With the increasingly darkening days the echidna must now find his place to settle down for the winter on his own and eventually he is sung into a neighbouring land rejuvenated through prior cool burning practices. The other organisms engage in the following call and response song that hums across and through the land and him.

“Here We Are
At home on this land
Of panninnher people
palawa land

Here we are
At home on this island
lutruwita
Tasmania

Here we are

At home in this nation
A nation of nations
Now, Australia

Here We Are

At home on this planet
Living planet
Planet earth

Here We All are
Living together
Part of this world
Here we all are Here we all are
”

And with that song in his heart the echidna buries himself in the old log and the wise words come on the breeze as he slows his heart rate and metabolism to enter hibernation **:"Sleep well my dear. Darkness is a time for rest, It is a time to replenish the spirit. It is time to Dream”.

Unbeknownst to me at this time this ending is setting us up perfectly for the next seasonal and somewhat surreal tale which will follow Eric’s hibernation dreams into the soil beneath him encountering the organisms and interrelationships of the soil ecosystem.

With the story finished our final and celebratory session for the unit Here We Are of fire and fungi we were blessed enough to be able to welcome Teangi Brown the wonderful, charismatic and inspiring Aboriginal liason officer with Tasmania Parks and Wildlife Aboriginal Burning Unit. He shared stories, artefacts and wisdom around the fire that reinforced the learnings and encounters of Eric the echidna around fire usage and impacts and indicator species. Teangi then joined us for coal baked bread with salt bush and mountain pepper dukkah, aumtumnal stew and fire baked crab apples (courtesy of my sons experimentation) as we celebrated a rich and rewarding and sometimes magical learning adventure into fire and fungi. Once again, thank you to all involved.

And that’s a Foodweb Education term unit germinated and grown out of applying Here We Are.

Please get in touch if you would like more information or have any questions: megan@foodwebeducation.com