Lunch & Learn and Guided Trail Walk Program

Portland Trails offers “Lunch & Learns” to businesses and organizations in greater Portland . Your employees have the opportunity to spend a lunch hour learning about Portland Trails and asking us questions. Portland Trails will come to your location for the Lunch & Learn, or we would be happy to lead a Guided Trail Walk for your employees. For more information, or to schedule a Lunch & Learn or Guided Trail Walk, please contact Isabel Aley at 775-2411 or isabel@trails.org.

Click here for: SCHOOLGROUND GREENING Project examples

PORTLAND TRAILS EDUCATION &
COMMUNITY OUTREACH PROGRAM

Portland has a unique opportunity for experiential education made possible by its existing open space, historic park system, and location on Casco Bay. Because it is an urban area with considerable open land, its residents can impact the future of its remaining growth and character. Several years ago, we began to create an integrated environmental education program to foster our mission.

Portland Trails' education program strives to achieve these goals in a variety of ways. Among them are:

Teacher Workshops

In June '98, over 40 teachers from Greater Portland attended a three-day workshop, "Urban Trails: Forging Community Connections", to learn about using trails as a resource and as inspiration for their curricula. Everyone attending received a copy of our "Trails as Classrooms" curriculum guide. Many teachers subsequently produced class projects and curricula based on ideas from the workshop, and we plan to sponsor another series in June 2000. Shorter teacher workshops and informative trail walks will also take place during the school year.

"Trails as Classrooms" Curriculum Guide

This guide is full of practical information on trails, trail building, and how to integrate the visual environment into the classroom. The product of collaboration with over ten other educational organizations and our education advisory committee, it also contains model lessons and worksheets that help connect classes with trails. It has been distributed to educators both within and beyond the Portland community. We will continue to expand and develop the guide as we develop our own resources and ascertain teachers' needs.
 

Bringing Schools and Trails Together

By establishing good relationships with schools, youth groups and other educational programs, we strive to accommodate requests for projects and materials. Our Education & Outreach Coordinator, an experienced teacher herself, facilitates these connections. Because this very important part of our program responds to individual teachers' curricular needs, the results are varied, creative, and meaningful; often they lead to bigger, more cooperative projects between schools and the community.

Website Resource

One of our goals is to put our Education Program information on the web, so that it is more easily accessible outside the Portland area. We would like to include links to other sites, model projects and lessons, and lists of printed resources available to educators, students and the community.

Collaborations with Other Organizations

We work with education and outreach programs of organizations such as Greater Portland Landmarks (historic preservation), Kids in Transportation (Greater Portland Council of Governments), Kids' Consortium (planning organization), Tate House Museum (historic house), Friends of Riverton Trolley Park (historic park), the Portland Partnership (education & business), the Portland Museum of Art, METRO (transit agency) and many others. The collaborations range from creating a curriculum on sprawl and planning issues, to our curriculum guide, to trail walks with an historical, botanical or cultural focus.

School Trails Projects

These projects team up kids, teachers and school communities with Portland Trails to work toward the development and construction of actual trails on school property, or extending from school grounds to other sites. Some of these trails become an integral part of the larger Portland Trails system. By involving students in the experiential learning process of planning, developing and building the trail, they learn about the importance of trail stewardship, greenspaces, alternative transportation and the environment. This process also encourages students to see the part they can play in shaping their community.

 School trails projects encourage community support, involvement and ownership by bringing students, parents, residents, landowners, local businesses and organizations together in the process of building the trails and rejuvenating the area. Furthermore, the end product will give students and teachers access to natural areas for educational and recreational purposes.

Lyseth School Pilot Project

The most current school trails project, linking Lyseth Elementary and Lyman Moore Middle Schools to a local park, will be used as a pilot, resulting in a written document that can serve as a model and guide for other schools and organizations to create their own project - one potentially replicable in Portland or any community. The document will include practical information for teachers on organizing the project, identifying and contacting stakeholders, soliciting community participation, and integrating the project into classroom lessons. The development of this project will require a considerable amount of time and effort to organize, facilitate and document on our web site.

Wellness Programs

Portland Trails will be collaborating with with the Portland Public Health Department on a worksite fitness program for employees of area businesses. Last year over 1,000 people from 15 companies participated in the program. Our role will be to encourage use of the trails and awareness of the urban open spaces available for recreation and alternative transportation. By making exercise in a scenic environment a more regular part of people's daily routine, we hope to increase appreciation of this resource and of the environment in general. We will continue to encourage the involvement of local businesses.

Events

Because our goal to educate the community extends beyond schools, we will be offering events open to all. Events include guided trail walks with historical background, information on flora and fauna and the trail-building process among other topics.