This journey for 8th graders is designed to teach skills of naturalist and ecological intelligence along with social and emotional intelligence. Through a series of day-longs, campouts, and backpacking trips, we weave inner and outer nature skills leading up to a weeklong ceremony. A final closing ceremony with families will culminate the group in fall of 9th grade.
In this Elemental Quest Rite of Passage program, we weave skills of outer and inner nature. We dive deep into nature awareness and naturalist knowledge as well as ancestral arts and survival skills. Beyond the hard skills, we also explore our inner nature. From song and storytelling, fireside council and talking circles, non-violent communication and peacemaking, we explore what it means to be human, to be a teen, and to be alive in the current global reality. The focus is on connection as we explore the concentric rings of relating to self, community, Nature.
Our day-longs focus on cultivating a particular skill, while the campouts give us more time to develop relational mindfulness and build connection together. The entire arc of the program is intended to lead up to a summer backpacking trip with a wilderness solo, where each participant gets to be alone with themselves, the wilderness, the night sky. Guides will support preparation leading up to the solo and integration afterwards.
This program includes seasonal parent meetings, so that we can build a container in which we have a sense of the youth’s journey in and out of program. Weaving in the parent community is also a beautiful way to create wider circles of ‘aunties’ and ‘uncles.’ We have all-family potlucks on the conclusion of some of our day-longs, as well.
Outline of the Yearlong open registration programs
Fall: Overnight and two day-longs
Winter: Two day-longs
Spring: Overnight and two day-longs
Summer: Weeklong backpacking trip and solo ceremony
Fall: Final overnight with family closing ceremony on Sunday
Example curriculum arc in a 1-year program:
FALL – EARTH ELEMENT
Outer Nature Skills: Nature awareness games, plant identification & foraging wild foods, knot-tying, making and tending fire by friction, knife safety skills, wood-working/carving
Inner Nature Skills: Group connection, storytelling, gratitude, mindfulness, ancestry
WINTER – WATER ELEMENT
Outer Nature Skills: Tracking, bird language, shelter building, water purification, wild herbal teas
Inner Nature Skills: Peacemaking, non-violent communication, relationships
SPRING – AIR ELEMENT
Outer Nature Skills: Herbal medicine-making, archery
Inner Nature Skills: Responsibility, goal-setting
SUMMER – FIRE ELEMENT
Outer Nature Skills: Backpacking, Map and compass, natural history of the Sierra Nevada, astronomy
Inner Nature Skills: Leading the group, solitude and ceremony, tending fire, commitments
FALL – EARTH ELEMENT
Outer Nature Skills: Completion and giveaway of crafts made
Inner Nature Skills:Appreciation and acknowledgement, Integration
THREADS OF TEEN RITES OF PASSAGE
Sustenance Skills: Tools and carving, cooking and fire tending, foraging/growing food, shelter buiding and survival techniques
Conflict Resolution: Non-violent Communication, Way of Council, forgiveness practices, mindfulness and meditation
Emotional Skills: Dealing with grief/loss (including Earth grief), appreciations, honoring love, facing fears
Status Assigning: Gender, power (physical, intellectual), racism/sexism/classism, privelege (earned and unearned)
Sex & Relations: Orientation, expression, culture, love
Human nature & Eco-Responsibility: Ceremony & Self-generated ceremony, eco-consciousness and ecological self, habitat care (and global awareness), animal care (and endangered species)
ELEMENTAL QUEST 