Black Hills National Forest

News Release

USDA Forest Service

Black Hills National Forest

Contact: Dianne Miller, Project Learning Tree Coordinator, or email us at r2 blackhills webinfo@fs.fed.us

PROJECT LEARNING TREE TEACHES KIDS ABOUT NATURE

SPEARFISH, SD: OCTOBER 13, 2009

South Dakota Project Learning Tree (PLT) recently hosted a kindergarten day for Sturgis school.

“There were over 120 students, parents and teachers enjoying the outside, today and last week we had over 160 students from another school,” said Dianne Miller, PLT Coordinator.

PLT is a national non-profit program that is dedicated to environmental education. “We are teaching the students how to think, not what to think about the environment,” said Miller. “The activities are mind challenging. We try to bring awareness and knowledge of the environment, and we want the students to go out and explore.”

Miller said their main goal is to get kids excited about their environment and teach them how to care for it. “If they learn what it’s all about and how much fun it is now, they will be better informed adults,” said Miller.

The kindergartners learned about trees, water, went on a walk to find shapes in nature, like circles, triangles, and squares. They also learned about forest animals and their habitats through a puppet show and song.

Miller said PLT is always looking for volunteers with environmental knowledge. “We have a program where we can go in and do workshops for forest professionals and teach them how to do these activities that are already written for classrooms. We would like to encourage forest professionals to help us with different classroom visits and events. It’s great to add their expertise and resources,” said Miller.

“PLT is fun, it’s great, the students love it, the teachers love it, and it’s very rewarding,” said Miller

For more information on the Black Hills National Forest visit our website at www.fs.fed.us/r2/blackhills.