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Article on this Page: What is Earth Skills Education by Tim Smith, M.Ed. Also check out our other articles available in the Ethnobotany series, Survival series, Wildlife series, and Earth Skills Education series.

What is Earth Skills Education?

Reprinted with permission from www.jackmountainbushcraft.com by Tim Smith, M.Ed.

“The More You Carry In Your Head, The Less You Carry On Your Back”

Earth Skills Education recognizes that there is inherent value in learning and understanding the skills of how to live in the natural world because it is, and has always been, our home. The goal of Earth Skills Education (ESE) is to teach and pass on the life skills of our forefathers. For more than 99% of human history, our species lived as small groups of hunter-gatherers in intimate contact with the land. Such skills and knowledge were not restricted to a portion of humanity; it existed everywhere amongst all races and cultures. The skills, techniques, and knowledge of the natural world were passed from generation to generation. But our modern world has abandoned both this knowledge and the idea of passing it on to future generations. Skills that were once common are now rare. For example, matches weren't invented until 1827, but today there are few who can light a fire without them.

Earth Skills Education as a discipline is new, and has not yet been widely recognized by the general public due to a lack of proper descriptive terminology and segmented understanding of what it entails. The terms that have fallen under its umbrella over time are many, including traditional wilderness living skills, wilderness survival, bushcraft, living off the land, primitive skills,indigenous skills, woodlore, and countless more. Many of these terms carry cultural baggage and are associated with stereotypes of unenlightened savages and paramilitary organizations, among other things, and as such they have hindered the acceptance and understanding of this type of educational experience. What has been lacking is a general term to refer to the many disciplines that represent the life skills of our hunter/gatherer and early agricultural forefathers that isn't specific to one group of people. This lack brought about the beginning of Earth Skills Education asa term and an academic discipline.

While Earth Skills Education has some things in common with both Environmental and Outdoor Education it is a fundamentally different discipline. Outdoor education seeks to use the natural world as a vehicle for personal and group development. Environmental Education seeks to teach people about the environment as if we were removed from it. Both of these disciplines seek to separate us from the natural world, while Earth Skills Education encourages immersion into it. It has been our home since our species originated, and knowing how to live in it without harming it is a critically needed skill in this day and age.

P.O. Box 61 – 267 Camp School Rd. Wolfeboro Falls, NH 03896-0061
(603) 569-6150 tim@jackmtn.com
www.jackmtn.com

Employment: We only need instructors with experience running camps and teaching in the field of Earth Skills Education, including skills of the Naturalist, Tracker, Herbalist, Survival Scout, Primitive Artisan and Sustainable Pioneer. Apply to become an instructor through our Earth Skills Teaching Apprenticeship.