Diversity EQUALS Health Part 1 of 2: "Nature Preschools and Forest Schools Boost Immunity"

Diversity EQUALS Health Part 1 of 2: Nature Preschools and Forest Schools Boost Immunity Through Regenerative Connection

From Individual Wellness to Collective Liberation

Our local and global communities are weaving together diverse, re-wilded cultures that challenge the artificial separation between human and more-than-human worlds. Recently, a parent in our Outdoor Nature Based (ONB) preschool shared compelling research from Finland showing that Forest School children spending most time outdoors—even in winter—demonstrated significantly boosted immunity. This well-researched article, with citations from primary studies, sparked wonderful conversations among guides and families about how nature-based education creates health benefits extending far beyond individual children.

This research aligns beautifully with Triple WellBeing® concepts emerging within regenerative learning ecologies—frameworks that move us beyond either/or thinking about wellness toward both/and approaches recognizing the interconnection between personal, community, and planetary health.

The Triple WellBeing® Framework: Nine Interconnected Competencies

Triple WellBeing® integrates three core capacities (thinking, feeling, connecting) with three core practices (self-care, people-care, earth-care), generating nine interconnected competencies that reflect what I've learned about regeneration as lived practice:

Awareness: self-awareness • social awareness • environmental awareness

Compassion: self-compassion • compassion for others • compassion for the more-than-human world

Action: resilience and agency • citizenship and belonging • rewilding and regeneration

This framework embodies the both/and thinking I've been exploring since my 2016 "Pilgrimage for Hope" essay—recognizing that individual healing, community justice, and ecological restoration are inseparable processes requiring integrated approaches.

The Science of Diverse Exposure

Extended outdoor exposure across all seasons connects our bodies to diverse microbiome networks. 2020 research on "biodiversity interventions" in daycares demonstrates immunity boosting effects, while 2010 studies on "Using Nature and Outdoor Activity to Improve Children's Health" show how exposure to diverse sensory inputs, varied gross and fine motor skill practice, and multiple species interactions supports comprehensive physical, mental, and social health.

But this research only tells part of the story. As someone who has navigated privilege in educational spaces, I understand that these health benefits currently reach primarily white, affluent families. True regenerative education requires making these benefits accessible to all children while addressing the systemic inequalities that create differential health outcomes in the first place.

Beyond Individual Health: Ecological Identity and Cultural Action

ONB Preschools cultivate ecological identity leading to individual and cultural actions that give back more than we take. Research demonstrates that children participating in Forest School programs "develop more pro-environmental attitudes," connecting to my previous exploration of how rewilding and regenerative learning create holistic, playful practices centering all nine Triple WellBeing® competencies.

This connects to broader movements for climate justice and Indigenous sovereignty. When children develop ecological identity through nature connection, they're not just becoming healthier individuals—they're developing the consciousness needed for addressing collective challenges like climate change, biodiversity loss, and environmental racism.

Pedagogy of Play and Stories: Daily Practice

Beyond research and theory, what does Triple WellBeing® look like in daily ONB practice? Pedagogy of Play and Stories!

Image from "How Diablo Became Spirit" childrens book from Conscious Stories 

Consider this example story I created for our Storytelling and Story Acting (STSA) protocol, inspired by the Conscious Stories book "How Diablo Became Spirit":

One day… the caretaker of the animal sanctuary had almost given up. The jaguar with silky black fur continued to snarl and act aggressively.

Then… he opened his mind and asked for help. He invited an animal communicator to come "speak" with the jaguar even though he didn't believe that was possible.

Finally… they listened to advice from someone with a different view and perception, renamed the jaguar, and helped resolve what the jaguar was worried about.

"One day; Then; Finally" are prompts I use in STSA protocol helping 3-6 year olds structure original stories with beginning, middle, and end. These loose suggestions elicit creative, student-led voices that the whole class acts out on our circle stage. The student author directs while choosing whether to perform or observe peers bringing their story to life.

Research shows STSA as deeply effective literacy protocol. When practiced in outdoor classrooms, I believe it also develops ecological identity and "perceptual reciprocity"—concepts that adults in families can explore through self-directed learning or in-person workshops.

Cross-Species Communication and Border Crossing

The jaguar story, based on true events about animal communication, reveals possibilities for cross-species connection. This simple weekly activity—practiced outdoors across all seasons with intentional content around diversity in the more-than-human world and linguistic diversity—connects us to Triple WellBeing® through practicing three core skills (thinking, feeling, connecting) with three core practices (self-care, people-care, earth-care).

This work requires what I call "border crossing"—moving between different ways of knowing while remaining open to perspectives that challenge dominant cultural assumptions. Even if we can't comprehend animal communication literally, or understand it as metaphor for reading body language and keen observation, we benefit from taking the perspective of different beings.

Expanding Sensory Worlds: Learning from Ed Yong

Ed Yong, British-American science journalist, highlights this beautifully in "An Immense World":

"The Earth teems with sights and textures, sounds and vibrations, smells and tastes, electric and magnetic fields. But every kind of animal, including humans, is enclosed within its own unique sensory bubble, perceiving but a tiny sliver of our immense world."

This perspective-taking—or at its most advanced level, interspecies communication—guides us toward cultivating ecological identity and increasing capacity for what Mitchell Thomashow calls "perceptual reciprocity."

Ecological Identity and Wild Names

Ecological Identity, explored in Mitchell Thomashow's book by that name and expanded through Joanna Macy's "Council of All Beings" ritual, becomes lived practice at Mycelium Cooperative. We invite children and multigenerational communities to explore "Wild Names"—what Coyote's Guide to Connecting with Nature calls "nature names."

Since I want children and families embracing that humans ARE nature, we call them Wild Names. Students create stories through STSA protocol while imagining communication with their chosen beings. Adults in families can also choose Wild Names, beginning their own journey toward ecological identity.

From Reciprocity to Generosity: The Health Connection

As Mitchell Thomashow writes in "To Know the World":

"Under the best circumstances, a truly reciprocal encounter yields generosity. Reciprocity implies exchange. Generosity implies gratitude, kindness and compassion. It encourages empathy, dialogue, connectedness and love—the giving of yourself to others."

This progression reveals the deeper health connection:

PERCEPTUAL RECIPROCITY

↓

GENEROSITY

↓

WELLBEING

↓

BOOSTED IMMUNITY

In just three months of programming, I witness this in our youngest mixed-age 3-6 year old cohort. They practice deeper kindness and love transcending compliance or exchange, diving into genuine perceptual reciprocity. The care they show during escalated conflict resolution and passion for creating grasslands seed banks with 15 diverse species while reseeding areas we've impacted demonstrates exceptional development.

Family Integration and Adult Learning

Bringing these experiences home begins family journeys toward improved health and ecological identity. Without using advanced terminology, these young humans embody Triple WellBeing® approaches, combining thinking, feeling, and connecting capacities with self-care, people-care, and earth-care practices.

I invite adults to explore perceptual reciprocity and ecological identity development:

• Which Wild Name of the Short Grass Prairie are you living into and trying to communicate with?

• What is that being telling you? • How would that more-than-human being share, grieve, and act in a Council of All Beings?

Justice and Accessibility: Making Health Benefits Universal

Through Mycelium Cooperative's Pay What You Can culture and partnership with the Colorado Collective for Nature Based Early Education (CCNBEE), we're working to make these health benefits accessible to all families, not just those who can afford private tuition.

This represents what grows when something life-affirming emerges from the rubble of systems that have created health disparities along racial and economic lines. True regenerative education requires addressing both individual wellness and systemic inequalities simultaneously.

Looking Forward: Adult Learning and Part 2

Stay tuned for upcoming adult learning workshops—both online and in-person—exploring these concepts more deeply, plus Part 2 of "Diversity EQUALS Health" examining how diverse learning communities strengthen everyone's development.

My blog posts serve diverse audiences—families, guardians, parents, practitioners, graduate students, and community adults—covering the "Tangled Bank" (Darwin's enduring metaphor) of interests, initiatives, and networks weaving together when we center justice, relationships, and regeneration.

Through Outdoor Nature Based Preschools, K-8 Forest Schools, and Emergent Strategy Wildcraft Workshops for Adults, we explore perception, observation, interpretation, and reciprocity from human and more-than-human perspectives. Central to all age groups remains this understanding: Early Childhood is "not just cute, but powerful and incredibly important."