Checklist-focused field teaching can fill woods with facts yet miss genuine attention.

Evidence

For three days we wandered over this ecological map, traversing elevational zones from deep cove forests of tulip poplar and cucumber magnolia to the summits. The lush coves were a garden of wildflowers, glossy patches of wild ginger and nine species of trillium. The students dutifully wrote down whatever I told them, creating a mirror image of my internal checklist of things to see without much apparent interest. They asked for the spelling of scientific names so often that I felt like I was in a woodland spelling bee. The dean would be proud. … For three days I checked the species and ecosystems off the list to justify the trip. We mapped vegetation, soils, and temperature with the fervor of Alexander von Humboldt. At night we drew graphs around the campfire. Oak-hickory at midelevation, coarse gravelly soil—check. Reduced stature and increased wind speed at high elevation—check. Phenological patterns with elevational change—check. Endemic salamanders, niche diversification—check. I so wanted them to see the world beyond the boundaries of their own skins. I was conscientious not to waste a single teaching opportunity and filled the quiet woods with facts and figures. — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass, 789

Categorization

• XREF: Models the tension between scientific checklist method and the listening/attention method that runs through the Soundscape course; the author’s own ‘jaw ached’ confession is a method critique.
• QUESTION: Kimmerer here shows her own Humboldt-style fact-dumping failing to reach students — does she revisit and correct this method later in the book?