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Over the years, we have done a lot of nature journaling in our homeschool, and it’s been such a highlight for us! Nature journaling allows your kids to work at their own ability level, connect real life with learning, interact with nature, and learn countless science concepts. And it’s a great practice – whether or not you are homeschooling! It’s a beautiful way to tie in nature, science education, writing, and art.
When we do nature journaling, I don’t really require my kids to write or draw a certain amount. I do expect that my older kids will write more than just a few words, because I know that they are capable of writing paragraphs at a time. At this point, my kids are pretty good about knowing the expectations.
But when my kids are younger and aren’t able to write longer paragraphs, I let them work at the ability level that’s appropriate for them. So if they just draw pictures and label the parts of the picture, that’s perfectly fine. As they are able to add more, I encourage them to do so.
There isn’t just one way to do nature journaling, so you can play around with it to figure out the best way for your family. There are two primary ways we do nature journaling in our homeschool – we either go somewhere outside to draw and observe what we see, or we use nature books to draw and observe something specific.
Here’s how nature journaling works in our family:
Go to a spot in nature to draw and observe what you see
We love to pick a spot (sometimes the same spot over and over, so that we can observe it in different seasons), bring our journals, and draw and write about the animals, bugs, plants, and bodies of water that we see.
This is our favorite way to do nature journaling, because it lets my kids use their observational skills and find what they are drawn to or think is the most important. It makes this student led, not mom/teacher led. And in my opinion, anytime learning is interest led, kids are more excited and there’s a deeper level of understanding that happens.
Other times, we have a specific goal for your nature journaling. For example, if we are talking about leaves I might have my kids observing and drawing leaves, recording information about details they notice, and looking up information about that particular tree. We will sometimes bring reference book along with us if we are out and about doing our nature journaling, but other times we leave the books at home and just read them before we go or after we get home.
Nature journaling is so great, because you can do it in your backyard, at a park, on a hike… anywhere! But you can also do it in your house – without going anywhere.
Use nature books to draw and observe something specific
Why would you want to do nature journaling in your house, instead of actually being IN nature?
There might be reasons you’re not able to leave your house. Maybe you have a new baby, the weather is really cold, or you just want a day at home. You can still do nature journaling.
The other big reason for doing nature journaling from books is that you don’t have physical access to ALL of nature! If you live in the United States, you’re not going to be able to just hop on a plane and head over to Australia to observe the unique animals that live there.
You might be able to visit a zoo that has animals you wouldn’t normally see in your community (which is a great place to go for nature journaling), but obviously you can find many, many books about every single kind of plant, animal, insect, ecosystem, etc. The possibilities of what you can observe and study are endless! Plus, as your kids grow and get older, they will not only be able to sketch, draw and label, but they will also be able to read and research about their topic.
You can also use documentary videos as part of your nature journaling! We have done this before, and it’s a great way to let your kids see these items in a bit more 3D.
If the idea of staring at a blank sketch book is overwhelming to your kids (or to you!) and you need some more guidance or some templates to get you started, try one of these options:
Especially when your kids are young, nature journaling can cover so many aspects of science, this was our main science “curriculum” for many years! We would add in books and simple science experiments to round it out, along with unit studies for other non-nature topics.
You can find some of our favorite nature picture books listed HERE.
Supplies we like for nature journaling:
- sketch books
- nature reference books – you can find a huge list of some of our faves HERE. I recommend finding books specific to your region.
- pencils – drawing pencils or our favorite everyday pencils
- erasers
- water colors – this set is great for taking on the go
- colored pencils
- crayons and crayon holder – this is my favorite for littles, especially for nature journaling at home
I have some additional resources (like different paints and sketchbook options) listed over in my Homeschool Faves list in my Amazon storefront.