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| A workshop for YNU art class |
In this post-COVID environments, the young attitude for environmental issues is more serious than that of, say, octogenarians. Grandpas and grandmas will perish sooner or later before seeing the consequences of global warming. But 20 somethings will be 40 somethings in 20 years’ time when the average temperature for August in Tokyo could be more than 40C°. College students must worry and honestly act to increase the number of collaborators to tackle the problem. These days there are lots of young people in campus to think and discuss the topic. They also form voluntary groups to act upon their discussion to stop a possible catastrophe, even if it may be a tiny act of tending downtown gardens that may contribute to the mitigation of “heat islands.” Also the classes for the topic are popular. Faculties for environmental studies are receiving lots of applications from highschoolers. Those YNU students who devised the nature games study at Institute for Multidisciplinary Sciences. Many are planning to be science teachers after graduation. They call themselves YNU Satoyama ESD Base. They are serious about creating fun ESD programmes.
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| The YNU students wore a red
uniform jacket during the session. |
About 20 years ago, the president for YNU was the chairperson for Japan Association on the Environmental Studies. He ordered the entire campus “Never cut down the tree.” Many members of the community murmured complaints for their campus approaching to a temperate jungle. But now, the premise is an amalgam of research buildings, classrooms and deep forest. It makes the place ideal for nature games to kids. In one weekend for the end of this fall, the college students of Satoyama ESD Base held a “School of Forest” inviting to their campus about 30 pre and grade schoolers with their parents. They are having such sessions several times in a year. They are secretly popular events among families in Yokohama. The possible number of attendees is limited, and a lottery is held every time. One mum told me her daughter applied 3 times to the session and reached BINGO for the third time. Many attendees are joining the fun as an entire family, meandering a jungle-like forest of YNU. This fall’s main program had two menus. One is “Let’s create Forest Mask!” Another is “Let’s unleash your inner penmanship with bamboo brush.”
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| Inside the campus. Art students installed their work there. |
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| In addition to the sessions, there were
several games kids could play whenever they wanted. |
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| They also presented panels
explaining SDGs and Japanese traditional Satoyama life for environmental sustainability. |
To make forest masks, kids entered roughly 50m*50m area of YNU jungle and gathered materials like fallen leaves, autumn fruits, snail shells, feathers of some birds, etc. etc. The kids then returned to a workshop, pasted their catch on a strip of craft paper, and connected both sides of a strip with a rubber band. Voilà! Your forest mask was done! It seemed to me all preschoolers found themselves in a totally unfamiliar place, i.e. a forest. Yet, they ran around, and sometimes fell down on, the unpaved mountain(-like) area covered with fallen leaves and the other debris of autumn forest. YNU students were watching the adventure of tiny kids to secure the safety but left the attendees for their adventure to find catches. What the kids brought from the forest differed greatly although they were searching in a same area. When they pasted their catch to the craft paper, they became tiny artists to make their mask cool. During the entire session, the children were carefree with shining smile. With their laughing kids, parents looked very happy as well. There was nothing elaborate for crafting the mask, but surely kids enjoyed the nature.
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| The catch |
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| Thinking what to put next … |
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| The craft paper attached with a rubber band … |
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| Then, connected to another end. |
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| This certainly was THE presentation. |
Another program was to make bamboo brush and to calligraph with it. The way to make a brush is simple. You harvest a bamboo on the day of making brushes. Cut them to a suitable length for making calligraphy, then peel the skin of it at its edge long enough for a brush. Next, pound the peeled part with a mallet until the solid trunk of a bamboo becomes a bunch of fibre. The freshly cut bamboo contains water so that it is easier for squashing the trunk for a brush. Voilà! Your forest brush is ready! Next you write down whatever you want to on a sheet of Hanshi-paper. Your presentation will join the larger mural of calligraphy. Finally, please go to a white banner and write down anything you want on the banner with your bamboo brush. Your writing becomes a part of “Manifest” of today! Many first graders who started their Japanese calligraphy class in their school wrote down a word of their choice. Some googled in their parents’ smart phones to write down a difficult names of Anime characters, like Agatsuma Zen’itsu 我妻善逸 of the Damon Slayer 鬼滅の刃. (Why not Kocho Shinobu 胡蝶しのぶ? Hers is Hiragana!) The kids were enjoying the occasion for writing graffiti-like presentations on a very large canvas. They again showed their own originality with twinkling eyes. The program was to experience the relation between the forest and human daily life, in a very creative way. I was impressed.
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| The bamboo sticks with the skinned
tips, prepared by college students early this morning. |
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| Pounding |
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| An example. This was created last spring. |
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| This is impressive. |
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| A dud also tried enthusiastically. |
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| Manifest! |
For kids in urban area like Yokohama, it is not common to enjoy forest even if Citizen Forests of the City is in their backyard (; more to it next year). Such events to play in a forest with college students must be a thrilling and fun adventure for them. I was also fascinated by the enthusiasm of students who not only leaded preschoolers for their fun but also enjoyed the program they devised in their campus. I hope such experience sticks to their memory for a long time and helped their life in a boiling planet. Theirs should be long, for tens of years to come. Long live the New Generation. Oh, one more thing. I think those college students are bilingual. If you’re living in Yokohama and want to bring your kids to School of Forest, please check their home page for the latest information. Caution: it’s a highly competitive ticket.
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If you have any questions about Yokohama’s Green Tax and Green Up Plan, please make a contact with
Strategic Planning Division, Green Environment Bureau, City of Yokohama
横浜市みどり環境局戦略企画課
Phone: 045-671-2712
FAX: 045-550-4093
Strategic Planning Division, Green Environment Bureau, City of Yokohama
横浜市みどり環境局戦略企画課
Phone: 045-671-2712
FAX: 045-550-4093
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