Open Minds and Bright Ideas

by Cara Davenport, Program Manager

Close to fifty elementary students, in addition to parents, teachers, and a few Merck Forest staff, formed a gigantic circle outside the Visitor Center in the biting April air, standard formation for our opening activity “Open Minds and Bright Ideas’’. “You have two important jobs to do while we’re together today,” Education Director Chris Hubbard instructed the group, “The first is to keep your mind open, and the second is to share your ideas and what you notice. We’re going to play a quick game to demonstrate this. Your left hand is your open mind, and your right hand is a bright idea.”

After some more directions and corralling, each person in the circle had their arms stretched to the sides, their left mittened or gloved hand facing palm-up towards their left neighbor and the fingers of their right hand resting lightly in their right neighbor’s palm; together we created a linked loop. The group was quiet, listening closely as Chris spoke, waiting for the signal they had been given. “Squirrel.... maple tree... bluebird...” The sense of anticipation grew with each word she listed, until finally “... newt!”, and with shrieks and giggles each student tried to simultaneously catch the hand of the person to their left and escape the grasp of their neighbor on the right.

“How many of you caught a bright idea in your open mind?” A smattering of hands go up, amid lingering laughter.

“So what does it mean to have an open mind? What does that look like?” More hands shoot up; we’re off to the races.

This scene has become a familiar one at Merck Forest over the past several years and is an activity that demonstrates, in many integral ways, some of the deepest values we hold here as a staff and organization. The ‘two important jobs’ that we highlight, having an open mind and sharing our ‘bright ideas’, are ones that transcend participating in a Merck Forest program or field trip as a student. In some ways, they are the most important work that any of us can do in our lives.

Our default tends to be our own perspective, assuming that the way we think and see and experience is the baseline. Unless or until this is challenged, our response to new and different ideas and perspectives can be defensiveness and dismissal rather than curiosity and appreciation. Having our own perspective challenged is in many ways a great gift, an invitation to understand in new and different ways. The natural world abounds with opportunities to see from another’s point of view, or to at least attempt it. Whether it’s a fungus, a dragonfly, a porcupine, an octopus, a person from another culture, or a member of your own family, there are countless perspectives out there beyond our own, ways of seeing and experiencing the world that are different from ours.

Together, we collectively have a much richer and truer understanding and glimpse of the world around us. Sharing our experiences and perspective is an important contribution toward that collective understanding, and can be hard work! As we tell the students in the “Open Minds” activity, sometimes we aren’t sure of the reception our voice will havewe’re shy, or afraid of being dismissed or ignored or mocked. For many, these fears are based on real and painful experiences. But sharing our perspective is a courageous gift that we give to others at the same time that we can give the gift of really hearing their voice and story too.

Activities like “Open Minds”, in which we use physical proximity to learn and grow together and feel connected, can seem like a distant memory sometimes these days. Our education team looks forward to once again interacting with school and multi-family groups in this particular way, but until then I hope that we all can continue to practice and cultivate habits of appreciation, open-mindedness and perspective sharing. Even distanced from each other as we are now, there is much closeness to be gained and given from listening to each other and the natural world around us, and sharing from our own senses and experiences.