Sherry crawford

Teacher at Wren’s Nest

Pronouns: she/her

My background is primarily environmental education and agriculture. My family owns an Ayrshire dairy farm in Whiting Vermont, where I grew up exploring and playing on the 300 acres of fields, swamps and woods with a core group of 6 kids living on the farm. It was definitely a child initiated unstructured play based background that I experienced as a child. I raised my 2 children, Galen and Brianna in the same manner- with the outdoors and nature exploration as key components; and as adults, the natural world and environment are integral to their way of life. And now I have a 1 year grandson, Alden, who is being exposed to the wonders of our beautiful natural world of the Pacific Northwest. Currently back in Whiting, I just moved into a new small house consisting of windows galore and book shelves filled with field guides and other nature oriented books. My days are spent outdoors as much as possible enjoying every season and observing the phenology of plants and animal behavior.

After graduating from Castleton State College with a degree in Environmental Science, I worked for the Nature Conservancy in the stewardship division recruiting and leading volunteers (which included many youth camps) in the field and on the water. Then for about 10 years I taught Biology and Animal Diversity labs at Castleton. I've developed and led multiple summer camps for both MALT and Castleton Recreation. For a number of years I volunteered in the elementary school classroom with the Environmental Learning for the Future (ELF) program and the current version, the Four Winds Nature Institute. I've also worked in a public school library, which provided lots of experience with kids and books, as well as a couple of months in Honduras volunteering at a school. And last year while in Seattle, I volunteered with the award winning Tiny Trees program, a nature preschool located entirely outdoors on the grounds of the city's parks.

In my other life- the agricultural world- after growing up on a dairy farm; while in my 20's we bought a dairy farm in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont . Years later, after returning to this area, I started a family farmstead artisan cheese business, although it was a popular alpine style cheese it kept me inside, too much for my liking. Thus I moved on to work for a progressive organic vegetable farmer working in the greenhouses, fields and farmstand.

After being aware of the forest preschool movement for a number of years, I'm thrilled to combine two of my passions, young kids and the natural world by being part of Wren's Nest.