Raised By This Place is a research project and creative journey that explores how theater can nurture children’s and adults’ connection to nature and awaken their spiritual awareness.

Guided by Indigenous wisdom, ecological education, and theater as ritual, we engage in activities like:

  • Embodied retelling of Skywoman's Story and other Indigenous stories.

  • Creating sacred jars and terrariums

  • Improvisational theater and image-making

  • Writing and performing poems inspired ecological identity

The title, Raised By This Place, draws inspiration from Robin Wall Kimmerer’s reflection on being raised by strawberries and the land. It invites us to see ourselves as shaped not only by our family, but also by the wind, water, animals, and the soil beneath our feet.

This website serves as a living archive of children’s voices, drawings, stories, and performances. It honors their wisdom and reminds us that spirituality and ecological awareness are not abstract ideas — they are embodied, relational, and already present in children’s ways of being.

Raised By This Place started during the winter of 2025 as an Integrative Project for the Master’s program in Spirituality, Mind, Body at Teachers College, Columbia University. The research was structured around a scope and sequence of ten arts-based sessions, each lasting between 30 minutes and one hour, and conducted over a period of two months. Nine students from a university-based lab preschool participated in the project after obtaining written consent from their parents.

The activities in this study were designed as a progressive sequence of embodied, creative, and reflective experiences, each building on the last to foster children's ecological awareness and spiritual expression. Inspired by the relationship between theater and spirituality, I intentionally chose activities and materials that offered multimodal artistic experiences, enabling children to express themselves not only through drama but also through visual arts, movement, music, and storytelling. My selections were shaped by my experience as a theater artist and educator and my desire to invite children into meaningful explorations of nature and belonging. Although books such as Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer and The Spell of the Sensuous by David Abram are not written for children, they were instrumental in shaping the conceptual foundation of this work. They helped me design activities that could translate complex themes — like reciprocity, interconnection, and ecological identity — into forms children could engage with. These ideas later found additional support through carefully chosen children's books, which made the concepts accessible and age-appropriate.

Raised By This Place now extends beyond its initial research setting, evolving into a flexible and living framework for spiritual and ecological learning through the arts. Whether offered as a workshop, retreat, or conference experience, this project invites children and adults alike to reconnect with nature, reimagine their identities in relationship to place, and cultivate a deeper sense of meaning and belonging. Through poetic inquiry, embodied storytelling, and creative ritual, Raised By This Place becomes not just a curriculum, but a call — to listen, to wonder, and to remember that we are all raised by something greater than ourselves