Nature vs Socially Constructed Ideas

While observing my chickens with my seven-year-old niece, we talked about a hen that I recently separated from the flock. I explained to her that I separated the hen because she lost some feathers and the other hens started picking on her and to determine the status of the bare chicken’s health, I separated the hen so I could observe her. Removing her also provided some relief but eventually I had to figure out if and how I could integrate her back into the flock. In other words, moving her was a way of protecting her from injury or possibly death. Moving her was also a way of protecting the flock from possible disease.

Literally, hens pick at the bare skin of an unfeathered hen. There are many reasons for this behavior. I went on to explain that the other hens could possibly hurt or kill the separated hen and that these behaviors offered a basic form of protection and preservation of the flock. Losing feathers could be due to many things but if the hen were losing feathers because she was sick, then the flock would instinctively drive her away (like expel her from the flock) or kill her to prevent the spread of disease to maintain the overall health of the flock.

She told me that "those hens were mean and that it is not nice to not include someone into the group." Of course, I laughed and then she was not happy with me for laughing. “Inclusion at all cost, even the demise of the flock –right?” I asked. She agreed. My niece’s response was an interesting representation of her understanding of nature in relation to socially constructed ideas.

We talked at length about inclusion as we have constructed this concept in our society -exclusion as it relates to my hens -and that it was important to learn the difference between nature and socially constructed ideas. She wasn’t interested in my comparison. Her response to my explanation of the hens might be correlated to her development - her ability to process complicated concepts such as death or flock preservation or perhaps her lack of experience with hens hindered her ability to compare ideas. It is also common for young children to see animals as an extension of humans. Or maybe it was something else. I don't know.

I could not help but wonder how the inescapable emphasis placed on socially constructed ideas and the lack of proximity to the natural world might interfere with the development of knowledge. I wonder how applying socially constructed ideas to the natural world gets in the way of increasing a child’s proximity to the natural world. I wonder how intentionally increasing a child’s proximity to the natural world might offer a vehicle to build upon concepts constructed in the all more familiar social world in a way where children understand the difference in natural science and social science.

A young child is capable of developing a nuanced understanding of the world –both natural and social, even with limited cognitive capabilities. Take the time to observe animal behavior. Children will likely have more questions than answers and will likely understand their observations through social experiences. This is a good thing. Embrace the exploration of finding out more information via reading a book or finding information on the internet. Then talk about observations and the new knowledge discovered. Conversation between teacher or parent and child about nature vs socially constructed ideas have the potential to develop a more nuanced understanding of concepts like inclusion.