Eco-poetic Inquiries to inspire Eco-literacy: Practices of Joyful Connection to Earth ANDREJS KULNIEKS University of Saskatchewan Abstract In my research I explore how practices of eco-poetic inquiry can support learners in developing ecological literacy by deepening their relationships with the Earth. Using examples from courses I teach in language and literacies at the secondary level in a teacher education program in Saskatchewan, I examine how eco-poetic practices also foster joy in this learning. Engaging with eco-poetic inquiries that ask students to describe the connections they have with local environments is a way of asking them to re-examine the relationships they have with the more than human world that can lead to a restoration of healthy relationships with local places. Key words: Eco-literacy, eco-poetic inquiry, language arts, environmental education David Orr  s (1992) argument, that   all education is environmental education   is an essential aspect of helping teachers and their students connect with the places where they live (p. 90). In our University of Saskatchewan Secondary Language Arts and Literacies courses, teacher candidates share one piece of their creative work that they revise and rewrite as they consider theories of language learning and their engagement with what Orr (1992) outlines as ecological literacy. Orr explains that although being ecologically literate includes the ability to read, write, use numbers and   to know what is countable and what is not   ecological literacy also requires   the more demanding capacity to observe nature with insight, a merger of landscape and mindscape   (p. 86). As outlined by Bowers (2002, 2016), Martusewicz et al (2011), it is essential to raise awareness of how language shapes our understandings about the Earth. In what follows, I share examples from my teaching and personal practices that show how approaches to eco-poetic inquiry can deepen student understandings and embodiments of eco-literacy as joyful connections with Earth. Joy is defined in the Oxford English Dictionary [OED] as   A vivid emotion of pleasure arising from a sense of well-being or satisfaction; the feelings or state of being highly pleased or delighted; exultation of spirit; gladness, delight   (2025). The connections that teachers and students make with the Earth can become a joyful activity when they are inspired by or grounded in emotions and experiences of gratitude, belonging, and well-being. First, I situate my pedagogy as a language and literacy educator in the need for eco-literacy as I consider connections between language arts learning and environmental education. Developing Eco-Literacy Public systems of schooling invest immense amounts of capital to develop technological literacy. Eco-literacy is often overlooked in systems of education due to an Language and Literacy  Volume 27, Issue 3, 2025  Page 167  emphasis on a doctrine of consumption promoted where students are increasingly expected to envision themselves as workers and consumers. As Bowers (2016) explains: Awareness of what is communicated through the relational and emerging world is also dependent upon having acquired the language necessary for naming and thus making explicit the patterns of communication that otherwise go unnoticed. Few people demonstate awareness that the digital revolution is driven by a libertarian/market liberal ideology that limits access to the place-based and intergenerational vocabularies necessary for becoming aware of essential information about the health of the cultural and natural ecologies upon which life depends (p. 78). Opportunities for re-evaluating information are an important social practice of eco-literacy because they include (and require) a deep analysis of language. Learners can develop their ecological intelligence by investigating root metaphors. Bowers (2016) outlines how language carries forward notions and understandings form the past. Discussions about how language is used to shift thinking are necessary because it is difficult to think beyond the language that we are immersed within when we are born. Looking up words in the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) provides students with an etymological awereness, that words have a history. Unpacking the meanings that words hold or represent, and how those meanings change helps us understand that languages evolve over a course of time. An analysis of the history of words also brings with it a discussion of Rosenblatt  s (1978) transactional theory that seeks to understand how the reader  s experiences are an integral part of the meaning-making process involved when engaging with texts. As Kulnieks et al (2010) explore, a deep analysis of language that asks the reader to consider the etymology of language beyond the word and to the land is part of an ecohermeneutic approach to experiential learning: An eco-hermeneutic curriculum involves moving beyond exclusively printcentred forms of learning in order to develop a deeper understanding of place. Rather than depending solely upon its reconstruction through printcentred learning, eco-hermeneutics seeks to include interpretive experiential learning in this process of inquiry. (p. 17) Writing in local spaces that are not re-constructed by humans can also give thinkers the opportunity for connecting with nearby nature. Living in Canada provides a wealth of spaces that can be accessed for engaging deep writing practices. Within any week of any season, by wearing appropriate clothing, writers can write for at least five minutes outdoors. Part of the first or second day of class (depending on the weather and temperature of the 1st day) I invite sudents to investigate the plants and animals that live beside the Education bulding. Thinking about the abundant gifts that the land gives us is a great opportunity to consider how the Earth provides what humans need for survival. We consider the size of the apple trees and crab-apples that were used long ago for researching and developing larger apples and greater yields. This opportunity to recognize that we are surrounded by nature is a way of beginning conversations about how we can help future students connect with local environments. Students tell me that they find joy in this activity as they meditate and connect with the trees and consider why being outside can promote health and well-being. Language and Literacy  Volume 27, Issue 3, 2025  Page 168  The places that people live and the environments that they engage with are part of a journey of becoming ecologically aware citizens. As teacher candidates reflect on and begin to define eco-literacy, they uncover some of the connections that their future students can make with local places. Cajete (1994) explains: Human beings must come to terms with the fact that we are a part of the natural community. It is through the educational process of ourselves and our children that we can internalize this basic understanding and reflect on the relationship we must establish with the natural world. (p. 114) Engaging, discussing, and writing about personal experiences with the natural world is part of examining and deepening the relationships that make the continuity of life possible. Helping students develop relationships with the earth is becoming an increasingly essential aspect of curriculum development due to the unhealthy screen-time practices that technological innovations are leading students toward. As discussed in Kulnieks (2023)   Eco-poetic inquiry provides an opportunity for writers to deepen their knowledge through an interpretive investigation of the language that they are using   (p. 221). Eco-poetic inquiry can also become an inspirational way of promoting joyful connection with Earth. I consider how my own environmental learning can contribute to my knowledge of intact ecosystems contributes to my own diet and why it is important for individuals to be part of food processing rather than leaving these processes up to multinational corporations. As I investigate the relationships that I continue to develop with natural environments the following poem evolves from considering a journey that I take with family and friends each year to reconnect with intact ecosystems: Preparing for our yearly sojourn north Visits to local markets and butcher shops inspire us to eat well find black olives that melt as you munch flavours delicate, processed for easy digestion Spring beyond cityscapes in small engine aluminum boats and kevlar canoes put aside thoughts of blackflies and mosquitoes as they hum and begin to cover your shirt these pollinators expand relationships with plant-life connect continuity and connectivity as they make berries become gifts of plant-life in everyday life blueberry bushes flower to generate fruit recognize a return of flower petals dance in the breeze a traformation to intensities of wild berry memories moments of growth represented in seasonal shifts of colour and sound trace forest paths that have been here long before humankind return to rocks where families of mushrooms return baskets of blueberries and raspberries fill jars with medicine gifts of health  Language and Literacy  Volume 27, Issue 3, 2025  Page 169  boiled into food, medicines for colder days the big blackened stainless steel pot will soon simmer above red coals heat generated toward future breakfasts garden scents clash with store-brought treats advice generates expanded crops overlooked in the moment grandmother sews extra rows of radishes, carrots, and peas for open-face breakfast treats gathered and recollected in joy sketch natural colours into blank pages of the notebook outdoor activities re-imagined in technologies imagine ideas that develop in walking beside plant-life communicated in yellow, violet, purple, and blue flowers engage with art created through a focus on plants enjoy gifts of health from families of plants that grow within the more-than human world waterscapes beyond shoreline limestone rocks with beginnings in the Oligocene well into the second half of this century the journey continues movement towards heathy understandings Kulnieks, A. (2025) As my poem illuminates, eco-literacy is also integral to my health. My ongoing practice of eco-poetic inquiry includes moving slowly by walking or bicycling as I reflect on the world around me and recognize that we are connected to the ecosystems we live within. Writing about present moments that we are experiencing is part of a journey that outdoor eco-poetic inquiry can inspire. Solnit (2000) writes: There is a subtle state most dedicated urban walkers know, a sort of basking in solitude  a dark solitude punctuated with encounters as the night sky is punctuated with stars. In the country one  s solitude is geographical    one is altogether outside of society, so solitude has a sensible geographic explanation, and then there is a kind of communion with the nonhuman. (p. 186). As I slow down and wonder about how joyful engagements can contribute to the development of ecological literacy, I am reminded that many of the technologies we use are designed to foster the attitude that we should sacrifice connections with the places we live for the convenience of speed and immediacy. Engaging Pedagogically in Eco-poetic Inquiry In my classes, teacher candidates expand on their notes about being outside. As they investigate ecological literacy during initial classes, they develop their eco-poetic writing to share with what grows into our learning community by the end of the term. Language and Literacy  Volume 27, Issue 3, 2025  Page 170  . Others may reflect on these processes in their theory-to-practice journal entries. Walmsley, Cox, &amp; Leggo (2017) write: Poetry (from the Greek poiein, to make) creates or makes the world in words. Knowing, being and becoming in the world. Poetry begins with attentiveness, imagination, mystery, and wonder. Poetry invites researchers to experiment with language and to engage imaginatively with experience. (p. 14) Arts-informed activities that inspire an analysis and reflection of personal writing help learners embody the importance of their learning. Our classroom discussions about the importance of providing opportunities to write creatively and opportunities to choose some work to share with our learning community becomes part of a process of eco-poetic inquiry. When teacher candidates share their creative work in my class, they have an opportunity to address questions like: What inspired your work and How did you expand your story so that the process of learning and theorizing becomes explicit. Poetic inquiry provokes the artist to reflect on the deeper meanings behind what they are writing which can lead to an embodiment of that process. Eco-poetic inquiry can help learners recover their connections with local places. In his (2016) book Digital detachment, Bowers writes: Within the context of the cultural commons, with its intergenerational gift economy essential to advances in the arts, crafts, healing practices, moral narratives, social justice traditions, and knowledge of local natural systems, the ecologically and culturally informed analog for reframing the meaning of wealth would be to associate it with possessing an in-depth knowledge of the traditions of the cultural commons and an ability to make a contribution to the community as a mentor, skilled craftsperson, artist, healer, and as a model of how to exercise ecological intelligence. (p. 82) Bowers (1993) explores   the commons   as places that communities can access as part of their connection to the more-than-human world. Eco-poetic inquiry can inspire learners to focus on the spaces that writers of poetic work can access in the creation of their art. We consider how public spaces can become sites of learning and inquiry for future writing activities. Eco-poetics to Inspire Reflexive Embodiment Reflexive embodiment can provoke a positive change for the future. Kulnieks and Young (2018) offer an opportunity for eco-poetic inquiry inspired by outdoor classrooms:   Learning gardens provide an opportunity to consider the world beyond the confines of the public school classrooms   (p. 81). Food products are often sold in guise of helping consumers to feed themselves quickly and efficiently. They are also on the market to generate a profit and often planned to be on shelves somewhere far away for a long period of time. Asking learners to reflect about their relationships with plants as well as the food that they eat can inspire an embodied thinking process for re-evaluating consumer culture. An engagement with ecological literacy and with eco-poetic inquiry is a reflexive and embodied practice as it asks learners to (re)consider their relationships with the Earth. These literacy practices are an integral part of eco-justice education as they require a deep and critical analysis of root metaphors as outlined by Bowers (1993, 2016). Eco-literacy Language and Literacy  Volume 27, Issue 3, 2025  Page 171  practices involve re-reading, re-examining, and re-writing understandings of relation to the Earth. Implications of Eco-literacy for Joyful Well-being Classroom environments are increasingly becoming spaces designed to perpetuate and support connection and integration into consumer culture as well as the exploration, commodification, and the production of data. Although technologies can help us explore information, these need to be used with caution. Bowers (2016) explains: The colonizing nature of the digital culture, with its cell phones, tablets, computers, and video games, brings about a change in consciousness and self-identity that aligns more with the Western values of seeking immediate gratification and material possessions, pursuing success in one  s chosen career, ignoring environmental limits, and viewing the traditional knowledge and skills as sources of backwardness. (p. 74) Engaging with eco-poetic inquiry and other eco-literacy practices can help learners consider the local spaces that they live and to develop relationships with the more-thanhuman world. In Young and Kulnieks, (2022)   Leadership in eco-justice environmental education practice   we write: While learners need to know about the effects of climate change in scientific terms through statistical data and other means, we believe that they will benefit immensely by making connections between themselves and what they are studying. (p. 200) As one example, my own eco-poetic inquiry shared in this paper that invites reflection and gratitude about where our food comes from is a way to combat unhealthy eating practices that are often inspired through the use of technologies. Eco-literacy practices can lead learners toward a path of discovery about concepts that they may have missed. Important eco-justice issues, like access to public spaces as outlined by Solnit (2000), are topics students are interested about when they are given time to think and to make meaning because important ideas require a deep level of introspection. Abram (1996) postulates:   The enigmatic nature of language echoes and   prolongs unto the invisible   the wild, interpenetrating, interdependent nature of the sensible landscape itself   (p. 85). It is important for learners to listen to the natural spaces where they find themselves. Being outdoors can remove them from the imagined safety of human-built environments to glimpse the gifts that come from the Earth. Opportunities to write about local places become a space for students to consider healthy relationships with the places they live. Writing stories, songs, and other poetic works allows learners to interrogate the language that they use to explore their understandings about human dependence on the Earth. Leggo (2004) writes: The past is forgiving, always present, still living, being lived, and the future is like the past, also present, the stories that return when we attend to the art and heart of storyliving, no linear progression like verb tenses in grammar handbooks, heartful and artful attending in the momentous moment, the present moment, where past and future are tangled lines composing a location, a circle of earth, heart, time, life, all circles, a curriculum of external moments for standing firm and flexible with hopeful remembering. (p.33) Language and Literacy  Volume 27, Issue 3, 2025  Page 172  When we ask students to take part in eco-literacy practices that inspire them to connect with the Earth, we help them understand what happens if we only see ourselves as working consumers of the planet. Asking them to think about what a throw-away society means may lead to interesting discussions about who we are as human beings. Engaging in ecoliteracy practices through eco-poetic inquiries can become an important way for learners to envision and embody more joyful, healthy futures. References Abram, D. (1996). The spell of the sensuous: Perception and language in a more-thanhuman world. Vintage Books. Bowers, C. A. (1993). Education, cultural myths, and the ecological crisis: Toward deep changes. State University of New York Press. Bowers, C. A. (2002). Toward an eco-justice pedagogy. Environmental Educational Research, 8(1), 21-34. https://doi.org/10.1080/13504620120109628 Bowers, C. A. (2016). Digital detachment: How computer culture undermines democracy. Routledge. Cajete, G. (1994). Look to the mountain: An ecology of Indigenous education. Kivaki Press. Kulnieks, A., Longboat, D. R., &amp; Young, K. (2010). Re-indigenizing curriculum: An ecohermeneutic approach to learning. AlterNative: An International Journal of Indigenous Peoples, 6(1), 15  24. https://doi.org/10.1177/117718011000600102 Kulnieks, A., &amp; Young, K. (2018). Exploring ecological literacy in teacher identity: Reflexive inquiry through a learning garden curricula. In E. Lyle (Ed.), The negotiated self: Employing reflexive inquiry to explore teacher identity (pp. 7685). Brill/Sense. Kulnieks, A. (2023). Eco-poetic inquiry for inspiring relationships with local places: Exploring a sustainable curriculum of eco-literacy learning. Cultura: International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology, 20(1), 217  230. https://doi.org/10.3726/CUL012023.0017 Kulnieks, A. (2025). Excerpts. Walking landscapes of story [Unpublished poetry manuscript]. Leggo, K. (2004). Tangled lines: On autobiography and poetic knowing. In A. Cole, L. Neilsen, G. Knowles, &amp; T. Luciani (Eds.), Provoked by art: Theorizing artsinformed research (pp. 18-35). Backlong Books and Centre for Arts-Informed Research. Martusewicz, R. A., Edmundson, J., &amp; Lupinacci, J. (2011). EcoJustice education: Toward diverse, democratic, and sustainable communities. Routledge. Orr, D. (1992). Ecological literacy: Education and the transition to a postmodern world. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Oxford English Dictionary. (2025). Joy, n. In OED online. https://www.oed.com/dictionary/joy_n?tab=meaning_and_use&amp;tl=true#40461919 Rosenblatt, L. M. (1978). Efferent and aesthetic reading. In The reader, the text, the poem (pp. 22-47). Southern Illinois University Press. Solnit, R. (2000). Wanderlust: A history of walking. Penguin Books.  Language and Literacy  Volume 27, Issue 3, 2025  Page 173  Walmsley, H., Cox, S., &amp; Leggo, C. (2017). Reproductive tourism: A poetic inquiry. Cogent Arts &amp; Humanities, 4(1), 1371101. https://doi.org/10.1080/23311983.2017.1371101 Young, K., &amp; Kulnieks, A. (2022). Leadership in eco-justice environmental educational practice: A case for climate change curricula through poetic inquiry that involves storytelling and walking the land. In E. Walsh (Ed.), Justice and equity in climate change education: Exploring social and ethical dimensions of environmental education (pp. 198-213). Routledge. Author Biography Andrejs Kulnieks is an Assistant Professor with the Curriculum Studies Department at the University of Saskatchewan. His research interests include literacies, eco-poetic inquiry, curriculum theory, language arts, environmental education, and eco-arts informed practices. His co-edited book with Dan Longboat and Kelly Young (Eds.) is entitled Contemporary Studies in Environmental and Indigenous Pedagogies: A curricula of stories and place.  Language and Literacy  Volume 27, Issue 3, 2025  Page 174