Richard Louv in his 2005 book Last Child in the Woods documents the benefits to children by spending unstructured and unsupervised time in Nature. Many of the stories he relates are from years past and from rural areas. The challenge for us now in populous urban areas is how to achieve those same results while sustaining our limited natural resources.
This presentation proposes that wildlife tracking skills can be a sustainable way for kids (and others) to better experience Nature in neighborhood canyons and open space preserves. It suggests some classroom/schoolyard activities that can prepare students for nature field trips and describes a simple field trip activity. Finally, it tries to relate all this to the scientific process.