Lessons

Bridging Perspective Storytelling to Worldbuilding: Five tips to making long-lasting connections between place and creative writing.

My name is Rory Peterson and I am currently a graduate student at the University of Washington working with the outdoor educational organization of Islandwood. Within my mission as an educator I work to create wider access to green spaces, developing deep connections with place through ecological knowledge, and help students realize that they can create hope within their communities for healthier ecosystems. The backgrounds that influence my desire to work on furthering these ideas are my education in recreation management, anthropology, environmental studies, and psychology. Something that connects my backgrounds and my goals within education is storytelling, the subject of this article.

Within the field of environmental education we often work on shifting our perspectives from our human centered views to the perspectives of different plants, animals, and fungi within our ecosystem. This has been important work in creating an eco-conscious generation, one where we tell the stories of not just what is directly affecting humans but what is happening within the environment. Perspective storytelling deepens our understanding of place, it allows us to think on wider temporal and spatial scales, solidifying our knowledge of what it means to be ‘a part of’ an environment instead of ‘apart from’. It also has the chance to unearth ideas of how humans have effected our environment and is an incredible way to dream of futures where we right the wrongs of past societal actions or build off of things we have done right.

What has influenced me in developing a lesson based off of perspective storytelling and worldbuilding is the way I have seen science fiction and fantasy stories physically alter my environment and also alter how I think about my place in the ecosystem. The example I most often talk about is that of Frank Herbert’s Dune, as he based much of the world off of where I grew up, Tacoma Washington. Much of the discussion based off extractive economic systems and flagrant disregard for native populations of the planet Arrakis comes from the way Herbert saw the Ruston Way smelter affect the coastline of Tacoma (Parks Tacoma, 2024). This is a story of ecological resilience told through a perspective that can only be dreamed of if one is given the opportunity to write down stories regarding complex interactions within environmental systems and human interactions. The story of the park itself is one of hope, the park has been cleaned through millions of dollars of restorative work and collaboration between organizations and cultural groups. It is an intense example of how a small local phenomena can influence one of the most important literary writings of our time.

But one may ask, where does the connection between perspective storytelling and intense worldbuilding happen? It happens within how we form the lesson. Below I will list five discussion tips I use in perspective storytelling and how they can connect to wider literary application and creative writing lessons.

1. Discuss Compassion

Whether it be for other people, animals, plants, fungi, or the natural world itself, perspective storytelling has us imagining what it feels like to be another being. This baseline compassion that requires perspective storytelling is great, but it can be better. Through more intense instruction and scaffolding we can switch that story into worldbuilding. What does compassion lead to? What conflicts could be solved? Who or what can be saved? These important themes are necessary as we want to be educators for the future. Adding in important notes of how different things within our world and students’ imaginary worlds care for each other is vital sense-making. The power of bridging wider gaps regarding these perspectives and worldbuilding is immense.

2. Discuss History

The next scaffolding tip for creative writing in the outdoors is discussing history. This brings in a temporal scale that is necessary for perspective storytelling to be meaningful. Whether that temporality be measured by events or the stark contrast of time it helps students understand their concept of the environment. When I have used this tool in my practice I often mention and discuss the following general questions:

– “What did this place look like 10, 100, 1000, or even 10,000 years ago?”

– “What events do you think these creatures have seen or felt that we haven’t?”

– “When do you think events like these occur?”

– “In the future what do you think this place could look like?”

These are some general spots I have started conversations off of in the past. They help offer unique points of interest that world building and perspectives can stem from. Pulling back the example of the smelter in Tacoma, there is knowledge of what that environment has seen. We can take the perspective of the land and see the scar that was left behind, but from that scar there has been envisioning of the future. From that dreaming there is now a beautiful park that serves as a monument to the way we can heal the environment when we injure it. These perspective storytelling questions can lead to development of abstract thought regarding historicity, knowledge that change is inevitable and stories help with that. Giving more fervor to creative writing and the importance that world-building has in regards to our environmental impact.

3. Discuss Culture

To have students relate to the things they write about we have to be acknowledging what expertise they are coming in with, that expertise often relates to their socio-cultural context. With perspectives we can do our best to try and experience worlds from other beings. An example of an author who has engaged in this to profound extents is Ursula K. Le Guin. Through her familial upbringing and interests she included the lens of anthropology in which protagonists of her stories participated in getting to know others and being different from themselves (Phillips, 2019). This leads to important aspects of worldbuilding where we imagine different creatures and different people creating routines of their daily lives. Imagining those ideas leads us to the next important note for taking perspective storytelling to a higher degree into worldbuilding.

4. Discuss Scale

When starting a lesson on perspective storytelling I find it useful to initially determine what students are interested in talking about with scale. The perspectives they can take within these stories can be microcosmic or planetary scale depending on an educator’s scaffolding of the lesson. To bridge perspective storytelling into wider world building techniques it is important to make distinctions on what to write about while not limiting the creative options for them. One could write about the moon in a story and have very apt observations of scientific phenomena regarding orbits, tides, and even geologic composition of the objects surface. Although this scale is large it has significant potential to help students understand ecological systems here on earth.

When expanding this perspective to wider world building techniques it relates to helping students write about how they connect to their environment and what they envision happening within their environment. What different systems and what scales are they making sense of through their storytelling? With the moon example that has been discussed there are scientific ideas and knowledge sets embedded within talking about its perspective. Thinking about how those systems could change within their writing or theoretical concepts that could be altered can add not only to the potential for their world building but also for their journey in seeking deeper understanding of natural phenomena.

5. Make a Map

What would a good fantasy or science fiction novel be without a map? These tools are important for student sensemaking as they are physical representations of the environment. If a student draws a map of a bug’s home or the map of a fantasy world their mind is occupying, both are wonderful teaching moments. Ask them questions and have them annotate it:

– What do these lines represent?

– Whose perspective shaped this map?

– How has it changed over time?

Not only is it an important tool for them but also you as an educator. Through viewing these as artifacts of your practice, you can examine the perspectives students are taking and see physical representations of how they see systems enacting themselves. You can see the beginnings of them making sense of their place and also the worlds they are building within their dreams.

I hope these five tips to scaffolding help with your outdoor environmental storytelling. Perspective storytelling helps students create compassionate connections to the world around them and dream of fantastical futures through world building and creative outlets.

Work Cited

Phillips, J., Heitman, D., Gillis, J. R., Tonguette, P., & Holsinger, B. (2019). Ursula K. Le Guin was a creator of worlds. National Endowment for the Humanities. https://www.neh.gov/article/ursula-k-le-guin-was-creator-worlds 

Winters, A. (2024, May 7). Tacoma’s real-life “Dune.” Parks Tacoma. 
https://www.parkstacoma.gov/tacomas-real-life-dune/