This Counts as School: Playing with Fire

“This Counts as School” - A monthly blog post about uncommon learning experiences 

Playing with Fire

by Leah Nelson-Almatar

Allow me to set the scene: It was a Saturday afternoon, mid spring, the temperature was in the mid 70’s and not a single cloud lurked in the sky. My 3 year old was puttering about in the garden while my 6 year old rounded up the neighborhood boys. I was watering my garden as they made their way towards the front door.. They wanted to go inside, plug into their respective devices, and meet up in a virtual world known as roblox. I chose the role of the villain when I said “no,”

They all hung their heads with disappointment, and began to melt in their sullenness on my front porch until I casually said, “Actually, I was about to make a fire,” 

If there is one thing young boys love more than roblox it is fire. So we had a fire, to rival the pull of the ipad, to restore our senses and dust off our lenses. I had to explain to one of the neighbor boys that I didn’t have any of that “fire water” stuff that his dad uses to start fires. Instead, I grabbed a few brown paper bags I had saved for exactly this occasion, and balled them up, placing them carefully under a stack of kindling in the firepit. Using a bic lighter ignited the brown paper bag, which lit up and subsequently dimmed quite quickly, while the kindling just barely clung to its flame. 

I employed the kids to collect items to add to the fire, while I tried to get the larger logs lit. Grandpa had just mowed that morning, so we had a surplus of fresh cut grass along with the dried leaves and pinecones in the garden beds. One by one we added these ingredients to our fire and observed the reaction. The fresh cut grass produced clouds of thick smoke but would not hold a flame. The dried leaves burned quickly and broke up into bits, flying up into the sky like fireflies. The pinecones were the biggest hit of all! The pinecones were like little torches, each time one was added to the fire it quickly ignited. They didn’t burn up quickly or disintegrate but held a steady long-lasting flame.

We considered the pinecone, the fresh cut grass, and the dried leaves. The fresh cut grass was still green, we concluded that it contains more water than dried leaves, therefore producing more smoke. Dried leaves are quite brittle and lightweight, allowing them to easily break apart and float off as they burn. Pinecones are full of sap, which burns so readily that survivalists actually do use them to make natural torches. 

As we were throwing the last of our pinecones into the fire, one of the boys picked up the old metal pot from the mud kitchen. 

“Can I throw this into the fire?” 

I thought for a minute, “Actually, yes. Well, Kind of. Do you guys want to see if we can get water to boil on the fire?” 

Their faces lit up with curiosity. Some of them doubted it was even possible. I filled the rusty old pot up with water from the pond, and balanced it across the logs, right over the biggest flame of the fire. I told the kids that if they ever got stranded in the wilderness, they’d have to boil their water before they drink it, and suddenly we were playing survivor. We added a few rocks in to make it a stone soup, then we waited. Slowly we started to see bubbles, more and more, until the stone soup was at a roaring boil. We noted how fast the water was evaporating, and how hot the fire must have been! We sat in pure wonder, until the pot was nearly dry. 

As the fire died down, and the sun began to set, I felt satisfied at how I had turned a moment of disappointment over a “no” to electronics into an organic learning opportunity, not just for my own children but also for their friends. Learning CAN happen on a Saturday night around a fire pit, or a Sunday morning at the farmers market, or a Thursday afternoon at the bank. Opportunities to educate our children in the real world are all around us, all we have to do is accept the invitation! 

Leah Nelson-Almatar is a home educator located in Kansas City, MO

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