Afterschool

Technology and nature, in the same afternoon.

These two get treated as opposites — the screen versus the outdoors. Out here they are one subject. You need instruments to see a forest properly, and you need a forest to make the instruments worth building.

Leaf identification worksheets, crayons, pressed leaves and a field guide on a table — Paper first. The sensors come later.

Three strands

What they actually do.

Coding and robotics

Building things that move, sense, and respond. Kids design the behaviour, then find out what the woods does to it — cold batteries, wet ground, leaves in the way.

Data and field science

Sensors, water quality, and logging tree and wildlife data across a season. Measurements only mean something once you have a second measurement to compare them to, so we keep going back.

AI and digital making

Games, tools, and digital storytelling about what they found outside. The subject matter is always the forest, which keeps the technology from becoming the whole point.

How it runs.

Sessions run through the school term, outdoors whenever the weather allows and under cover when it does not. Groups are small on purpose — everyone has to be within earshot of one adult on a trail.

There is no prior experience assumed, for the technology or the woods. The kids who arrive knowing a lot about one usually know nothing about the other, which is the most useful possible starting point.

Ages: School-aged
When: Through the school term, after school hours
Group size: Small — everyone stays within earshot on the trail
Led by: The trail's official NY DEC forest steward

Write to us and we will tell you what a term looks like and what it costs.

For schools & groups

Bring your class.

Most of what we run is arranged directly with a teacher, a scout leader, or a homeschool group — you tell us roughly when, and we find a date that suits the weather and the season. Groups of up to about twenty work best. Everything is led by the trail's official NY DEC forest steward.

Tell us the age range and rough group size and we'll come back with what we can do and what to bring.

Request a date →

Who it's for: School groups, homeschool co-ops, scouts, and families
Group size: Up to about 20
Cost: Tours and hikes are free. Workshops are free or low cost.
Where: Kerhonkson, NY · Ulster County