The Workshop Design Kit

"The best ecological teaching happens outdoors, in relationship with a specific place. The classroom is a preparation room. The land is the classroom."

Three Ready-Made Sessions, Take Off the Shelf and Teach. Paul Morris, MSc, CERP, Planet Healers.

How to Use This Kit

This kit contains three complete workshop designs, scripted enough to be used by someone teaching them for the first time, flexible enough to be adapted for any bioregion, any audience size, any level of prior knowledge. Each workshop includes: a session overview (purpose, audience, duration, materials); the arc (the emotional and intellectual journey participants take); a facilitation script (what to say, in what order, with what questions); adaptations (how to modify for different contexts); what to prepare in advance (the 30 minutes before participants arrive, which makes everything work); and what to do when it goes sideways, because it will. These are starting points, not scripts to follow rigidly. Your own ecological knowledge, your specific place, your particular participants, these will shape every session differently. The structure holds the space. You fill it with what you know.

Workshop One: What Happened to This Place?

A Two-Hour Public Introduction to Ecological Literacy.

Purpose

To shift participants from seeing landscape as scenery to reading it as a story, with a history, a current condition, and a direction of travel. This is the entry-level session. It works for people who have never thought about ecology, and for gardeners and farmers who have spent their lives in the landscape but never had a framework for understanding what they're seeing.

Ideal audience: general public, garden clubs, school groups (secondary and adult), community members near a restoration site, neighbourhood associations. 8 to 30 people.

Duration: 2 hours (15 minutes indoors or sheltered, 90 minutes in the field, 15 minutes closing).

Location requirements: any outdoor space with at least three distinct vegetation zones, ideally a degraded area alongside a less-degraded reference area. A park, a farm edge, a conservation area, an urban green space.

Materials: a hand lens for every 2 participants (worth the investment); field guides or printed species sheets for your region (iNaturalist can substitute); clipboards and pencils (optional but useful); one soil sample from two contrasting zones in a zip-lock bag; a camera or phone for documentation.

What to Prepare in Advance

(30 minutes before participants arrive.) Walk the route you will take. Identify five specific stopping points where you will ask the group to observe and discuss. At each, know the most ecologically significant thing visible from that spot, the question you'll ask to draw attention to it, and the simplest ecological explanation of what you're seeing. Do not over-plan; five stopping points with one good question each is better than twenty stops with prepared lectures. Find one piece of evidence of history, an old fence post that shows where a hedge used to be, a change in soil colour that indicates drainage, a cluster of invasives that marks the edge of a disturbance. This becomes your anchor story for the session.

Session Arc

Opening (15 minutes), the question that shifts everything

Gather participants in a circle before you enter the landscape. Ask them to look around and simply describe what they see. They will say: trees, grass, sky, birds. Then ask: "what happened here?" The question lands differently than "what do you see?" It implies the landscape has a story, that it was once different, that what you're looking at is the result of forces acting over time. Tell them: today we're going to learn to read that story.

First stop (20 minutes), the most degraded area

Bring them to the worst-looking spot first. Ask "what do you notice?" and gather observations without correcting. Then "what would you predict about the soil here? Touch it. Smell it." Hard, dry, light-coloured, little smell: that is the soil food web, suppressed. Introduce the infiltration test if you have time: pour a cup of water on the surface and watch; slow absorption means compaction. Ask "what do the plants here tell us?" and read two or three as indicators (Canada thistle means disturbed, compacted soil; African grasses mean abandoned agricultural land; bindweed means heavy disturbance, low organic matter). Key teaching point: these plants are not the problem. They are the symptom. The problem is what happened to the soil that lets them dominate.

Second stop (20 minutes), the transition zone

Move to an area showing some native recovery. Ask "what's different here?" before you explain. Teach succession: ecosystems move through stages from bare ground to mature community, driven by pioneer species that prepare the ground for what comes next. Point to a pioneer: "this plant is here because it tolerates conditions native woodland species can't, and it's also improving those conditions for what comes after. It's a nurse plant." Key teaching point: the landscape is always moving. It is recovering, trying to return to the more complex community it was. Our job is to remove obstacles to that process, not to impose a new community from outside.

Third stop (20 minutes), the best-preserved area or reference site

Move to the healthiest part, or walk to a nearby reference area. Ask "how does this feel different from where we started?" The answer is usually emotional before technical: cooler, quieter, more layered, more alive. Teach structural complexity: count the layers (ground cover, herbaceous, shrub, understory, canopy); each layer multiplies the species the habitat can support. Ask "what birds do you hear that you didn't hear in the first area?" Do the soil comparison: pass around your two samples. "Both soils were here before human intervention. The difference between them is biology, thirty years of accumulated organic matter, fungal network, bacterial activity. This is what we're trying to rebuild." Key teaching point: this is not wilderness. It is probably just a piece of land left alone for twenty years. Nature does not need much from us. She needs us to stop, and then she needs time.

Fourth stop (20 minutes), return to the starting point, the view forward

The degraded area looks different now; they are reading it rather than seeing it. Ask "if you were restoring this site, what would you do first?" and let the group problem-solve. Introduce adaptive management: make a plan, implement it, watch what the land does, and adjust. Close with one specific local action each participant can take next week, whether they have a garden, a balcony, or just a walk through their neighbourhood.

Closing circle (15 minutes)

One question around the circle: "what are you taking away from this?" All answers are right; the diversity is the point. Close by inviting everyone to iNaturalist: photograph one plant each day for a week and upload it. The habit of noticing is the skill you are cultivating.

Adaptations

For urban groups with no degraded land, any park or street-tree pit works; compare a managed lawn with an unmanaged verge. For school groups, shorten each stop to 10 minutes, give each pair one plant to research on iNaturalist, and close with a drawing. For experienced naturalists, go deeper on indicator species, bring a soil probe, and introduce reference ecosystems for your bioregion. For large groups over 20, break into small groups of 4 to 5 with one knowledgeable person each and reconvene at each stop.

When It Goes Sideways

If someone says "but it's natural for things to change," reply "yes, and the rate of change matters; natural change happens over centuries, what we've done has happened in decades, and the biology can't adapt at that speed." If someone becomes visibly distressed about ecological loss, acknowledge without minimizing: "that feeling makes sense; it's a sign of someone paying attention; the grief and the love are the same thing," and give them space. If you can't identify something, say "I don't know, let's look it up together" and identify it on iNaturalist in real time. If the weather is bad, do a brief shelter version with the soil samples and photos, then go out for thirty minutes regardless; being in the landscape in the rain teaches something no indoor session can.

Workshop Two: Reading the Land

A Half-Day Site Assessment for Landowners and Practitioners.

Purpose

To teach a practical site-assessment methodology participants can use independently on their own land. This is the practical skills session, less conceptual than Workshop One, more technical, with participants doing the assessment rather than watching it.

Ideal audience: farmers, landowners, rural residents, community restoration volunteers, early-career practitioners. 6 to 15 people (larger groups lose the hands-on quality, split them).

Duration: 4 hours (30 minutes briefing, 2.5 hours field work in pairs, 1 hour reporting and synthesis).

Location requirements: a site with actual restoration potential, a farm, a degraded rural property, a community land parcel. Not a park or well-managed conservation area.

Materials: printed copies of the Project Planning Template (Stages 1 to 3) for each participant; a hand lens per pair; a soil probe or large screwdriver per pair; a water bottle and open-ended can per pair (for infiltration tests); clipboards and pencils; a measuring tape (for transects); a camera per pair; sample bags for soil (optional); and the Merlin Bird ID app on at least one phone per pair.

What to Prepare in Advance

Walk the entire site the day before. Identify three distinct vegetation zones (degraded, transitional, better condition); two to three specific soil contrasts you can use to demonstrate the assessment; any evidence of natural regeneration worth highlighting; any invasive species requiring identification; and a clear boundary for the assessment area so participants aren't navigating an unbounded site. Prepare a simple hand-drawn map with the three zones marked, one copy per participant.

Session Arc

Briefing (30 minutes), the questions we are trying to answer

Gather around the site map. Explain that today participants do a real site assessment, the actual first stage of a real restoration project. The assessment answers four questions: what happened here (history); what condition is the site in now (current state); what is the site trying to become (trajectory); and what does it need from us to get there faster (intervention). Walk through Template Stages 1 and 2, demonstrate the infiltration test and compaction probe, show the two soil contrasts, and ask participants to predict what each zone will find (write predictions on a flip chart). Assign pairs to zones.

Field work in pairs (2.5 hours)

Participants work through Stages 1 to 3 of the template in their zone. Circulate and prompt deeper observation: "what are the weeds telling you about the soil?"; "where does the water go when it rains here?"; "if you were a native seed, would you germinate here? What would stop you?"; "what's the best thing on this site, the asset you'd build from?" At the halfway point, call a brief check-in; use any disagreements between pairs, they usually point to genuine complexity worth discussing.

Reporting and synthesis (1 hour)

Each pair reports on their zone and their Priority Actions for Year One. Facilitate the synthesis: where do the zones agree, where do they differ, what does the combined picture say about the whole site? Return to the briefing predictions: what was right, what was wrong, what surprised everyone? Key teaching moment: the site usually turns out more complex, more degraded, but also more resilient than first impression suggested. Complexity is not a problem, it is what you work with. Close by asking each participant "what is the one thing you would do first on this site, and why?"

Adaptations

For beginners with little botanical knowledge, pair each with someone more experienced and focus on structural features (compaction, water movement, layers) that don't require species knowledge. For experienced practitioners, add a monitoring-design component (photo points, transects, indicators) using Stage 6 of the template. For a site with an actual project planned, this becomes real work, not a workshop, and the assessment outputs feed directly into project planning; this is the most powerful version.

Workshop Three: From Seed to Ground

A One-Day Native Plant Propagation and Planting Workshop.

Purpose

To teach the complete arc from seed collection and preparation through propagation and field establishment. Participants leave with plants they propagated themselves, seeds ready for collection or stratification, and the skills to continue independently.

Ideal audience: people who want to grow native plants, gardeners, small landowners, restoration volunteers, teachers. 6 to 20 people.

Duration: 6 to 7 hours (can split across two days: morning propagation, afternoon planting).

Location requirements: access to a propagation area (greenhouse, polytunnel, or sheltered outdoor space) and a planting site (a degraded area where participants' plants will be established).

Materials, propagation station: seed trays and individual pots (recycled containers work well); potting mix appropriate for native plants in your region; native plant seeds, minimum 5 species from local sources if possible; stratified or stored seed ready to sow (prepared in advance); cuttings from locally-adapted native shrubs or trees (collected the morning of the workshop); labels and waterproof markers; watering cans with fine rose heads.

Materials, field planting station: trowels (one per two participants); mulch (woodchip or leaf litter, from local non-invasive sources); a bucket of water per group of four; pre-grown native seedlings for planting (prepared in advance or sourced locally); stakes for larger plants; a site map showing planting zones.

What to Prepare in Advance

(The day before.) Collect fresh cuttings, semi-hardwood from 3 to 4 native shrub species, cut in the morning when plants are turgid and kept moist in buckets. Pre-stratify or sow seeds; some native seeds need cold, moist stratification before they germinate, so have these in process so participants see the technique and the result at once. Prepare planting holes if the ground is very hard, and prepare the site so participants focus on technique and ecology, not the physical struggle. Identify five teaching plants: one each of a pioneer species, a nitrogen-fixer, an insectary plant, a keystone tree, and a threatened or rare local species. These five become the ecological curriculum of the propagation station.

Session Arc, Morning Propagation (3 hours)

Opening (30 minutes)

Gather around the propagation station. Hold up the smallest seed you have and ask "what is this?" It is a bet on the future, a package of information encoded over millions of years, a living thing in suspension waiting for the right conditions. Introduce the five teaching plants: for each, the species, where it grows naturally, what it feeds, why it matters in restoration, and what makes it ecologically special.

Seed sowing (45 minutes)

Walk through cleaning, stratification requirements, sowing depth and density. Participants sow two or three species in trays, labelling carefully. Teach the difference between broadcasting (for meadow grasses and flowers) and individual sowing (for trees and shrubs). Key teaching: "native seeds are adapted to the specific conditions of their region. The stratification requirement mimics winter; the seed needs cold and moisture before it believes spring has arrived. This is the most important thing to understand about growing native plants."

Cutting propagation (45 minutes)

Teach cutting length, node placement, wound preparation, optional hormone treatment, and medium insertion. Participants prepare five to ten cuttings each of two or three species. Be aware these are clones; collect from many unique plants to maintain genetic diversity. Key teaching: "a cutting is genetically identical to its parent. Propagating from locally-collected cuttings preserves that plant's specific adaptation to that place, its relationship with local soil fungi, its timing relative to local pollinators, its tolerance of local extremes. This is local provenance, the most important principle in restoration plant production."

Labelling and aftercare (30 minutes)

Label every propagule with species, collection location, and date. Explain watering frequency, light requirements, when to pot up, and when they'll be ready to plant. Participants take home their propagules to grow on.

Discussion over lunch (30 minutes)

Open question, "what is the relationship between growing plants and restoration? Are nurseries part of the work, or preparation for it?" Both. The nursery is itself a restoration act, propagating local genetic material that might otherwise be lost.

Session Arc, Afternoon Field Planting (3 hours)

Introduction to the planting site (30 minutes)

Walk the site as a group and briefly assess condition, priority, and where different species belong. Assign planting zones by species requirements: wet-zone species to wet corners, pioneers to the most degraded areas, specialists to the best-condition zones.

Planting technique (30 minutes)

Demonstrate hole size (two to three times the root ball), soil loosening, mycorrhizal inoculant if available, planting depth, firming in, initial watering, and mulching radius. Teach the three most common mistakes: planting too shallow (roots exposed, plant desiccates); the mulch volcano (mulch piled against the stem causes rot); and watering once and forgetting (the first dry season kills more planted natives than anything else).

Planting (90 minutes)

Participants plant while you circulate and give feedback. Let them work at their own pace; the planting is meditation as much as technique. Ask participants to photograph each plant they plant, with a GPS location if possible; these begin the monitoring record and create buy-in, since many will come back to see their plants.

Closing ceremony (30 minutes)

Gather in a circle among the newly planted community. Ask each participant to name one plant they planted and say one sentence about what it means to have put it in the ground. This is not sentimental; the relationship between the person and the plant is ecologically real, and the person who planted it is more likely to return, monitor, and protect it. Close with the commitment question: "what is the one thing you will do with what you've learned in the next two weeks?"

Post-Workshop Follow-Up (for all three workshops)

Send within 48 hours: the session summary (what was covered, key concepts, recommended resources); the iNaturalist project link for the site or instructions for creating one; your contact information for follow-up questions; and the next workshop date if one exists. One-month follow-up: a single question by email or message, "what did you notice this month that you wouldn't have noticed before the workshop?" The answers tell you what landed, and who is becoming a Planet Healer.

Designing Your Own Sessions

The three workshops cover three scales of the Planet Healer Path: Workshop One is the shift in perception (Stage One and Two); Workshop Two is the applied skill (Stage Two and Three); Workshop Three is the act of creation (Stage Three and Four). When designing additional sessions, use the Hook, Experience, Reflection, Application framework from the Teacher Training Guide.

• Hook: start with something that creates genuine curiosity or emotional engagement, a striking observation, a surprising fact, a question they can't immediately answer.
• Experience: put participants in direct contact with the thing you are teaching, in the landscape, with soil in their hands, with a plant they propagated themselves.
• Reflection: create space to make meaning, the circle question, the pair discussion, the journal entry; experience without reflection does not become learning.
• Application: close every session with a specific action in the next 24 to 72 hours; not "think about this" but "do this." The habit of acting is as important as the content of the action.

One-Page Session Planner

Use for any workshop you design.

• Session title.
• Duration and group size.
• Location.
• Materials needed.
• The hook (how you open).
• The experience (what they do or encounter).
• Key questions (three maximum).
• Key teaching points (three maximum).
• The reflection (how you close).
• The application (specific action within 72 hours).
• What could go wrong, and how you'll handle it.