Kids! Be healthy – be like a wolf!

On May the 11th and 12th, our European Wilderness Society team member Gudrun Pflüger took more than 50 kindergarten kids between the age of three and six of the pedagogic kindergarten in Bischofshofen in the province of Salzburg, Austria out on the wolf trail.

The provincial health prevention institution of the province of Salzburg, AVOS, invited European Wilderness Society team member Gudrun Pflüger; exposing already the kids to the importance of a conscious way of living. The wolf combines all the ‚pillars’ important for a healthy life: movement, awareness, social competence and ‚natural food’-

The little ones first got a peek into Gudrun´s film documentary ‚searching for the coastal wolves’ , learning that wolves do not automatically see humans as a good dinner. Then, they were finding their way to the forest through their nose, sniffing and following ‚markings’ made from the ‚rose’ wolf (who sprayed on elevated and pronounced places her disgusting intense deodorant a la ‚rose’). Along the way they also learned how wolves are moving (‚walking in a line’), how dangerous a hunt also for the wolves is and how they can avoid being kicked by the hooves of the deer or moose. In between the groups came together for howling sessions and had their smart lunch. Smart, because the snacks should be healthy.

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At the end, they could cut out their own wolf mask, provided by the European Wilderness Society. This whole outdoor program was accompanied by students of the kindergarten pedagogic school, who eventually will take their own kids groups out on the trail of the wolf. Hence the seed is planted…

What is it eating? How can it stay healthy? How is it living together with its pack members, how does it move through its environment and many questions more were answered through play, slipping in the role of a wolf and experience familiar surrounding through the senses of a wolf.