Lizette Castano's Contact Details

Lizette Castano's Company Details

The Children's Nature Institute

Los Angeles, California, United States • 7 Employees
Program Development

The mission of The Children's Nature Institute (CNI) is to educate children, families, and their communities through interactive experiences with nature that cultivates respect and responsibility for the natural environment. We focus on children in underserved communities who have little, if any, access to green spaces. For some of the communities we serve, a graveyard is the only green space they have!\\CNI is the only environmental education organization in Los Angeles providing direct educational experiences to underprivileged children during their most impressionable years: Pre K through 3rd grade. We fill two critical gaps in early childhood and elementary school education in Los Angeles County: insufficient learning opportunities and inadequate exposure to the natural world. In a time of both educational and environmental crises in California, CNI creates a critical link to nature, education, and stewardship through interactive programs including field trips to wilderness settings, school visits from our traveling classroom The WonderMobile, schoolyard urban nature workshops, and an array of environmental education programming at the Magnolia Place Family Center. Our curriculum incorporates the California Language, Arts and Science Standards and EEI curriculum.\\For 27 years, The Children's Nature Institute has brought classroom learning to life and brought out the 'natural scientist' in children. We serve approximately 15,000 children each year.