“Earth teems with sights and textures, sounds and vibrations, smells and tastes, electric and magnetic fields. But every animal can only tap into a small fraction of reality's fullness. Each is enclosed within its own unique sensory bubble, perceiving but a tiny silver of an immense world.”
So writes Ed Yong, Pulitzer-winning environmental journalist and Guest Judge of Write the World’s November 2026 Environmental Writing Competition sponsored by Patagonia. Yong’s words humble and compel us. They remind us of our size in relation to a vast and unknowable universe, yet amplify the magnitude of the role that we humans play in shaping—indeed, protecting—the planet on which an “immense world” spins.
Writing is a powerful vehicle for exploring and expressing that immensity. Sight, texture, sound, vibration, smell, taste—a writer can capture and conjure all of these through language. Whether one identifies as a poet or scientist, filmmaker or philanthropist, how we speak about our world impacts, and is impacted by, the ways that we learn and work within it.
Environmental stewardship, too, begins with story. The stories that we share about our world impact how we relate to it, how we advocate for and protect it. This month, inspire students to immerse themselves deeply in their own “immense world,” no matter what country or continent you call home. The following activities are designed to scaffold their engagement with environmental writing, across disciplines, before sending their work off to our Environmental Writing Competition judged by Yong.
Ekphrastic poetry is poetry that is written in response to an image or object. Usually, the poem is written from the point-of-view of a character or thing within the image, or from the point-of-view of the object itself (for example, a poem from Mona Lisa’s vantage point or one in which the speaker is a water fountain in Yellowstone Park).
To get students’ creativity flowing, no matter what genre they ultimately wish to write in for Write the World’s Environmental Writing Competition, invite them to pick a free nature image from this National Geographic collection, or to find a nature image from their own town/state/country/continent to write an ekphrastic poem in response to. Ask them to pay attention to the sensory elements described in Yong’s quote above: texture, sound, smell. You might invite them to share their work in a class read-aloud or post their selected images alongside their ekphrastic poems in a group Gallery Walk, in which they jot down connections that they notice between works and questions that they have for the writer(s) of each verse.
We have written before about the power of nature immersion in sparking environmental writing and stewardship. Whether your school sits within rolling rural fields or a concrete landscape, getting students moving outside of classroom walls—attuning to their five senses, taking note of the feelings that their environment evokes for them, and freewriting in response to their observations—is great fodder for further writing.
With these “field notes,” students can explore multiple writing genres: turning one observation into a scene in a flash fiction story, for instance, or leveraging the overwhelm that they feel in response to car horn noise to write the thesis statement of an Op-Ed about traffic control and its impact on the environment in their city.
Take students’ nature observations to the next level through a community-building activity. First, ask students to pair up with the buddy closest to them. Then, ask them to share “I See” statements (you can alter this for any sense or reaction, like “I Feel,” “I Notice,” “I Smell”...). Then, ask them to practice active listening and reflection skills by summarizing their partner’s observations ( a “You See” statement). Welcome them to keep documentation of the conversation as they go.
Then, engage them in a collaborative writing activity, a “We See” poem of any form (prose poem, free verse, haiku) that melds their observations. They might alternate authorship of lines or brainstorm each part together. Once they have completed this activity, invite them to return to the whole group and share their poems as pairs—as well as reflections on their creative process. Like ekphrastic poetry, this exercise offers a creative starting place for sensory attunement and reflection, position writers of all genres for deeper, more intentional engagement with their environment and requisite writing.
For a multimodal method of engaging students in their environment and preparing them for writing, invite students to create short films capturing and describing an element of their surroundings that is meaningful to them, and ask them to show or tell, through the video, why it holds value in their lives. Flipgrid cameras, if your school has access to them, are a helpful tool for creating these types of simple video captures.
Host a classroom film screening, asking students to consider what each video makes the notice and wonder about the natural world around them. Use these questions to spark more writing, especially personal narrative and opinion writing that relates students’ lived experiences, research, and perspectives to environmental themes.
Sponsored by
One of Patagonia’s core values is Environmentalism: using our business to conserve our home planet. This begins with story: sharing our love of the natural world and drawing the deep connections between environmental destruction and social justice. Learn more at patagonia.com.