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Introducing the Life Cycle to Young Children: Building Empathy and Emotional Resilience
Thursday, June 12, 2025 @ 2:00 pm - 3:00 pm EDT
Presented by Dr. Carla Gull, Associate Professor, Merry Lea Environmental Learning Center of Goshen College; and Dr. Laura Wilhelm, VP of Professional Learning Services, Kaplan Early Learning Company
Sponsored by Kaplan Early Learning Company
Learn more about viewing the live presentation and the recording, earning your CE certificate, and using our new accessibility features.
Come along on an eye-opening journey of discovery as we introduce the full life cycle to young children, including the natural processes of death, decay, and decomposition. While not a typical component of life cycle discussions, understanding death in a natural context helps children get to know the natural rhythms of life.
In this edWebinar, you see how these often-overlooked aspects of nature provide rich opportunities for young children to build social skills, as well as understanding, empathy, and emotional resilience. You also learn developmentally appropriate ways to guide children in understanding life cycles as more than just beginnings, they’re about transformations, endings, and the beauty of renewal. This recorded edWebinar is of interest to PreK-3 teachers, librarians, and school leaders.
About the Presenter
Carla Gull, Ed.D., is the Director of the Master of Arts in Environmental Education Program and Associate Professor at Merry Lea Environmental Learning Center of Goshen College in northern Indiana. She has over 20 years of experience in the education field at the preschool, elementary, and college levels. Dr. Gull enjoys helping educators incorporate more nature in the everyday early childhood setting and in nature preschools. She hosts a podcast, Loose Parts Nature Play; facilitates an international group, Loose Parts Play; and presents workshops, presentations, and academic research around loose parts, tree climbing, STEM, outdoor classrooms, and nature education. She is co-author of the book Loose Parts Learning in K-3 Classrooms and the upcoming book Living Loose Parts: Creatures of Curiosity. She is the State Coordinator for Indiana Children and Nature Network. She enjoys going on adventures and traveling with her husband and four (mostly teen!) boys.
About the Moderator
As the Vice President for Professional Learning at Kaplan, Laura Wilhelm, Ed.D., draws on decades of experience teaching young children and early childhood professionals, starting with toddlers in the 1980s, followed by PreK-third grade in urban and suburban schools, and as a university lab school director. Since earning her doctorate in ECE curriculum and instruction in 1999, she has served as a program director, full professor, national validator for the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC), and a site visitor for the Council for the Accreditation of Educator Programs (CAEP). She enjoys planning professional development, speaking at conferences, leading study tours, visiting early education programs around the world, and returning home to her family. She is the author of The Neglected Child: How to Recognize, Respond, and Prevent (2013); Treasure Baskets: Heuristic Learning for Infants and Toddlers (2017); Enticing Environments for People Under Three (2021); and Living Loose Parts: Creatures of Curiosity (2024), all from Gryphon House.
Learn more about viewing the live presentation and the recording, earning your CE certificate, and using our new accessibility features.
Join the Classroom Management for Early Learning community to network with educators, participate in online discussions, receive invitations to upcoming edWebinars, and view recordings of previous programs to earn CE certificates.
For more than 50 years, Kaplan Early Learning Company has been a champion for play. From our research-based curricula to enriching classroom environments and innovative technology solutions, Kaplan’s products and services inspire a lifelong love of learning in children and educators. We are architects of learning good and defenders of the imagination. We live for inseparable bonds and open minds. We encourage the eager and inspire the inspirers. We transform lives through play.
