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Children play it safe by learning forest survival skills

Thursday, May 25, 2000
By Elaine Thompson :: Telegram & Gazette Staff

SHREWSBURY-- It could be a parent's worst nightmare.

Little Johnny and his friend are out playing in the back yard when they decide to hike into the woods. An hour later the 8-year-olds are nowhere to be found.

Depending on the time of year, what started out as an innocent childhood adventure could quickly turn into a disaster.

"If you ended up lost in the woods, what would you do? Where would you go? How would you keep yourself safe and warm?" asked Linda J. Gosselin, a wilderness survivalist expert prompting an array of answers from a group of 5- to 8-year-olds.

"If I got lost in the woods, I would look down and retrace my footprints," 8-year-old Alex Ulmer of Westborough said.

"You're the man," Ms. Gosselin said, slapping Alex a high five.

Both answers were correct, but what you do while you're in the woods can mean the difference between life and death, Ms. Gosselin said.

Yesterday Ms. Gosselin piloted a camp at Dean Park that teaches young children how to survive in the wilderness. The Junior Wilderness Technician camp is a child's version of a wilderness survival program that Ms. Gosselin teaches adults through her 16-year-old Millbury-based company, Massachusetts Emergency Care Training Agency. She also is the emergency medical services coordinator and medical director for the town of Shrewsbury. And, as an instructor at the Massachusetts Criminal Justice Training Council, she teaches police officers to become emergency medical technicians.

Ms. Gosselin said she also has managed search and rescue teams for law enforcement agencies. She said one of the saddest parts of her job is to search for a child who is lost in the woods in bad weather.

"When a kid gets lost in the fall and they don't know how to stay warm, they die quickly," Ms. Gosselin said. "If this camp teaches one child how to stay alive a little longer so a trained adult can find them, it's well worth all of our time here."

The camp also puts children in touch with nature, a pastime that is slowly being replaced by the Internet and other electronics, Ms. Gosselin said.

Yesterday's junior wilderness learners were 60 children in kindergarten through second grade at the private Lilliput School on Grafton Street, where Ms. Gosselin teaches emergency medical techniques to the staff.

She is working with the public school system to recruit children ages 6 to 14 to participate in the two-day camps beginning this summer. The camps are financed by Ms. Gosselin's MECTA company and are free to children.

Ms. Gosselin told the eager learners that while a person can go without food for as long as two weeks, water is needed every day. She taught them how to use large fern leaves or a plastic trash bag or a rain coat to collect dew from grass to drink.

Small groups of the students also were taken about three-quarters of a mile into the woods and taught how to use a big boulder as shelter against the climate, and how to backtrack out of the woods. The children also learned how to recognize different animal tracks and to differentiate poisonous plants.

"Leaves with three, leave it be," Ms. Gosselin said, showing the children a picture of the three-pointed poison ivy leaf.

"It's even interesting for adults to learn this stuff. The part about gathering dew to drink was very interesting," said Jane M. Spiegel of Westborough, who was at the camp with her 6-year-old daughter, Julianne. "It's too bad all schools can't incorporate something like this into their curriculum."

Ms. Gosselin and her teaching assistants also taught the students to have a heightened awareness of their senses, including the use of their peripheral vision. At one point, each student was given a magnifying glass and asked to get close to the ground to see what they could find.

"I found some worm poop," one little girl yelled, sending teachers and parents into a roar of laughter.

As other children began pulling worms from the rain-soaked earth, Ms. Gosselin had them deposit them in a pile.

Ms. Gosselin pulled a tiny transparent box from her almost-as-small red survival kit. The box contained several fish hooks and a small coil of line. She explained that even without a rod, she could put a worm on a hook tied to the string and catch fish from the nearby pond.

And, if there is no lake or pond in the woods where you're lost, the worms could still help keep you alive, she said. "They are a little slimy and disgusting, but when you're very hungry, they're good protein," Ms. Gosselin said.

"Eeeew," the children screamed in chorus.

© 2000 Worcester Telegram & Gazette
Reprinted From the Worcester Telegram & Gazette.

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