Lia Grippo

Reaching Nature Connection Conference Faculty

​Born in Riga, Latvia, Lia (she/her) spent many of her earliest years foraging and fishing the nearby woodlands with her family. Her early relationship with Nature has remained a constant thread in her life. At an early age, Lia was drawn towards working with young children and has been an early childhood educator since 1989. She has been fortunate to have had wise and skilled mentors in both early childhood education and nature connection. Lia has taught in a variety of settings, including small and large preschools, a Waldorf kindergarten, a parent cooperative, and wilderness programs. In 1996, Lia founded her first preschool, Seedlings, and in 1998 she opened Wild Roots Forest School, a preschool and kindergarten roofed by the sky and carpeted with the living woodland floor. In 2010–2011 Lia directed Orca School, a Waldorf inspired K–8 school with nature immersion at its center. Lia is an accomplished storyteller, parent educator, naturalist, and herbalist and teaches classes and workshops in all of these areas of study. She is a co-founder and presenter of the annual Reaching Nature Connection Conference and the co-founder of The Academy of Forest Kindergarten Teachers. Lia resides in Santa Barbara, CA with her musical husband, Jim, her two nature-immersed, tree-climbing sons, and three cats.