"John Ayto’s 'Dictionary of Word Origins' suggests that 'etymologically, if you improvise something, it is because it has not been provided for in advance.' The word improvisation emerges from the French improviser, descended from the Italian extempore, and then further descended from the Latin improvisus, meaning 'unforeseen.' Amazingly, Ayto reports that the first recorded use of the verb in English is in a Benjamin Disraeli novel from 1826.

"In terms of environmental learning, I think of improvisation as the ability to spontaneously respond to dynamic changes in the environment. When observing nature, this could mean looking at the ever-changing patterns, such as clouds floating across the sky, leaves rustling in the wind, water flowing down a stream, ocean waves crashing against the shore, migrating birds moving through the trees — biosphere phenomena that emerge from structural relationships, but are always different, an infinite variety of possibilities and pathways, changing according to the prevailing conditions. This is the essence of environmental change. I am less patient with the painstaking but equally important observational skills of identification and order. Yet this is a crucial aspect of environmental learning, and without it we would be floating in a world of dynamic change with no ballast or anchor. Environmental learning is a balance, then, between structure and improvisation." - Mitchell Thomashow

Book Excerpt: An Environmentalist’s Lessons for an Improvisational Life