This morning, this video came up on a natural playscape discussion group I belong to:
"Outdoor Preschool: Norway" on YouTube
Please watch this if you have the time and have children, think you might want to have children, are a teacher, or care at all about education.
Reading and watching things about "forest kindergartens" (as they are often called) is the only time I've felt my devotion to Montessori education challenged at all. But before I go into that, I need to have a bit of a squee in bullet point form about how many things I LOVE in this video. (If you don't have the time or inclination to watch the video, you can read on for the highlights.)
-The factoid that there used to be "only" a dozen of these schools in Norway, and now there are hundreds. Norway, for your reference, has a population of 4.9 million people. The greater Bay Area has a population of 7 million people. I wish there was "only" a dozen forest kindergartens here, to say nothing of hundreds!
-The children spend more time indoors when they're younger, but when they are older they spend the day outside at least three days a week. "Older" is defined as "three."
-The rest time in sleeping bags in the tipi! That was just charming.
-The teacher's awareness of not passing on her own opinions about the comfort of the weather. If anything proves that attitudes towards "cold" and "hot" are culturally constructed, an outdoor kindergarten in Norway sure does.
-The part where the teacher pulls out a real hammer and saw to show the children, and then the shot of the child using a real knife to whittle his boat parts. I think I actually squealed with delight out loud when I got to that part.
-The factoid about how children who have regular nature access have better motor development than children who play on artificial playgrounds.
-The way they are able to follow the children's interests without having to adhere to a rigid schedule.
-Regarding the clam: "Shall we have it for lunch?" "Yes, it looks good" - I just LOVED that.
-Likening the clam's edibility to mushrooms - "It's just like mushrooms" - which of course implies the children know about mushrooms too.
-The whole scene with the boy starting the day's fire. Just - the way she calmly intervenes when he's doing it unsafely, then shows him how to do it. Look at his face after he starts the fire successfully. He is beaming with pride and capability!
-The quotation from the teacher: "Everything is dangerous! It's dangerous to drive to the kindergarten, get on a bus or plane." Also, I love how their concern when it gets dark is that children could get lost… and wander into a traffic roundabout. That is a REAL risk assessment, based on reality, not on fantasies of lurking horrors ready to harm children.
-The 20% average proportion of men working in outdoor kindergartens versus a European average of 1-2% is incredible.
-The children going on a 1600 foot elevation change hike over four miles in an afternoon. Just… wow. WOW.
* * *
I've been thinking a lot lately about how you could combine elements of a forest kindergarten with a traditional Montessori environment. Is it even possible to mix them, or does one just need to choose one or the other?
(I'll be interspersing some photos I took on the two camping trips Elina and I led back in 2009 - which remain pretty much the most fun I've ever had on a job. Unfortunately none of these are the very best photos, since I'm not making public any that clearly show the children's faces without parental consent - but you'll just have to trust me that they were totally radiant.)
I deeply love the Montessori materials and method: the way it gives children the tools to understand and manipulate the world around them continues to inspire me. However, I do not think we are doing our children a service by keeping the inside when it rains. Playtime should be more than an hour on some manufactured equipment in the yard. There is more to the development of the mathematical mind than the golden bead material. And children ABSOLUTELY shouldn't be learning about botany merely by putting together a wooden parts-of-the-flower puzzle.
One possibility: One could do maybe every day with a morning work cycle in the classroom and the afternoon spent outdoors. Unfortunately, licensing requirements generally state that children under 4 must have a rest period every day. So dividing it up like that would exclude the younger napping children, or those who only do half-days. Not ideal. Moreover, this doesn't allow children to get the full rhythm of the day outdoors. Seeing the shadows change with the sun, or seeing the weather patterns shift in the afternoon, is part of the whole point.
Another possibility: Do 2-3 days per week in the classroom with Montessori work periods, and 2-3 days outdoors. I wonder how children would adapt to the different routines on different days, and if they would still be able to have as rich of an experience with the Montessori materials? I have become more and more skeptical that children really NEED two Montessori work cycles every day, but I'm not sure about doing something different on different days. Hmm.
Here's the thing. Children come out of three years in a Montessori classroom as exceptionally capable, confident, thoughtful, and academically secure individuals. But clearly there are other ways of guiding children to acquire these traits. As a teacher and, now, as a parent, I want to be sure that I'm looking at all the possibilities for how to raise well-rounded and happy human beings… and being outside more seems like a pretty great way to get there.
Do any experienced Montessorians have opinions about this? Parents? Otherwise interested parties?
"Outdoor Preschool: Norway" on YouTube
Please watch this if you have the time and have children, think you might want to have children, are a teacher, or care at all about education.
Reading and watching things about "forest kindergartens" (as they are often called) is the only time I've felt my devotion to Montessori education challenged at all. But before I go into that, I need to have a bit of a squee in bullet point form about how many things I LOVE in this video. (If you don't have the time or inclination to watch the video, you can read on for the highlights.)
-The factoid that there used to be "only" a dozen of these schools in Norway, and now there are hundreds. Norway, for your reference, has a population of 4.9 million people. The greater Bay Area has a population of 7 million people. I wish there was "only" a dozen forest kindergartens here, to say nothing of hundreds!
-The children spend more time indoors when they're younger, but when they are older they spend the day outside at least three days a week. "Older" is defined as "three."
-The rest time in sleeping bags in the tipi! That was just charming.
-The teacher's awareness of not passing on her own opinions about the comfort of the weather. If anything proves that attitudes towards "cold" and "hot" are culturally constructed, an outdoor kindergarten in Norway sure does.
-The part where the teacher pulls out a real hammer and saw to show the children, and then the shot of the child using a real knife to whittle his boat parts. I think I actually squealed with delight out loud when I got to that part.
-The factoid about how children who have regular nature access have better motor development than children who play on artificial playgrounds.
-The way they are able to follow the children's interests without having to adhere to a rigid schedule.
-Regarding the clam: "Shall we have it for lunch?" "Yes, it looks good" - I just LOVED that.
-Likening the clam's edibility to mushrooms - "It's just like mushrooms" - which of course implies the children know about mushrooms too.
-The whole scene with the boy starting the day's fire. Just - the way she calmly intervenes when he's doing it unsafely, then shows him how to do it. Look at his face after he starts the fire successfully. He is beaming with pride and capability!
-The quotation from the teacher: "Everything is dangerous! It's dangerous to drive to the kindergarten, get on a bus or plane." Also, I love how their concern when it gets dark is that children could get lost… and wander into a traffic roundabout. That is a REAL risk assessment, based on reality, not on fantasies of lurking horrors ready to harm children.
-The 20% average proportion of men working in outdoor kindergartens versus a European average of 1-2% is incredible.
-The children going on a 1600 foot elevation change hike over four miles in an afternoon. Just… wow. WOW.
* * *
I've been thinking a lot lately about how you could combine elements of a forest kindergarten with a traditional Montessori environment. Is it even possible to mix them, or does one just need to choose one or the other?
(I'll be interspersing some photos I took on the two camping trips Elina and I led back in 2009 - which remain pretty much the most fun I've ever had on a job. Unfortunately none of these are the very best photos, since I'm not making public any that clearly show the children's faces without parental consent - but you'll just have to trust me that they were totally radiant.)
I deeply love the Montessori materials and method: the way it gives children the tools to understand and manipulate the world around them continues to inspire me. However, I do not think we are doing our children a service by keeping the inside when it rains. Playtime should be more than an hour on some manufactured equipment in the yard. There is more to the development of the mathematical mind than the golden bead material. And children ABSOLUTELY shouldn't be learning about botany merely by putting together a wooden parts-of-the-flower puzzle.
One possibility: One could do maybe every day with a morning work cycle in the classroom and the afternoon spent outdoors. Unfortunately, licensing requirements generally state that children under 4 must have a rest period every day. So dividing it up like that would exclude the younger napping children, or those who only do half-days. Not ideal. Moreover, this doesn't allow children to get the full rhythm of the day outdoors. Seeing the shadows change with the sun, or seeing the weather patterns shift in the afternoon, is part of the whole point.
Another possibility: Do 2-3 days per week in the classroom with Montessori work periods, and 2-3 days outdoors. I wonder how children would adapt to the different routines on different days, and if they would still be able to have as rich of an experience with the Montessori materials? I have become more and more skeptical that children really NEED two Montessori work cycles every day, but I'm not sure about doing something different on different days. Hmm.
Here's the thing. Children come out of three years in a Montessori classroom as exceptionally capable, confident, thoughtful, and academically secure individuals. But clearly there are other ways of guiding children to acquire these traits. As a teacher and, now, as a parent, I want to be sure that I'm looking at all the possibilities for how to raise well-rounded and happy human beings… and being outside more seems like a pretty great way to get there.
Do any experienced Montessorians have opinions about this? Parents? Otherwise interested parties?
