Article Link: http://exchangepress.com/article/a-community-transformed/5026856/
We wake up in the morning and the first thing we do is check the outdoor temperature. As preschool educators, we used to think 30 degrees was cold. Not anymore. Our school has ventured outdoors for hours in 17 degrees, multiple times. We have learned to layer, eat warm foods in thermoses, and keep moving. We never expected to run an outdoor school, but have learned to embrace it. In fact, we do not think we will ever be able to work with children again without prioritizing the outdoors.
Our preschool, the Henry Frost Children’s Program, is in Belmont, Massachusetts, right outside the city of Boston. We serve 10 families in a restored early 1800s farmhouse, with a staff of three full-time teachers, and three extended-day teachers. Our school philosophy has developed an approach called Complementary Curriculum. In our program, we do not subscribe to one approach; instead, we embrace multiple approaches to early education, combining Montessori, the Reggio Emilia approach, Vygotsky, and Dewey philosophies.
The farmhouse has a beautiful wrap-around porch that has been transformed into our outdoor classroom area. To make this happen, we brought our indoor shelving outside to hold our choices, and placed soft rugs to make the exterior ...