Beyond Four Walls: Establishing Trust in an Outdoor Classroom
As the year approached, Mr. Etropolski, like other teachers, was considering the final details in his plans for the fall. Notwithstanding that all plans must remain flexible, especially when your students come with a range of competing needs, he felt he had a pretty good grasp on what the year might look like. Main Lesson, though tailored to their needs, would contain most of the elements one might expect to find in a Waldorf Main Lesson: movement, singing, math work, stories, bookwork, and so on. Their new classroom was set, and visions of the school year percolated in his head. With two teachers and three students, alternatives were ready to provide for one or another student as the need arose, and things could progress more or less as planned.
School began as late summer heat held fast. It was evident from the start that this more traditional Main Lesson which had been mapped out, even with the customized changes, supports, and alternatives, would not work. Distractions were removed, one by one, from the classroom, but the walls remained, and from all appearances, it seemed the students felt that these walls, spacious though the classroom was, were closing in on them. Mr. Etropolski considered examples of other students Otto Specht had over the years who had struggled to enter the classroom setting and how the teachers had worked creatively to meet their needs until, slowly, the classroom became a place of safety and learning. The common threads amongst all of the strategies that were implemented, were lots of practical work and time outdoors. Mr. Etropolski consulted with various teachers, particularly Mr. Bosch, our Farm and Garden teacher. The third grade curriculum includes farming so perhaps there could be a farm project to begin the year with. However, not being the farm teacher, Mr. Etropolski decided against this, recognizing that if the content was not authentically held, it would present yet another obstacle for the students. Whatever he brought, he realized, had to contain certain elements:
The teachers had to be able to authoritatively live into the work
Students should see that there is important work happening and that it will get done whether they join or not
Students should feel capable of navigating the tasks whenever they were able to join
The predominant educational model, in which an adult teacher delivers content to a group of children, is predicated on the fact that the students will feel a sense of “importance” in the learning even if they don’t necessarily know how or why they will use what they learn. The precursor to this sense, however, is a feeling of security in an adult-led world. With the rising prevalence of anxiety based disorders amongst children, fewer and fewer children feel this security, and thus they do not enter school trusting that it is important to learn certain things and the adults are going to teach them. These students fail to see the importance of learning reflected in their life experience and stuck in your standard classroom environment, the “why” seems as intangible to the adults as it is to them. If we do not build this necessary scaffolding, we will lose our ability to educate the next generation. For now, these children are outliers, but I don’t imagine they will be for long. Despite the diverse diagnoses and outward presentations of Mr. Etropolski’s three students, coursing deep through each of them is severe anxiety, a symptom of the world we all are living in.
The task ahead for Mr. Etropolski, therefore, was to build the missing scaffolding, creating a learning environment that provided a sense of autonomy, removed anxiety, and demonstrated that the teachers had keys to the world that the students could have too, if they wanted to join in the work. The 3rd grade Waldorf curriculum, which incorporates traditional life skills to support all students as they navigate their growing separation from the world, equipping them with tools that develop independence and self sufficiency, just happened to be perfectly suited to this task. They would create an outdoor classroom. The forest setting, the daily rhythm, and the hands-on building project would create an accessible structure (literal and figurative) for all three students to enter.
Mr. Etropolski, Ms. Joen, and the students set out. Mr. Etropolski and Ms. Joen said verse, built a small fire to boil some tea, and set about building. The students enjoyed the space and played amongst the trees, peripherally taking in the taks their teachers were doing. They did not join the verse that first day, but became somewhat curious as branches were brought to a grouping of trees. They began to join in, connecting larger branches to the trees to create a frame then gathering others to tie across, beginning to create a platform. The following day, one student came over as the teachers stood for verse, and the next day the other two followed. Students came in and out of work as needed, with few instructions being given unless asked for. As the Main Lesson time would come to its end, they would sit on a blanket and enjoy their snacks and warm tea. As the rhythm became familiar and students relaxed, Ms. Joen began to play flute and tell stories at snack time. It may be hard for some people to understand, but even listening to stories can be very challenging for children with high levels of anxiety. Someone else’s story represents something they know and you do not, a vulnerability that may trigger hardwired flight or fight responses. Being occupied with something else, in this case, eating snack, can help maintain or regain autonomy.
Next, a candle was brought, and students learned breath control as they extinguished the candle with a gentle blow. Soon, students were playing their own flutes, drawing pictures, doing form drawing, and writing. Only chalkboards were used for this work at first, the impermanence diffusing any pressure to get it right. It was accepted that students would take space as needed and there was no short supply of space in the forest. However, the students also knew that when work was missed it would have to be done.
On Mondays, painting day, a rhythm was built that included time in the indoor classroom, with each student entering one at a time to do their painting and the other students working on skip counting with the jump ropes and other projects such as filling tea bags with herbs they had dried from the garden. The outdoor classroom became sturdy enough to walk on and thickly roofed enough for shelter underneath. A ladder was added. The students were proud of their accomplishment and happy to show it to teachers and schoolmates.
As winter approached and days got colder, there was a natural inclination to spend more time indoors. With newfound confidence, writing and drawing was entered into each child’s main lesson book, and moments of this more typical main lesson Mr. Etropolski had initially envisioned, did emerge. Much time was still spent outdoors, sledding down the auditorium hill before and in between classes, exploring the frozen landscape and breaking ice at Farm and Garden, and going back to check that the outdoor classroom was still secure through wind and rain and snow.
As the world began to thaw and icy adventures included stops to tap trees, drink sap, and make maple syrup, the students have been excited to return to their outdoor classroom. This time not because they cannot be indoors but because the outdoors meets them in a way that diminishes their differences, reduces their anxieties, and lets them simultaneously experience their own autonomy and trust in the wisdom of their adult teachers.