8:00: Drop off, Free Play, Art Explorations

The children are welcomed into their classroom space with a wide variety of inviting materials such as tools for digging, balls, slides, climbing trees, and a “clubhouse” to play inside. We offer art projects outdoors such as decorating the fence with stringing beads, wrapping beautiful yarn and ribbon on trees, or painting large sheets of fabric hanging up on our clubhouse. Children are offered a chance to explore all of their senses in a welcoming, supportive environment that invites freedom of choice and creative expression.

9:15: Morning Meeting

We greet each other, we move and breathe together through stretching, yoga, or games. We share with each other and we make plans for our day. We often discuss the weather and what we will need to prepare for our day together. Some days we pack our adventure packs and head to the woods for snacks. Other days, we stay and have snack in our classroom.

9:30/9:45: Snack time is our Story Time

Sometimes, teachers read picture books to the children and sometimes the children take turns making up their own stories. We often play, “and then what happened?” This is a game where the children tell stories and then take turns filling in “what happens next.” We eat, we play, and we practice our independence by unpacking and packing up our own snacks.

10-10:30: Potty Time and Free Play

Children are encouraged to use the potty indoors or in our woods spot. We encourage independence from even our youngest children and empower children to learn how to take care of their own bodies. During potty transitions, one teacher stays with the children. This is typically a time where children are “free playing.” In the woods, the children typically use this time to climb on “The Dragon,” a downed tree in the woods, find trash to clean up the earth, run away from snakes, or decorate the Forest with string.

10:30: Playground Time or Woods Adventures

We use our bodies to learn and grow by climbing, running, playing structured games, or exploring pretend play with each other on the playground or in the woods. We split up our week so that we spend half of our morning time in the woods and half on the playground.

12:00: Lunch

We eat lunch under the tent outside. We often tell stories about our day. We take turns sharing stories or talking about the food we are eating. Sometimes, teachers ask questions about the kids day such as “what did you play at school today,” and we practice listening to each other and reflecting on our days together.

1-2:30: Rest Time

Children nap indoors on cozy mats with quiet, relaxing music. Children who do not sleep are offered a mat to lie down and books to look at or quiet activities to play at their spot

2:30-3:00: Wake Up/Pack Up

Children are gently woken up. They are then given help by the teachers to pack their things up. We then walk outside together to greet our grown-ups for pick-up time.

8:00-9:00 Greetings, getting started, and game plan

All children arrive at school between 8:00 and 8:15 and are greeted at their classroom door by a teacher. Outside of the classroom, children organize their morning snack and water bottles into the appropriate baskets and go on to join their friends who are playing outside. During this first hour of school, we are all saying good morning to each other and acclimating to the new day. Some friends might read a book with a teacher, and others might get right to work in the sand area. Around 9:00, a teacher calls out, “Olly olly Puzzle Primes!” which signals for friends to stop what they’re doing and join the group for further instructions. At this point of the morning, teachers share what our choice time plan is for that particular day. Maybe there’s an insect carcass to observe closely in the classroom, or maybe there’s some project work we are planning to revisit.

9:00-10:20 Choice Time and Project Work

As we move into our classroom and the next phase of our day, children are asked to check in with their bodies to decide if they are hungry for snack or if they will delay their snack a little while longer. When a child is choosing to have their snack, they wash their hands, collect their snack bag from the basket, and note their choice by placing their clothespin inside of the bowl.

During this period of time, friends are busy exploring the classroom space and participating in project work while teachers are busy scaffolding the play, observing, and documenting pertinent dialogue and ideas. At the end of choice time, a teacher turns off the lights to give a clean-up message, turns on our clean-up song, and we all work together to put our materials back where they belong.

10:25-10:45 Meeting

After cleaning our space, we gather in a circle for a meeting. During this time we greet each other with a greeting or a song, and there is an opportunity to share with the group what work took place during choice time. Teachers will often use this time to get group input on conflicts or problems that need solving. At the end of our meeting, we think about the weather, and how we need to prepare our bodies for the woods.

11:00-12:30 Woods play

Children pack their adventure packs with their water and all necessary supplies for our woods spot. Some days we might pack lunch for a woods picnic. In our woods spot, friends get right to work digging in the dirt, balancing on logs, walking on slacklines, building forts, finding bugs, and imagining in the magical world of the woods.

12:30-1:15 Lunch

Teachers tell the kids to wash up their hands and take out their lunchboxes. We all eat lunch as a class so that we can talk amongst ourselves about our day so far, weekend plans, home life, etc. We also do a ton of talking about food during lunch time, which is a great way for everyone to have something to add to the lunch conversation. Lunch is an important community building time. Often towards the end of lunch a teacher will choose a story to read. This often helps the kids take those last few bites without being too distracted by their neighbors.

1:30-2:15 Rest time

After lunch is cleaned up we will start calming down the room for our rest time. Teachers do this by dimming the lights a bit and encouraging calm bodies. Students will go to the bathroom and find their cozy rest spot. Once most of the children are on their nap mats a teacher will turn on some quiet music. Students are encouraged to look at books quietly at this time so that their bodies and minds can have a break from the stimulation of the day. Teachers will float around the room tucking students in and making sure their rest time needs are being met. Some children will sleep and some will continue to look at books until it is time to transition into pick up and quiet play.

2-3 Indoor/outdoor choice and goodbyes

Once rest time mats are put away and everyone is awake and moving about, we will have some choice play time while we wait for grown-ups to come. Most days we open up our door to the outside so that children can choose where they would like to play. All the gear that needs to go home will be packed up and ready outside for grown-ups to snag when they come for their child. Some of the play choices at this time include drawing at the easel, doing a puzzle, reading more books, and playing with play doh. Then we say our goodbyes and students leave for the day.

8:00-9:30 Ready, Set, Play (Greetings and Getting Started)

Everyday a teacher is at the vestibule doors ready to greet our parents and friends and usher them into our school. The other teacher is in the hallway helping friends unpack for the day before they enter the classroom space. This work entails children hanging up their outerwear and backpacks and deciding whether or not they would like to start the day with shoes inside, taking out their morning snack and lunch and storing them on the food shelf, and finally bringing their water bottles into the classroom to store in the "water closet" a cabinet beneath our class sink out for easy access. Once these tasks are done friends are then set to begin free play. This is a time when our classroom is buzzing with activities. Friends can be seen in every part of our room either lounging on our couch or building forts with cushions, the babies in the nursery are being cared for, meals and coffee are being served out of our kitchen, complex structures are being built, and many beautiful drawings are being created. Often in this frenzy our toy shelves are emptied and toys are strewn about. It can get messy but our friend knows that part of our play is the clean up! When it's time friends join up with their fellow crew members and do their clean up jobs. Each crew is responsible for an area of our classroom. If crews are done with their jobs they will often join another crew who may have had a bigger job. When all is cleaned we circle up on our rug.

9:15-9:45 What’s The Plan, Stan? (Gameplan and Preparations)

After being gathered up on the rug it's time for Meeting. We often begin meeting with a variety of greetings, and games. Then depending on the energy of the group we may do some yoga, or light aerobics to get our bodies warmed up. We then take some bubble and get our minds focused. Teachers will move to making announcements that friends need to know about. Together we identify the day of the week and review our schedule for the day. We check the weather which helps inform our plans for the day. If we are going to the woods we may discuss our plan for the woods. What should we wear? What should we pack in our adventure pack? What foods are good food to bring to the woods etc. Sometimes we have projects or jobs that we need to do either inside our classroom or out in the woods and we will review and prepare for those tasks..

9:45-10:15 I Like to Eat, Eat, EAT! (Snack)

Snack time is a quick fuel up time. It can take place inside or outside. Inside we are spaced out around our classroom. We remove our mask and chow down. Casual chatting and sharing is what we see a lot of at this time. Outside snack takes place under the tent or in the woods. We lay out our candas pads 6 ft apart in either space. We then go to our spots, remove our masks and have snacks and conversations.

10:15-12:00 Get Up, Get Out, and Get Something (Outside Play)

Outside Adventure Time is an emergent play time which happens rain or shine. The outdoors can provide a sense of endless magic and wonder for our kids.

In the backyard, they are climbing the dome, they are decorating our sidewalks with colorful chalk drawings, they are throwing frisbees and kicking soccer balls. Friends are hula hooping playing tag games and staying cool under the shade of our tent.

In the woods, kids are often engaged in group free play which can include making fairy houses, playing families as both human and creatures. However if an emergent theme, issue, interest comes up we may call an impromptu meeting to discuss it. Other times we are building bridges, hanging tarps and constructing forts to make our woods spot work for us the best it can. Soon we will begin exploring the trails on our campus but for now we are getting to know our space first. Whatever we do in the woods it's always an adventure!

12:00-12:45 Eat, Play, Love (Lunch)

On warm days so far we have eaten inside our classroom, or under our tent. Our kiddos are hungry and tired and looking to fill their bellies and rest their bodies at this point. Some cool air and a comfy spot to sit and eat are the priority. So we use the bathroom, wash our hands and set ourselves up for lunch. Each child then gets out their lunch and removes their masks to eat and drink.

Lunch is a time where we teachers will often lead casual discussions about a range of topics. Our conversations are emergent and often responsive. Sometimes teachers will read a few curated stories based on themes we may have encountered as a group recently. Sometimes we play eye spy, tell jokes or riddles or talk about any and everything. No matter where we are, lunchtime is one our richest times of day in terms of community building. We reflect on what we did earlier in the day. We spend that time sharing and learning more about each other. We learn new things about ourselves, each other, and sometimes the world.

Once lunch is over we know our plan, we pack up and wash up. Teachers encourage students to use the restroom if they need to.

1:00-2:00 Mr. Sandman, Bring Me a Dream (Rest Time)

At rest time our kiddos lay out our yoga mats, they may bring over their class blanket and special rest stuffies/toys, remove their mask, and cozy up for a quiet rest time. We start with a brief 25-30 minutes of quiet time. A teacher may lead a meditation or visualization exercise to prepare our bodies to relax. Friends are asked to be still and let their mind wander. After that teacher will often give our quiet time activities such as manipulatives, and tactile play elements as well as art materials, and books. Things like legos, counting and sorting objects, coloring, puzzles are what is often in use at this time. Friends are encouraged to play independently for a brief period. Once quiet play is complete, friends may mask up, and join someone on their mat to have small group play. They may bring over their toys or opt to play with things that their friend may have on their mat. Once rest time ends we mask up, wash up, pack up, clean up, return their items to their bins and pack their bags up for home. Once their jobs are done and they are packed up and ready we head outside and play!

2:00-3:15 Bye, Bye, Byes (Outside Games and Goodbyes)

Once rest time mats are put away and everyone is awake and moving about, we will have some choice play time while we wait for grown-ups to come. Most days we open up our door to the outside so that children can choose where they would like to play. All the gear that needs to go home will be packed up and ready outside for grown-ups to snag when they come for their child. Some of the play choices at this time include drawing at the easel, doing a puzzle, reading more books, and playing with play doh. Then we say our goodbyes and students leave for the day.