Wald Kindergarten or Kindergarten in the Forrest?

[Vicitoria]

Hello!

We just moved to Germany and DS is almost 20 months old. He will start kindergarden when he is 3. There are many options and I recently came upon this very interesting one. We live next to a wonderful forrest with hills and playgrounds and a zillion trails as well as a huge playground. We were out playing and there were 15 kids in the playground. We started talking and I found out this was their kindergarden! I spoke with one of the teachers and he explained that the kids come there every morning and they use the woods (state park area kind of) as their classroom. They are there from 9ish to 1ish every day. They come dressed for the weather and go on from there. (That particular day it was really cold and half the class was "out with a cold" but that part doesn't bother me. I would probably keep my son home in sub zero temperatures too.) School is year round here with 2 or 6 week breaks so all seasons are represented in the school year. DS will go to kindergarden for 3 years and I thought one year spent in this environment might be good. Does anyone know anything else about this. I went to their website and the whole thing was in German along with their selected readings so I'm looking for a shortcut right now. Anyone know of any english language books written on the subject or anything else?

Thanks in advance! Vic:-)

[bean0322]

Oh my gosh -- the forrest, the forrest!!! What a wonderful opportunity for your dc. It sounds like it'll be fabulous. My son attended a Waldorf k but had this option been available to us he would've gone to the forrest without hesitation.

[behr]

Vicitoria,
I'm familiar with Waldkindergarten and I think, for the kids, they are perfect, especially for boys. Of course, it depends a lot on the teachers, but usually these are very creative people.
Waldkindergarten work best if one parent stays home so the child can stay home whenever needed. For a 3 yo it can be hard to be out in the real cold sometimes. Also the ticks in Germany have a high infection rate with lyme disease carriers. You should check your dc every day after he comes home.
Also, keep in mind that in most German Kindergarten there is the option of going into the forest for a week at a time or a specific day of the week.
Waldkindergartenparents are usually a good group of people to meet too.

[mariposita]

Originally Posted by Vicitoria

I went to their website and the whole thing was in German along with their selected readings so I'm looking for a shortcut right now. Anyone know of any english language books written on the subject or anything else?

if you google waldkindergarten it comes up with a ton of hits for different cities. you can find your city (if it's there. if not type waldkindergarten and your city to see if something else pops up). to the right of the link you'd click on to go to the website is a link that says "transate this page". the translation isn't perfect, but it's pretty decent.

i had never realized tat this feature was on google until i typed it in to learn more about this program. it sounds like a great program for kids! i would definitely have ds g to one of these kindergardens!