Summer vacation is just around the corner for the students at the Forest School (
As the kids explain it, their school is like school, but actually not like school at all. What they mean is that the boring, rigid and disciplinarian aspects that characterize school for most kids in regular schools simply don't apply here. To the farthest extent possible without generating total chaos, the students at this alternative education elementary boarding school are in control.
There are classes and teachers and administrators, textbooks, desks and chalkboards, but the similarities with regular schools stop there. The school aims to be the vanguard of education reform in Taiwan and it doesn't take long walking around the campus to believe there is no other school like it in the country.
Vive la difference
"Practically nobody is satisfied with the public education system, but there is a lot of hesitation on the part of parents and society to make sweeping changes. Most parents still think that if school isn't tough, then the kids aren't learning," said Feng Chiao-lan (
"Our purpose is not to weigh children down with education, but to empower them with it." The foundation sees its mission as convincing parents of this reactionary principle and destroying the widely held conception that alternative education options will leave their kids playing in the sandbox all day instead of doing their multiplication tables.
PHOTO COURTESY OF FOREST SCHOOL
Forest School's fundamental difference from public schools lies in its golden rule that the teachers never scold nor hit the students. The kids are encouraged to understand the reasons why they made a mistake instead of being berated for having made it in the first place, and discipline is an interactive process instead of coming down from above. This concept is extended to all aspects of life at the school, where children are permitted to climb trees and clamber over tall walls as part of their life education.
"Kids will be kids and we don't need to restrain that. Let them climb the trees. That way they'll learn their limits. Kids need space for learning from the environment through trial and error," said Chiang Si-hao (
Most parents, Chiang said, are overly protective of their children and schools cater to this tendency by restricting the movement and space of their students.
Forest School, in contrast, is high in the hills above Nankang on an expansive campus practically encased by dense vegetation and trees. There are a few traditional playground items but most of the kids seem content during their playtime to run around in the bushes, climb over stone walls and fawn over the 16 stray dogs that the 64 students collectively raise and feed.
"Nature doesn't judge children as right or wrong. Children can feel free to learn outside from the environment without the anxiety that there is ever a wrong answer," Chiang said.
For this reason, many of the classes are taught outdoors. Earlier this week the first grade class was getting a lesson in mechanics by using a discarded cable spool, a length of rope, a broom and a bucket. The children were asked to build a pulley system to haul bucket-loads of sand up a sharply inclined slope. The teacher watched and gave advice, but didn't interfere, mostly because the kids were managing just fine without her.
Also, once a semester the whole school takes a week-long field trip. The most recent was two weeks ago to Hohuan Mountain in Nantou County, where the students learned firsthand about alpine flora and fauna, gained map-reading skills and felt the effects of high altitude on the human body.
"As much of our education program as possible is experiential," Chiang said, referring to the Hohuan Mountain trip.
Back in the classroom, where students spend from 8:30am to 3pm each day, the students are encouraged to provide input through a discussion format more similar to a college seminar than an elementary school. All sorts of opinions are shared and willingly offered and the students show little of the hesitation and fear that their public school peers have been routinely shown to feel in surveys.
The experience for the children of having their opinions taken seriously provides confidence that they can handle situations through discussion and don't need to accept what they hear at face value, Chiang said.
This can sometimes lead to problems when the students move on to public junior high school and high school, where they are frequently perceived by teachers as a threat to their authority and hard to discipline. The students typically experience difficulties in adjustment to the public school system after graduation, but the records show that they go on to do well in the test-heavy environment of public schools while retaining much of the independent spirit they learned at the school.
A different task
If the students that graduate from Forest School make public school teachers uneasy, then the school is on the right track, according to Feng. Starting from administrative organization, to curriculum design, teaching methodology and materials, the school has sought to make a clean break from the traditional educational system.
Experimental elementary and junior high schools are required to receive accreditation by city or county governments and must also have written approval from parents that their children be taught using the school's teaching methods. Beyond that, the schools are free to do as they choose.
"The Ministry of Education does not seek to restrict the growth of experimental education or get involved in its curriculum design. We encourage the growth of these schools," said Wu Wei-ning (
Taking it one step further from the pubic school system, the Humanistic Education Foundation last month completed a full set of textbooks written by researchers from National Taiwan University for grades one through six that cover all the basic subject areas using hands-on practical lessons. Whereas public school textbooks tend to be geared toward training and are harsh on the eyes with only text and numbers, the foundation's books contain loads of attractive, colorful illustrations that make them seem like a good read.
Having completed the textbook set, the foundation hopes to begin selling them to other schools and in this way gradually prod the educational system toward broader reform.
"The interest in our program keeps growing, but the cost of attendance is a major stumbling block for most families," Feng said.
A semester at Forest School comes in at NT$150,000. Parents must first be willing to spend that kind of money, but must also be willing to accept the school's quirky curriculum. For the most part, this has meant that the parents are highly educated with hefty incomes. Many also harbor bitter memories of their education and refuse to submit their own children to the constant testing and drilling at public schools.
The students at Forest School don't seem preoccupied with the differences of their education as compared with children at public schools, but they are well aware that they live in a special place.
One student this week was taking time out from his natural sciences class to sit alone under a tree. When asked if he felt bored sitting alone, he turned the question around by saying: "No. I was bored, that's why I came here to be alone." A minute later he walked back to his class being held on the grass. There was no teacher chasing him down and no one appeared shocked that he wanted some time alone. Class just continued as usual.
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