Our Greatest and Most Childish Glory

The boy was on his knees, sobbing. I don't know why, but I also did nothing because there was already someone caring for him. Two people, in fact: girls, his classmates, children who rarely played with him, but down there with him nonetheless, hands lovingly across his shoulder, on his knee, talking soothingly into his ear.

When I first started writing this blog, I did it for myself, but as people started reading and responding, as I began to see my words and ideas impact people, and especially as I began to see that the profession of early childhood education is full of people who see the world, or the prospects of a world, the way I do, I got the idea that maybe I could make a difference in how children everywhere experience childhood.

Yes, I'm a utopian. Yes, I've experienced the reformer's zeal. Call me naive, but even as I look around and see that there have been as many steps back as there have been forward, I remain convinced that a more beautiful world is possible. The news discourages me. Especially now when cruelty is being employed as a tool of public policy. But my job, the time I spend amongst the newest humans, convinces me that utopia remains possible.

In her memoir Recollections of My Non-Existence, Rebecca Solnit, writes of "that microscopic utopia that is a moment of kindness." People use the word "childish" to refer to adults who behave in petulant, self-centered ways, but these microscopic utopias are also, even mostly, what I've discovered during my decades on my knees with children. Another book by Solnit is A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities that Arise in Disaster, in which she shines a spotlight on the countless examples of temporary, but real, utopias that predictably emerge in the aftermath of earthquakes, fires, floods, and other traumatic events. While we focus on the pain and suffering, we too often miss the kindness that is our greatest and most childish glory.

This is a result of creating loving environments in our classrooms in which these moments of utopia emerge, not from teaching, not from rules, not from preaching, but because it is simply a part of how we live together. It is a central aspect of Creating a Natural Habitat for Learning (see below).

The utopias, heavens, and nirvanas of our imaginations are perfected places, impossible in a world in which our fellow humans so often find themselves on their knees, sobbing. But what I've learned from my years with children is not a destination, but rather an act of one human caring for another in their time of need. Actual utopia is created in moments of kindness.

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Registration is open for the 2026 cohort for Creating a Natural Habitat for Learning. We cannot make utopia happen, but we can create spaces in which it emerges. This is a 6-week deep dive into transforming your classroom, home, or playground into the kind of learning environment in which young children thrive; in which novelty and self-motivation stand at the center of learning. In my decades as an early childhood educator, I've found that nothing improves my teaching and the children's learning experience more than a supportive classroom, both indoors and out. This course is for educators, parents, and directors. You don't want to miss this chance to make your "third teacher" (the learning environment) the best it can be. I hope you join me! To learn more and register, click here.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

Environments that Give Children Permission to Play

Not long ago, orcas off the coast of Spain and Portugal were ramming and often sinking smaller boats. Back in the 1980's, pods of orcas in the Pacific Ocean made a fad of wearing dead fish on their heads. The leading theory for these behaviors is play.

The orcas don't need to ram those boats and bite at their rudders, although I imagine them cheering one another on. There's no apparent reason for orcas to wear a dead fish on their heads, and the same can be said for young children who laugh themselves silly while sporting, say, underpants on their heads. 

In my course Creating a Natural Habitat for Learning, one of the key things we will be exploring is how our classrooms, playgrounds, and homes can become the kind of environments in which young children know they have permission to play.

It's far easier said than done because so much of what school is about, so much of what playgrounds are about, is proscribed activities. You can climb this structure, but not that tree. You may slide down, but not climb back up. You can build with those blocks, but nothing higher than your head. 

And most manufactured toys come with "scripts" designed right into them. The fire truck is, well, a fire truck. That doll from a Disney movie is a specific character. Princess costumes, vehicles, action figures, tools, weapons, and pretty much anything made for kids "instructs" or "directs" the child's play. A creative child will, of course, find other ways to play with these toys . . . That is, if there isn't an adult nearby to tell them they're doing it wrong. 

But even when the adult stays out of it, we all know that young children tend to prefer the boxes the toys come in. The wrapping paper. The twist-ties and rubber bands and other packaging material. This tendency, what we call "loose parts play," frees children from the scripts and expectations, allowing them to fully engage in the deep, genuine learning that takes place from exploring without artificial constraints.

The best habitats for learning are those that embrace the promise and genius behind loose parts learning. There is far more learning in the recycling box than the toy box.

If this sounds like the kind of learning environment you want to offer to the young children in your life, please consider joining the 2026 cohort of Creating a Natural Habitat for Learning.  This 6-week course is a deep-dive into the impact of the environment on how and what young children learn, including the theory and practice of loose parts. It’s a course for early childhood educators, directors, and parents of young children who are interested in creating environments that inspire self-directed learning. 

Meanwhile, if you find yourself in a small boat off the Iberian coast, just hope the orcas are playing the dead fish on the head game that day, because otherwise it's liable to be a bit rowdy!

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If you're interested in transforming your own space into this kind of learning environment, you might want to join the 2026 cohort for my 6-week course, Creating a Natural Habitat for Learning. This is a  deep dive into transforming your classroom, home, or playground into the kind of learning environment in which young children thrive; in which novelty and self-motivation stand at the center of learning. In my decades as an early childhood educator, I've found that nothing improves my teaching and the children's learning experience more than a supportive classroom, both indoors and out. This course is for educators, parents, and directors. You don't want to miss this chance to make your "third teacher" (the learning environment) the best it can be. I hope you join me! To learn more and register, click here.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

Fixing Design Flaws in Your Classroom and Playground

I was recently leaving a downtown store. When I came to the exit door, I saw that it had a handle. I grabbed and pulled. The door didn't budge. I then, counter-intuitively, pushed and the door swung open. This is a prime example of a failure in design: a handle means "pull" and a push plate means "push." Indeed, every time you see a sign on a door reading "push" or "pull," you're looking at a design flaw that someone has clumsily attempted to correct.

Design flaws are all around us. Awhile back, my local supermarket began offering discounts to "members." To take advantage you opened an app on your phone, then held the bar code under a scanner which was located beneath the checkout screen. There was no beep, no green light, or any other indicator that your code has been read, which meant that every single person who used it wound up fuddling around, trying their phone at different angles before finally, in frustration, engaging the cashier in the following conversation:

"Did it work?"

"What work?"

"My app thingy."

"You mean your discount code?"

"Yes."

"Let me see . . . Yes, it worked."

And you thought the "Paper or plastic?" question got old.

This too, is a design flaw that a simple beep or bell or light would fix. 

Every time you see that pedestrians have worn a path through a lawn instead of sticking to the sidewalks, you're seeing evidence of design not working. My father was a transportation engineer who was fond of pointing out how design flaws were causing the traffic jams we were experiencing. He would say, "I'm sure it looked beautiful on the drafting board, but the engineer forgot to consider how actual people behave."

When I first started teaching, I set up our classroom as I would have a living room, thinking in terms of seating and "traffic flow," making sure the passageways were wide enough, that there were no places where one could get "trapped," and so forth. The reality I discovered once actual children were on the scene was that I'd created a race-track that said, quite clearly, "Run in circles," and that's what they did. After weeks of scolding the kids about running inside, I finally re-arranged the furniture and the behavior disappeared.

One of the aspects of the Reggio Emilia model for early years education that I think about often is the concept of the three teachers: 1) the adults, 2) the children, and 3) the environment, which is where design comes in. Quite often, I've found that repeated troubling or trying behaviors have little to do with the children themselves and everything to do with an environment that forgot to consider how actual children behave. Things hanging from above tend to tell children, Jump or Swing or Hang. Long open areas say, Run. Echoey spaces say, Shout. Dark and confined says, Giggle and Whisper. Bright and busy creates a different vibe than muted and uncluttered. And design flaws are not limited to the physical space. Sometimes the aspect that needs tweaking has to do with the schedule or the expectations or even the school's philosophy, all of which I consider to be part of the children's environment as well.

This is the thinking behind my 6-week course, Creating a Natural Habitat for Learning. It's a tool to help educators, parents, and directors to think comprehensively about how your classrooms, homes, and playgrounds as a "third teacher" (see below). It's amazing how much a well-considered, adaptable, child-centric learning habitat can free you up to be the kind of educator or parent you always wanted to be.

Of course, it's not always about design flaws, but whenever I find myself forever correcting the same behavior over and over, I begin to suspect that's what it is. Instead of looking to change the child, I start by wondering how I can change the environment. It's amazing how often even a small change, like moving the furniture or replacing a handle with a push plate, can make all the difference in the world.

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If you're interested in transforming your own space into this kind of learning environment, you might want to join the 2026 cohort for my 6-week course, Creating a Natural Habitat for Learning. This is a  deep dive into transforming your classroom, home, or playground into the kind of learning environment in which young children thrive; in which novelty and self-motivation stand at the center of learning. In my decades as an early childhood educator, I've found that nothing improves my teaching and the children's learning experience more than a supportive classroom, both indoors and out. This course is for educators, parents, and directors. You don't want to miss this chance to make your "third teacher" (the learning environment) the best it can be. I hope you join me! To learn more and register, click here.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

A State-of-the-Art Preschool Playground (for under $200)

Awhile back, a reader left a comment on the Facebook page asking, "If I have $200 to make our playground look a little more like your schoolyard, what should I get?"

First off, $200 is a pretty good budget for a project like that, mainly because most of the coolest stuff we have in our outdoor classroom we acquired at little or no cost. 

In my course Creating a Natural Habitat for Learning (see below) we'll spend six weeks digging into every aspect of this question, and more, but in the meantime, here are some suggestions:

Sand or at least someplace for digging. Backyard sandboxes are great, but they're often really too small and too shallow for growing kids. When our community has created playgrounds, we always talk about "full body" sand pits. Sand, while not terribly expensive (around here we get about 60 lbs. for $3), could eat up that whole budget, however, but setting aside a digging area involving just regular dirt is an acceptable alternative.

And, of course, you'll need shovels, pails, and other tools. We use cheap plastic ones. We've tried metal, but galvanized steel buckets are heavier when full and tend to get bent out of shape quite easily in our rough and tumble environment. We do own some metal shovels, rakes, and hoes, but they aren't for day-to-day use even though they would probably make the work go easier. The reason is that our shovels are as often used as "weapons" as for digging, and while they both hurt, getting accidentally brained by a plastic shovel is generally preferred over being brained by a metal one.

Our two-level sandpit wouldn't be itself without a cast iron water pump. You can get a new one for under $50. Our's is mounted on a board that rests atop an inexpensive 30-gallon plastic tub that serves as our cistern. We drilled holes in the lid for the uptake pipe and for a hose to refill it when it's empty.

A natural extension of the pump, of course, are lengths of guttering. Ours are cut into 6-foot sections although we have a couple 10-footers stashed away for special uses. If you spend more than $200 on a pump set up, you've spent too much.

Using the gutters as loose parts is much preferred over a permanent installation. Not only does that allow kids to change the direction and flow of water as their needs demand, but we can use the gutters for other purposes, like down at the art station where we employ them in painting on adding machine tape with balls, mini-pumpkins, and/or toy cars and trucks.

Much of the stuff that makes our space "look" the way it does are things on which you really shouldn't have to spend anything. You can usually pick up logs and tree rounds, for instance, from a neighbor who has recently removed a tree or done some major pruning. Tree services will often give you some if they know its for kids.

Our two boats have both been donations. You just have to get the word out and wait.

It's important to remember, I think, that nothing lasts forever. It's good for kids to spend time playing on, with, and around things that are in various stages of deterioration. So when we got our new metal boat, we simply left the old, rotting, wooden one in place, where it is slowly "sinking" into the sand.

And speaking of loose parts, you shouldn't have to spend a penny on those.

Most of the toys, broken things, cartons, containers, boxes, and whatnot that we're ready to toss out, spend at least a little time in the outdoor classroom before reaching their final resting place in the dumpster.

"Loose parts" is just another name for junk.

Counted among our favorite loose parts are those larger bits that can be hoisted about by teams of kids.

Planks are incredibly versatile.

Ours range in length from 4-8 feet. These have all been donated by families and others looking to make space in their garages.

It's best if you can get new wood without a lot of knots in it: kids really like to experiment with the springy nature of the planks. Some of these have lasted us 3+ years being outdoors year round.

Shipping pallets are a great addition to planks. Ours were all acquired for free. We used to just grab them from the side of the road, but since learning that there can be some chemical and biological hazards associated with pallets, we've started making sure to only use those that are stamped with "HT," which stands for "heat treated." You don't want the chemically treated pallets around kids. We also avoid pallets that have been used to transport food products.

Old car tires are also staples around our place.

And we have a couple of galvanized steel garbage cans. They not only make great, loud, "thunder drums" and hidey-holes, but we often commander them as impromptu table tops.

Other free and inexpensive things we like to have around include brooms . . .

. . . ropes . . .

. . . pulleys . . .

. . . chains . . .

. . . roles of plastic fencing . . .

. . . pvc pipe . . .

. . . old bicycle inner tubes (in this case, we used them to make a sort of catapult) . . .

. . . pipe insulation . . .

. . . cardboard boxes . . .

. . . hoops . . .

. . . stick ponies . . .

. . . chalk . . .

. . . and lots of stuff to just bang on.

As far as more permanent things, I think it's nice to have some sort of playhouse. Again, ours was a donation from a family whose kids had outgrown it, although one of our grandfathers eventually built us a new one on his own dime. A playhouse can be as simple as a cardboard box, however.

It's also nice to have some sturdy tables and chairs. We've purchased ours and they were quite a bit outside the $200 price range, but that's because we're a preschool with over 65 kids playing out there every day. Cheaper stuff, and even cast-off items with the legs cut down will work for backyard purposes. You can often find workable stuff at Goodwill.

And our space simply would not be what it is without a garden. Ours is just a collection of raised beds, but you don't even need that. 

Pots, soil and few seeds will suffice.

We've also re-puposed an old sensory table as a compost/worm bin. 

None of these things are expensive and that's how a child's play space should be. If there is any great truth about an outdoor classroom it's that it should be continually evolving and adapting, a hodge podge of old and new and everything in between. I am not exaggerating when I say that we acquired everything discussed in these photos for not a lot more than $200, other than the furniture and the sand, although there are work-arounds for both of those. If you're just outfitting a backyard, you can probably do it all for less.

That said, it's a backyard, which implies neighbors. As educational as these kinds of spaces are for children, these wonderlands of loose parts, dirt, rocks and compost, these bastions of junkyard chic, they are often perceived as eyesores by the uninitiated. Before going too far, you might want to save up to build a fence.

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A junkyard playground is not right for everyone, but it is ideal for the Woodland Park community. Your own playground or backyard must reflect the wider community, the geography, and the local culture. My 6-week course, Creating a Natural Habitat for Learning, is designed to help you figure out how to transform your classroom, home, or playground into the kind of open-ended, child-led environment that puts curiosity, self-motivation, and teamwork at the center of learning. In my decades as an early childhood educator, I've found that nothing improves my teaching and the children's learning experience more than a supportive classroom, both indoors and out. This course is for educators, parents, and directors. Group discounts are available. You don't want to miss this chance to make your "third teacher" (the learning environment) the best it can be. I hope you join us! To learn more and register, click here.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!