In the heart of a Vashon woods one recent chilly morning, a group of children gathered the ingredients for Hot Forest Tea: red cedar tips, Douglas fir needles, huckleberry leaves and the delicate pink flowers from salmonberry bushes.
The five children, all between the ages of 2 and 5, knew exactly what they were looking for and confidently slipped each leaf, bud and bloom into the waiting thermos. For them, forest tea is not a concoction they might create for an imaginary friend, but a staple they help make and drink every day at Cedarsong Forest Kindergarten, the all-outdoor preschool where they are students.
Vashon boasts several excellent preschools and programs, many of which foster a love of the outdoors in children. But Cedarsong holds an unusual spot in the constellation of preschools: It’s the only one in the Northwest and likely the only one in the country based on the popular “waldkindergärtens,” or forest kindergartens, in Germany, where kids never once step into a building during their school day.
Vashon’s small school, which this year serves just 16 families, has recently garnered attention from far and wide. The Seattle Times ran a feature story on it last spring, as did KUOW. The Associated Press covered it, and several papers across the country picked it up from the news wire. Sierra magazine featured the school in November. People magazine ran a two-page photo spread in February, and ABC’s Nightline ran a story in March, as did UK Daybreak, a morning news show based in London. Seattle’s Evening Magazine weighed in with a story, too.
All the attention has come because Erin Kenny, Cedarsong’s founder and lead teacher, has created a school that immerses young kids in nature — a subject gaining interest in a variety of circles — and she is doing so in the soggy Northwest, a place where many people often think the great outdoors is not all that great and even a dash from the car to the grocery store can feel like a hardship.
But at Cedarsong, it’s a different story. For three hours every day, the forest is the classroom, come rain or come shine, and students, teachers and parents want it just that way.
“She loves it so much,” Barb Weist said of her 3-year-old daughter Piper. “She’s been very, very happy.”
Most of Cedarsong’s kids come from Vashon, but two families make the trek from off-Island, including Weist, who lives in Gig Harbor.
Before she was pregnant, Weist said, she did graduate work in environmental leadership and learned about all-outdoor schools. She knew then, she said, that when she had a child, she wanted that child to go to such a school and reap its benefits.
“We were bound and determined to make it happen,” she said.
It was good timing for her, then, when Kenny opened the school in 2008.
She did so, she said, after reading Richard Louv’s best-selling book, “Last Child in the Woods.” In it Louv coins the term “Nature Deficit Disorder” and contends that the many hours children spend indoors are at the root of many ever-growing problems, from attention deficit hyperactivity disorder to childhood obesity and depression.
In his book, he talks about Germany’s many outdoor schools, and for Kenny — an educator, naturalist, ethnobotanist and former environmental lawyer — it was an ah-ha moment.
A considerable amount of research later, she and her friend Robin Rogers opened the school on five acres of old-growth forest Kenny owns not far from town.
Now in its third year, the school has grown from serving six families two days a week to serving 16 families five mornings a week. It will offer afternoons beginning next fall as well.
The school does not have a set curriculum, Kenny noted, but follows the seasons and the kids’ energy, which seems to go naturally with the cycles of the year. The children’s interests lead the day. With two teachers and only eight students, kids can safely choose to do different things. Some might “fish” in the school’s big mud puddle while others discover a hideout in the woods. Some kids might put on a play in the forest theater, or everyone might gather round for a good story. When something catches the children’s interest, Kenny says, she steps in with a quick science lesson, about the calls of a bird, maybe, or what happens when a log decomposes or how to play safely in Vashon’s soil.
The benefits of this kind of education are not just about nature, Kenny said. Studies from Germany show that kids who go to forest kindergartens do better on standardized tests than their academic preschool counterparts — a result experts in the field attribute to the problem solving and critical thinking skills they acquire outdoors.
F. L. Dammann, a board member of the nonprofit school and the father of two daughters who are students there, speaks passionately about the mission of the school. With all the media attention, it would be easy to think Cedarsong is an elite school, he said, but part of the philosophy is to have this kind of learning experience accessible to as many as possible. Keeping tuition reasonable and offering scholarships are important to the board and teachers, he noted.
His daughter Lola, 5, has attended the school since its first year, and Eva, 3, started last fall. They explore and have adventures, the likes of which kids often only read about in books, such as “Tom Sawyer” or “Bridge to Terabithia,” he said. They also learn a lot.
“My 3-year-old is teaching me what slugs are poisonous and identifying different roots on a plant,” he said. “They are becoming stewards of the land at 3 years old.”
For her part, Kenny stressed that no one involved with the school has sought the media attention, and sometimes it has been a distraction. Still, she said, she is thankful for it — if only because it helps convey a message she’s passionate about: the vital importance of connecting children with nature.
It pleases Kenny, too, she said, that the kids’ parents also embrace this educational model and are as passionate about it as she is.
“It’s my greatest joy,” she said. “It’s my life’s work.”
Cedarsong Nature School will hold a fundraiser for its program from from 6 to 9:30 p.m. Thursday, May 19, at the Spice Route, which is donating 30 percent of its proceeds from that evening to the nonprofit school.
