Louis to The Land School

Louis left this morning -a beautiful, sunny spring morning- with his class for the Lake Country Land School.

Lake Country takes Montessori pretty seriously and they were put in a position about ten years ago of becoming the owners of an 80 acre farm in western Wisconsin, about an hour and fifteen minutes from school. This answered a problem that they had been trying to address in a number of different ways: how to pursue the ErdKinder (child of the Earth) requirement that is such a major part of Montessori's teachings.

They took the gift, hired two couples to run the farm as a CSA in the summer and then trained them as Montessori teachers. Lake Country kids start going to the Land School in first grade and by the time they are in Jr. High they are spending six weeks a year there, working on science projects and getting to know the rhythms of nature. (They come home on the week-ends.) It's a wonderful place and a big part of why we chose Lake Country for Louis.

And so, off they went this morning., 28 first through third graders. They had all packed their own bags (I only had to add two t-shirts because it's still a bit chilly at night and in the morning!) and were loading them into the truck that would carry them. They were going to be riding out on a school bus, but Thành and I left before they loaded up the kids because there's no telling how long that could take!