My son has been attending for three weeks now. I'm relieved and feel so lucky that my son goes to the Mulberry Tree Preschool.
After looking for a preschool for quite some time, I knew that I didn't want my son to be in an "academic" school where he is sitting indoors most days listening to a teacher where the curriculum emphasizes rote memory and learning how to be obedient kids who listen to instructions well. I knew that my son wouldn't do well in those settings, and upon some research about "whole children" and "respectful parenting" I wanted him to go someplace where the learning environment is child-lead, creative, nature based and slow paced so the children can lead peaceful, thoughtful days. My emphasis was in encouraging my son to be curious, thoughtful, to find joy in small, everyday things, to gain peaceful social skills... a place where differences and conflict are not taboo so kids don't learn to feel guilty, where conflicts are talked about openly together to find solutions... well, this school is it and My son has flourished in meaningful ways already. For example, he always had trouble with eye contact when speaking to someone. Today he has started making eye contact himself! Teacher Gigi noticed it too, even though it wasn't something I had flagged to her. It's really amazing. But wait, there's more...
- Affordable vegetarian school lunches: my son now eats lentils, chickpeas, hummus, fennel, and has tried all sorts of other fresh ingredients thanks to the school lunch. They get the kids involved in food prep and gardening. They eat family style. It's really improved my son's ability to eat (he has been an extremely picky eater his whole life).
- Huge, fun outdoor area. Mud, sand, water, rocks, garden, slides...
- flexible hours. Core hours are from 8:30-1:30. But you can opt for 5pm and they even can extend childcare to 7pm with advance notice at a very affordable rate of $10/hr!!
- Music. I wanted my son to be more musical and bought many musical instruments but he never played with them. He nows plays with them thanks to daily musical activities addressing music theory and variation of instruments.
Gosh, the list goes on. But, I think you all get the point. read more