A singular faculty in Boone County, Missouri, offers the entire county’s fifth graders a possibility to study in regards to the pure world. Designed and furnished with the assistance of College Specialty, the college serves as a house base for studying inside nature.
A partnership between the Columbia Public Faculties and the Missouri Division of Conservation, the 8,000-square-foot, $7 million Boone County Nature College formally opened in August 2024. College students from the district will attend the college for a complete of seven days of their fifth-grade 12 months, biking by way of in shifts as they study Missouri ecosystems, observe the migration of birds and butterflies, and work on sustainability initiatives.
A lot of their studying takes place outdoor, however college students are additionally studying inside 4 nature-themed school rooms and a moist lab area. The curriculum focuses on 4 key ecosystems inside Missouri, and every classroom is designed to replicate certainly one of most of these environments with an aquatics-themed room, a cave room, a forest room, and a prairie room.
“Youngsters aren’t outdoors as a lot anymore,” mentioned Ragan Webb, elementary science coordinator for the Columbia Public Faculties—and she or he famous that the fifth-grade nature faculty program goals to alter that.
Except for the psychological well being advantages of being outdoor, the district thought it was essential for college students to study conservation, Webb added: “Educating them in regards to the historical past and stewardship of this land hopefully will make them good stewards and residents going ahead.”
Connecting to Nature
The ability sits on greater than 100 acres of land donated by Columbia College Board President Suzette Waters’ late father-in-law, Hank Waters, and his spouse, Vicki Russell.
To design the college’s indoor studying environments, the district turned to College Specialty and its Initiatives by Design® group for assist.
“We wished quite a lot of pure supplies, in order that even when college students had been inside, they had been nonetheless related to the outside,” Webb mentioned.
College Specialty Studying Atmosphere Specialist John Hoey shared catalogs and introduced samples of tables for Webb and her group to judge. “He additionally supplied drawings and gave us visuals to assist us perceive how we might use the area,” mentioned Dana Reynolds, the district’s buying director.
In school rooms the place direct instruction takes place, district officers selected tables with a pure wooden laminate end to strengthen the concept of being in nature. For the hands-on, project-based studying labs, they selected Classroom Choose Assemble-IT makerspace tables with whiteboard surfaces.
“We just like the model of those tables,” Reynolds mentioned. “They permit college students to sit down or stand as they work.”
The entire tables are on locking casters, to allow them to be moved across the room simply to accommodate various kinds of actions. “The group shall be utilizing this facility as nicely,” Webb mentioned, “so the extra versatile we may very well be with the furnishings, the higher.”
Extremely Functioning Design
Each fifth grader within the district attends the Boone County Nature College for 3 days throughout the fall, two days within the winter, and two days within the spring. “That manner, they get to expertise the completely different seasons and see how issues change over time,” Webb defined.
Though the character studying program is designed for fifth graders, college students in different grades could go to the character faculty on discipline journeys and science camps.
College students within the nature studying program are doing actual “citizen science,” Webb famous. They’re amassing information in regards to the migration patterns of birds and butterflies and creating maps with this data. They’re additionally designing and finishing sustainability initiatives to bolster land and animal conservation efforts.
What’s extra, the educational environments that Hoey designed in partnership with district officers are enjoying a key position in supporting these actions. “Being able to maneuver the tables round has are available in extraordinarily helpful,” Webb mentioned. And the whiteboard surfaces make instruction and ideation each easy and spontaneous.
“College students love the thrill of writing on the tables,” Webb noticed. “And so they come clear very simply. We now have sixteen hundred children who’ve cycled by way of twice already, and the tops of the tables are all nonetheless white.”
College students within the nature studying program are extremely engaged of their schooling, she famous: “We now have solely had one conduct incident this complete 12 months. College students get pleasure from getting out and studying on this area. They’re studying with out even realizing they’re studying, they usually’re having enjoyable whereas doing so.”
She concluded: “The commonest remark we hear from them is: ‘I want we might study like this each day.’”