The Hidden Joys of a Small School

Hello all,

For today's check in, I'd like to share some of the hidden beauties of teaching at, and attending a small school.

While I might have started my teaching career with classrooms filled with anywhere from 25-35 students, over the years it seems I have  niched myself into teaching for smaller private schools ranging from Montessori schools to accelerated schools to International schools.  And I have no regrets whatsoever.

Right now I am teaching at Kyoto International School.  We teach children ranging from our 2 year old program to Middle School.  And I, of course, teach Kindergarten.

I have 6 students.

6.

KIS an IB World School, and in my program, the PYP program, we follow an inquiry-based curriculum that uses play and independent thematic  exploration as the cornerstones for learning.

So for a teacher like me, with  a background in Montessori and a love of messy hands-on art and science as well as a passion for words in all forms, it is a dream-come-true for teaching.

Because for 5 and 6 year old children, play is their work, and work is their play and the two should be, and are, intertwined.  Which means I can bring in my experiments and wacky materials and set them up in a center and step back and see what happens.

And what happens?
Magic happens.
And like thirsty sponges, they soak it all up.
And they learn.
Effortlessly.
Words and reading, writing and numbers. Social skills and self-care skills.

I set up the classroom environment (hello there Montessori), I give the initial push, and off they go.

Now this kind of learning isn't just for small classes.  I could do the same with a larger class.
And this kind of learning isn't just for International schools in Japan, because I could do the same anywhere, including back at home in the United States.

Except that it seems that so many schools back at home  have forgotten, or maybe choose to deny, or maybe have never learned the secret to inspire joyful, independent education.

Time.
The secret is time.

At KIS especially, but in other schools I have taught at as well, I was given the gift of time.
At some schools the time I was given was shorter, because the school had a curriculum that needed to be addressed, deadlines that needed to be met and tests that needed to be taken.  Sometimes, like now, the time I am given is longer, allowing students to stretch their imaginations, hone their skills, work at the play that is so vital to real learning for young children.

But the benefits of a small school don't just rest in the individual classrooms.

I'll give you an example.

Just this week my Kindergarten class (6 students)  and our Middle School class (4 students) went on a field trip to visit our sister school that is located some distance  away up in the mountains.  Every year on Halloween students from our sister school visit us for Halloween fun, and in turn we are invited to their school for their Winter festival and mochi pounding (pounding cooked rice in massive stone bowls with wooden mallets until it becomes a delicious glutinous mass, which is then cooked and eagerly devoured).

10 students, 2 teachers.

That was it.

Now, in a larger school, the first difference would be that Middle School wouldn't even be a part of the elementary program, but would be separated into it's own school, maybe across town.

And even in a larger school that did go from Kindergarten to Middle School, the likelihood of them going together on a field trip would be small, since to take a large group with such an age spread would be challenging, to say the least.

But not here.

The four Middle School students willingly accepted being paired off, each middle school student with either 1 or 2 kindergarteners.

And those pre teens and teens stayed with their Kindergarten buddies all day.  On the subway.  In the stations.  On the train.  On the bus.  Through all the activities at our sister school  and all the way back on the trains back to KIS.

Now, I have 2 teenage kids myself, and I know without a doubt that this situation was perhaps not a teenager's idea of a great time, to be paired up with a 5 or 6 year old all day.  But, just as when Aya and Patrick volunteer with KIS during various events, each of the middle school students put aside what they'd perhaps rather do (just hang out together and chat or doze on the trains), and helped watch over wiggly, giggly Kindergarteners.

And here is where we can see what a small school does best:  it takes 50 or 80 or 100 kids from a wide spread of ages and cultures and backgrounds and experiences, and forges them into a family.

Like a family, they argue and get into scrapes sometimes.  But like a family they also look out for each other, help each other.  And when the students become a family, so too do the teachers.

This is an incredible gift anywhere, but perhaps especially here, in Japan, where so many of our own  families and long-time friends are thousands of miles away.

And as with so many of the wonderful, small schools I have been lucky enough to have taught with, going to work each day is like stepping into the warm embrace of home.

I wish everyone could be so lucky.


Until next time....