We want to keep our children WILD through early childhood environmental education. Muddy Boots Nature Preschool will take our children outdoors and connect them with nature through exploring, learning, and growing in the wild!
WHO WE ARE
My name is Amanda Ripa and I am an environmental scientist and educator. I have combined my love for nature with education, to engage our children with the environment and nurture their love for all things wild. Having taught middle school for six years, I strive to provide authentic learning experiences outdoors for my students. I have built our school garden program from the ground up and continually design place-based environmentally focused curriculum for my students. My aim is to harness this same drive and determination as director of Muddy Boots Nature Preschool
OUR PROJECT
A nature preschool, as described by the Natural Start Alliance, has nature at the heart of the program and is based on high quality early childhood and environmental education practices and helps lay a foundation for environmental literacy.
The philosophy of Muddy Boots Nature Preschool will be deeply rooted in Montessori practices, centered around the whole child and the use of natural learning materials. We will be state licensed as an in-home Family Child Care, but will run as a preschool. The students will be aged 3-5 and grow up in a low income, rural setting. Despite living in the beautiful western Maine mountain region, most children do not get to experience and learn from nature while developing and growing. Our preschool will serve a child care need in the area while also providing high quality care, connecting children to the local environment to learn and grow in nature. To start, we would serve 6-12 preschool children. We hope to grow over time to employ additional teaching assistants so that we can provide services to more children. We also plan to offer professional development for teachers to grow other nature based preschool programs.
The location for Muddy Boots Nature Preschool is a wonderfully private, safe, and wooded residence. Funds raised will be used to purchase the supplies to build a yurt for a central outdoor classroom space. The yurt will be integral to daily routines with our children. We will have stump chairs, cable spools for tables, log balance beams, mud kitchens, tree cookies, vegetable gardens and more! We can’t wait to see how creative our children are with the natural materials and the natural environment.
Muddy Boots Nature Preschool will be an extension of the environmental approach to education I have developed as a science teacher. When I envision what a day in the life of a child at Muddy Boots Preschool will be, it starts with a morning circle outside under the forest canopy, sitting on log benches or cross-legged on the mossy ground. We check in with the children, share thoughts and intentions for the day, and follow with a healthy breakfast prepared with the children. The morning block of time will be filled with open-ended play and exploration outdoors, in the yurt classroom, and with access to manipulatives, natural materials, and stations prepared for the children to extend their learning. The children will have the equipment they need to be fully immersed in nature: hats, gloves, coverall suits, boots, and reflective safety gear to wear as they explore. After a busy morning outside, we will have lunch and rest time. Rest may take place indoors on cots and mats, in the yurt, or in hammocks under the forest canopy where the wind may gently blow the children to sleep. The afternoon could be pre-planned with activities for the children to engage with in small groups, free play, or a whole group nature hike for a scavenger hunt, to visit the farm animals next door, to plant in our gardens, or to read independently under the shade of a tree.
Parents will have an open invitation, take part in local field trips, fundraisers, and events to build our network and encouraged to spend time in nature alongside their child. In addition, we will pride ourselves on being “green” and using sustainable practices such as integrating farm to table in our meal plan, reducing our overall footprint through energy and water efficiency, recycling, gardening, composting and being an Eco-Healthy Child Care (a program through the Children’s Environmental Health Network.)
WHY IT MATTERS
Because the youth of today is spending less time outside than the generations before them, they statistically have increased health problems as they grow, and are surrounded by technology in their everyday lives. Richard Louv, the author of Last Child in the Woods, has coined this epidemic as “nature deficit disorder.” Being an educator, I also see the effects of this first hand. Adolescents are spending more than 8 hours in front of a screen or “plugged in” in some way every day. They can recognize restaurant, games, and sports teams logos but most can’t identify the common name of a dandelion flower or a maple tree. Therefore, this reality requires that parents, teachers, schools, and communities provide purposeful, unstructured play and experiences in nature so that our children grow to appreciate, care for, and connect to the natural world. Connecting children with nature demands that kids play freely and frequently in wild nature close to home...day after day, week after week. Muddy Boots Nature Preschool will make these experiences in nature a reality for our children in Maine!
HOW YOU CAN HELP
Your donation will be used to purchase the necessary supplies to open Muddy Boots Nature Preschool! This includes supplies to build a yurt for our outdoor classroom space, tarps, outdoor clothing for the children to wear, hammocks, a Montessori class set of materials, classroom furniture and food prep supplies. Your donation will help fund my grassroots project to protect the environment through youth education and keeping our children WILD!