Nursery school, Life

But since such a solution is, for the moment, so far from the Spanish reality and since, in the present case, it is a question of planning a nursery school for 50 children of both sexes, from two to six years of age, what I have tried to do has been to conceive it within the aforementioned rules, trying to satisfy them as fully as possible and therefore avoiding what has been done and legislated up to now, which could be an obstacle, since the wording of the competition allows it.

Froebel, Montessori, Decroly, and with them the whole of modern pedagogy, condense the pedagogical programme for the child of these ages in these three concepts: nature, play and conditioned freedom. I understand, moreover, that if this means, contrary to what has been done up to now, that the child must be the one to do and the teacher the one to observe, guide and suggest, according to the psycho-physical temperament of each pupil and according to the conditions of locality, race, etc., a fourth concept must be added to those three: absolute absence of methods for these games, for these observations, for these suggestions, except in those cases which have the character of a scientifically experimental study in the form of a laboratory task. To satisfy these four postulates I conceive the school:

First: surrounded by "nature", i.e. in a space free from the suffocation of immediate buildings, amidst woodland, orchards and gardens.

Second: with no other element of work than the child's own functional activity (essentially muscular at this age and a little intellectual), manifested in all his actions and in the handling of his "toys" (educational stimulants), observed and channelled at all times by an educator (educator in this case).

In this school, therefore, there are no fixed working hours or recreation times, but an orderly life; nor is there, therefore, a number of classrooms to contain all 50 children at any one time, but a house and a field for all; nor a material store, but a toy room. The children "are" and show themselves in the open air most of the time; when not, in a large hall-gallery, and only to highlight a group that wants to be engaged in an activity that needs more attention, one or two classes can be arranged.

For example, children learn to wash themselves, to comb their hair, to change their clothes and shoes, to brush their hair, to use their toiletries and food, to help in the arrangement of "everybody's house", to take care of flowers, animals and toys, and this is done by giving each one their responsibility and making them aware of it.

Thus, this school should aim at nothing more and nothing less than "educating", and this without a single auxiliary element standing between the educator and the children. In the school there are no other staff, apart from the serving staff, than teachers, as many as necessary, but nothing but teachers.