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Connecting with Nature

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Class Trips

At BWS, grades classes make a number of school-day outings in Brooklyn and our surrounding New York City.  Corresponding to current lesson blocks, our local destinations include museums, geographical and historical landmarks, gardens and cultural centers.  Beginning in Grade 3, our students venture further afield, embarking on overnight trips.  This Waldorf tradition signals a transition point of burgeoning independence, and enables our students to embody a sense of greater maturity and responsibility with each passing year.  Grade 3 routinely travels to a working farm, which folds into their curricular theme of “living on the Earth”.  These trips reinforce a sense of natural rhythms and inspire an appreciation toward service, as students happily participate in the farm’s daily tasks.  Older grades typically revisit a farm or nature program to augment their broadening studies of the natural world, including botany in Grade 5 and geology in Grade 6.  These multi-day excursions provide precious opportunities for students to grow and stretch in harmony with one another, while exploring their inherent bonds to the natural world.

Rooftop Bees: Apiary & Garden

Our rooftop hosts over a dozen flourishing bee colonies and a bee population of over 200,000 and growing. Tended lovingly by our beloved beekeepers, the apiary is a primary source to our teaching of botany, ecosystems and the work of a thriving community. Our grade-schoolers visit the bees routinely and can be found sitting amongst the variety of buzzing herbs and flowers, with a sketchbook in hand.