Introduction from the school: Our school, The Montessori School Kingsley, is nestled on the hill in leafy Kingsley, surrounded by native bushland and overlooking Lake Goollelal. As a result, our students …

Introduction from the school:

Our school, The Montessori School Kingsley, is nestled on the hill in leafy Kingsley, surrounded by native bushland and overlooking Lake Goollelal. As a result, our students enjoy a natural environment, with its own ecosystem, right outside their classrooms.

Our students use the wider nature grounds of the School for their studies, projects, and research, as well as pursuing personal interests such as practising music in the bush classroom, working in the garden, or reading under a tree.

The children can choose to use a manual water pump when doing jobs outside, such as cleaning, gardening, or ‘cooking.’ The students also use the pump and its creek during playtime, and it is a crowd favourite! Students construct dams, bridges and conduit systems in and around the creek in the front playground. Using sand, rocks, wood, and various tools they have explored various designs of dams – ranging from damming the source, to a sequence of small dams down the length of the creek.

In addition, our students enjoy our nature-inspired playground during their playtime. Our school features plenty of trees and logs, providing space for children to freely climb, jump, and explore. Within this natural environment, scattered branches spark imagination, often inspiring students to build creative structures like huts or houses. We also have a few gardens beds and some of our students even grow vegetables, which is an excellent way for them to connect with nature.

For outdoor tasks such as cleaning, gardening, or ‘cooking’, children can use a manual water pump and play in our simulated creek. The students enjoy constructing dams, bridges, and conduit systems using natural materials like sand, rocks, and wood. These activities encourage creativity and problem-solving skills, from blocking the creek’s source to creating smaller dams downstream.

If you would like more information about our school, please visit our website here.