<![CDATA[MR NOAH'S - Articles]]>Sun, 10 Mar 2024 06:31:44 +0000Weebly<![CDATA[A 'Nursery School'?]]>Fri, 20 Mar 2015 23:54:41 GMThttp://mrnoahs.org/articles/a-nursery-schoolPicture
Why we are called a ‘nursery school’

Most early years establishments local to us refer to themselves as either a nursery or a preschool.  Why have we used the designation nursery school which term is normally applied to the state maintained providers led by qualified teachers?

We must start with a very important negative point.  The term preschool is quite unacceptable because it implies that what do is before the all-important work of the school.  This plays into the hands of the school-readiness agenda of the present government, and also encourages the disparaging and belittling attitude of very many who see the activity of young children as mere play.

Early childhood education is not ‘pre’ school; it is school.  It does not just come before something, but is something - it is what matters today for young children.  It is school appropriate to them.  There is secondary school, primary school and nursery school.  Mr Noah’s is school for children up to five years.  In deed we would argue that it is actually school appropriate for children as old as six.

To speak of ourselves as a school makes it quite clear that our task is not merely to provide care while parents work or do other things.  We are committed to supporting the learning and development of little people.  We do that by the provision an appropriate environment and by carefully nuanced interactions.  Much attention is given to the next steps for a child and what will facilitate progress.  Careful records are kept identifying learning dispositions as well as tracking achievements.  This is not mere supervision of children in care but the support of children in education - age-appropriate education.

Friedrich Froebel, the pioneer of early education, called his schools kindergartens.  The name was very deliberate and suggestive, meaning children’s garden.  Those schools for little people were the places where children were nurtured and tended like seedlings.  That designation was once popular; perhaps less so now in Britain.  The nursery school also has a history, and our heritage is to be traced to the work of the McMillan sisters, Margaret and Rachel.  Froebel trained, the McMillans gave opportunity to children to be outside in the fresh air, enjoying the woodland and the garden.  They also paid great attention to the total wellbeing of the child, caring for the physical and spiritual health as well as other aspects of raising the young.

 

]]><![CDATA[What is Christian about Noah's?]]>Tue, 05 Aug 2014 09:23:51 GMThttp://mrnoahs.org/articles/what-is-christian-about-noahsPicture
Every morning children arrive at the entrance which is decorated with a large wooden cross. Understandably, people ask, “How much religion is there?”  “Can parents opt out of the Christian elements?” Perhaps the answer will be apparent if we address the question “What is Christian about Mr Noah’s Nursery School?”
In 1994 the idea of a Christian nursery was conceived.  For two years the church in the Kent hamlet of Iden Green had been running a parent and toddler group. The children attending with their parents were getting to the age when they would be old enough for pre-school.  Parents were asking each other: “What next?” The church agreed that, if a suitable employee could be found, its very limited premises could be used daily for a nursery school. The vision was for a gospel ministry to young children and families. Over the quarter-century, it has been possible to develop a Christian pedagogy. Hundreds of children have heard the stories of Jesus, and the love of Christ has touched their homes.
We have not tried to ‘reinvent the wheel’. All Western culture is influenced in some measure by our Christian heritage. The great pioneers of early childhood education were Christians.  For example, Friedrich Froebel is very explicit in his writings, with references to the Holy Trinity and the life and teachings of Christ. At Mr Noah’s, we continue to sing a grace which was used in the McMillan sisters’ first nursery schools in England: 
       Thank you for the world so sweet,
         thank you for the food we eat,
       thank you for the birds that sing,
         thank you God for everything.
Christianity is nothing if it is not a way of life. Therefore, it is a lifestyle that essentially constitutes a Christian school.  There are whole school values by which all live in the nursery school.
Those values we explicitly identify in what we call ‘the three Ls’.  They are (1) Loving one another, (2) gentle Living, and (3) Learning together.  Of course, Christians do not have a monopoly on these things, but they are values that can be shown to arise from a Christian worldview.
The three ‘Ls'
Loving one another
Love rightly comes first. It is universally recognised as having priority in the Christian ethical system. Jesus taught: “By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.” (John 13:35) We genuinely care about the children; our priority is their well-being and their development. We serve them with tenderness and kindness. ‘Love’ is the right word.
We expect the children to become equally generous towards one another. They learn to feel for one another and to look after each other.
‘Loving one another’ means concern and compassion, and it means respect for others whoever they may be.  The love of Christ is not exclusive but inclusive.  At the cross, His arms were stretched out, welcoming any who will come. Therefore we say that the nursery school is open to families of any colour, culture or conviction.  This openness is not contrary to Christianity but arises directly from the Christian message.  One officer of the local authority who visited Mr Noah’s commented: “The love is tangible.”  That is as it should be.
Gentle Living
This is about caring for our world and being gentle with it. We are concerned about the global environment and, also, about our more immediate surroundings of the classroom and the garden. This interest in our world arises from the creation ordinance to have dominion over the earth: “... replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.” (Genesis 2:28)  Dominion does not mean ravaging the earth, but to ‘tend and keep’: Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. (Genesis 2:15, NKJV)
This emphasis has given rise to Mr Noah’s status as an ‘Eco-School’. All the time, we consider how we can look after the natural world, as we feed the birds, plant the flower beds and vegetable plots, and recycle whatever we can.
Gentleness has been an aim from the beginning of Mr Noah’s. We set out to create a peaceful and peaceable context in which children can to feel secure and flourish.
Learning together
Naturally, everyone expects children to learn at Mr Noah’s. We are deliberately called a ‘nursery school’, and a school is where you learn. But it is not just the children who learn: we are all learners. The very word ‘disciple’ means ‘learner’.
Mr Noah’s is a community of learning. Pedagogues learn as they attend training courses and as they study to develop their skills. They also learn from children day after day. Teaching is reciprocal: adults teach the children and children teach the adults. Friedrich Froebel expressed it like this: ”Let us learn from our children, let us give heed to the gentle admonition of their life, to the silent demands of their minds. Let us live with our children: then will the life of our children bring us peace and joy, then shall we begin to grow to be wise, to be wise.”

We also share the great stories of the Bible and the parables of Jesus.  These are recounted using simple artefacts after the style of Godly Play, a model devised by a Montessori educator, Rev. Jerome Berryman. The stories are recounted in the context of a liturgy that is understood by young children.  A candle is lit and these words are said: “We have lit the candle and now we are going to be very quiet and still and we are going to think and feel about the One who is the Light of the world.”   The storytelling is non-directive and children are encouraged to explore the stories for themselves (and, sometimes, the artefacts also).  Usually, rather than announcing the meaning or application of the story, there is an invitation to respond to it. For example, the pedagogue may ask: “What do you think of the story?  How do you feel about what happened?”
In all this, Mr Noah’s is unashamedly Christian.  The Christianity it represents is founded on the Bible and the teachings of Jesus; its essence is a way of life that cannot be divided so as to opt out of its parts. It is welcoming and inclusive.
​So will anyone, of whatever religious or non-religious persuasion, refuse the love that is at its heart?
]]>