Los Niños Primero brought experts to Sandy Springs regarding a Finnish style of learning that emphasizes play-based learning.
Representatives of Lumo Education joined a Global Learning, Local Impact Panel held at Mount Vernon School this month to discuss their partnership in play-based, child-centered learning.
Salla Halko and Sanna De Araújo, co-founders of Lumo Education, shared details of their nonprofit organization’s work with Los Niños Primero, its first U.S. collaboration.
Sanna De Araújo described the three core values of play-based learning as the intrinsic value of childhood, research-based and age-appropriate education, and trust. Decades of research back this method, which emphasizes engagement, collaboration and social nearing.
“In Finland, a child’s happiness and well-being are considered equally important as the academic goals. So even though the academic achievement is important, the childhood is not sacrificed for it,” De Araújo said.
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The education model calls for mutual trust amongst the teachers, the families, and the students. Everyone takes responsibility and is valued as an expert. The students are considered active actors who must have a strong voice.
“We think that it’s more important to trust that people take responsibility than holding them accountable, because in an environment of trust, innovation can grow,” Halko said.
This play-based learning model has shown increased attendance, improved behavior and higher academic scores.
“Lumo will help us develop programming that honors the whole child, intellectual, emotional and cultural, while respecting the teacher as an essential component of the learning process that is very important for us,” Los Niños Primero Executive Director Maritza Morelli said.
In play-based learning, teachers plan but focus on the students. That gives them freedom to experiment, whether through the learning resources, teaching methods, or strategies they choose.
Sometimes experiments fail, but they are not considered a failure. The teacher will reflect on what went wrong and determine what could be changed. Students evaluate what happened, also, keeping it at a low level of hierarchy.
A crucial part of this education model is recognizing that playing and learning are the same for a child as that’s how they explore and try to make sense of the world.
Tameki McDowell, an educator for Los Niños Primero, has begun adopting play-based learning principles in her teaching.
“The biggest difference that I can say in the classroom is that the definition of the classroom is no longer just confined to the four walls. Our classroom is anywhere that learning can take place,” McDowell said.
McDowell’s learning site is located at Hapeville Elementary School, which has a garden on campus. The students got permission to maintain the garden and have taken notes this summer on what kinds of plants are growing in it, making sketches and getting inspiration for their own gardens. They’ve weeded the garden and harvested vegetables and herbs.
They got more from that one set of ideas and activities than is possible if they sat in the classroom, looking at videos, having discussions, and reading books, she said.
“We really are trying to give our students control and ownership over what they’re learning. And I have found that when the teachers start letting go more and more, they start enjoying teaching and learning more and more,” McDowell said. “And once that teacher is enjoying it, the kids are enjoying it, they’re loving it.”