You know the sensationalized old adage, “When I was your age, I had to walk to school uphill both ways, barefoot in the snow?” Well, maybe there’s more to it than reminding kids how easy they have it.
Parents and co-founders of the Tideview Nature School in Halifax, Jessie Zhao and Mikel L’Italien, have found a way to incorporate walking in snow—not barefoot—into their weekly learning sessions for students. It was their first-ever Friday morning class in Cole Harbour Heritage Park in January 2024, and “it decided that it was going to be a very heavy snow day,” says Zhao.
Walking through the park that day, it soon became clear the path they were taking was up over the knees of both the adults.
“That was an interesting first start,” Zhao says. So they took the students, including their son, back to the beginning of the snowy trail and together figured out how they would move along the path without getting stuck or sinking. “We worked on using a toboggan to move our bags, pulling each other along and using our shovels to dig out an open space that the kids could explore.” That introduction to what the school would become is where ‘land-based’ or ‘space-based’ learning comes in, says Zhao.
“We didn't necessarily plan that our lesson would involve trekking through snow or shovelling snow to make a shelter or space, but that is what the land decided to give us, so that's what we worked on.”
Zhao and L’Italien run Tideview out of two parks exclusively: the Cole Harbour Heritage Park, closer to where they live and Point Pleasant Park in the south end of Halifax. So far, it’s just Zhao and L’Italian running the show; they each have over 10 years of experience in early childhood education. However, they’re in touch with other ECEs who are interested in joining in as they aim to expand their program beyond its current Friday morning weekly sessions. They hope that, by adding more staff, they can expand their current program to full-day, week-long sessions available to more families in more parks across the province.
Right now, their Friday morning sessions run from 9am to 11:30am, and alternate between the Heritage Park and Point Pleasant—depending on demand. In any given session, they teach from three to eight students, says Zhao. Their school is open to children aged two-and-a-half to eight, and costs $49 per session. However, Zhao says they recently rolled out a $35-per-session promotion in July, and are looking to offer more help to families who can’t afford the full price. They’re soon rolling out an afterschool program that Zhao says will range from $27 to $49 daily.
“We have students who are in pre-Primary, we have students who are homeschooled, and we also have younger kids who are daycare age.” Their youngest student is their son, who just turned three.
Zhao and L’Italian founded Tideview shortly after moving to Cole Harbour from Vancouver in the summer of 2023. Their son, Milou, was almost two years old. Zhao said it’s the age where “he needs more socialization and we want him to be exposed to other environments and caregivers.”
They were looking for daycare options—”and you know the daycare shortage here is crazy”—as well as day programs and “forest school” options. “He’s such a high-energy kid, and he has a lot of big emotions,” says Zhao, “but when he’s in nature and free to roam outside, he's so much calmer; you can see him being able to challenge himself; he interacts with people better; and he's able to regulate his emotions better.”
When Zhao started searching for forest schools for her son in the HRM, the only one she could find was the Wild Child Forest School, “and they didn't offer any programs for kids that young.” This surprised her, she says, because forest schools originally began as early childhood programs.
Zhao is a trained ECE with over 10 years of experience and a research background in developmental and educational psychology, “with a focus on toddlerhood.”
When they couldn’t find child care for their son in 2023, Zhao says she and L’Italien thought, “We have the knowledge, we have the experience—if we can't find anything, let's just do it ourselves and learn as we go.”
Land-based learning is part of Indigenous learning and knowledge sharing. Over the years, various programs for children and youth have been offered across Mi’ma’ki Nova Scotia through partnerships with the Mi'kmaw Kina'matnewey, the Ulnooweg Education Centre, the SuperNOVA STEM program at Dalhousie, Mi’kmaw early childhood educators and the Nova Scotia Community College.
Zhao says their school is inspired by Indigenous land-based learning models as they learn more about them–as non-Indigenous people—and that they’re also inspired by Scandinavian forest schools that have outdoor classrooms all year round and also get long snow-filled winters like Canada.
Tideview uses what Zhao calls “place-based and land-based curriculum,” meaning it “depends on what the season provides us and what the land provides us at the time of our session.”
Before each Friday morning session, they walk the land to prepare for anything that’s upcoming, which could mean rain, snow, and all the sights and sounds of nature, depending on the season. When each session begins, says Zhao, ”we have an idea of where we're going to head to at the start and then we let the children guide us by what they're interested in.” They ask what they notice around them and build on top of that.
Then, they typically find a place to stop, rest, and introduce wilderness learning through stories and practice.
Zhao says they’re seeing a lot of demand for their forest school from families on the Halifax peninsula and from the Spryfield and Fairview areas. They’ve recently partnered with the Atlantic Canada group ADDvocacy, which supports neurodivergent people with learning. Zhao says they’re hoping this collaboration will allow their school to reduce the fees for families whose children have a wide range of needs and create an inclusive learning environment for all children.
“This forest school is great for kids of all ages,” says Zhao. “It's so beneficial for their social emotional development, for their learning and for understanding their own bodies, and their own selves—and we hope that more parents can benefit from it.”
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