ABOUT THE PEDAGOGIC

ARBETETS PEDAGOGIK

"Arbetets Pedagogik" is the name of a pedagogical movement based upon the ideas of the French teacher Célestin Freinet.

Freinet, who was born in 1896, has experienced 40 years as a teacher in a very dramatic era that included two world wars. His major contributions to teaching are his views of children, society and work. "The work of the brain has the same value as the work with the hands".

The teacher of today, who leans on the ideas and practice of Freinet, put high value in school to democracy, freedom of expression, communication, and work that is meaningful for the student. The child is of the same nature as the grown up and the teachers and the children participate with equal rights.

ABOUT THE SCHOOL

-Opened fall 1997

-180 students age 6-13

-21 teachers

-10 other staff

We want to create a school where the students are given the opportunity to have an all-round development, not only in gaining knowledge and logical thinking, but also when it comes to fantasy, games and creative force.

We want to see the possibilities of the individual child, by strengthening their self-reliance.

All children are curious by nature and want to learn new things all the time. The greatest task of the modern school we believe is to keep this curiosity burning. 

It is important that we create an environment where the children are comfortable. We work in small groups where the children know their teachers and friends, and where bullying and other problems can be discovered and suppressed at an early state.                  

The school has a unique and important task when it comes to raising the children to become adults who take their democratic responsibility. The goal is to make the children ready to shape their own future.

The pedagogic we use, Freinet's, can be summarized in the following points:

-       Cooperation, solidarity

-       Planning and routines

-       Student democracy

-       Influence and responsibility

-       Production

-       The work of the hand and the work of the brain valued equally

-       The fumbling effort – to do and try

The connection to reality

is one of the key elements of our school. We strive to make all subjects come together to form a whole, where theory and practice are sandwiched by connecting the schoolwork to reality instead of reading about it in books.

We think that the school has to be open towards the society; therefore we invite people to the school with different works and backgrounds. By doing this we show the children that life is full of possibilities and that there are many exciting things to do.

Freinet said that it was important that the work that was done in school was real work. Therefore the work is aimed towards production. 

 Our school magazine, Tallbackens Magazin, is a part of our production. Every term the students of Tallbacken produce a magazine. The editorial staffs consist of students only and the newspaper is a company on its own, with its own board, financial department, advertising department and everything else you find on a normal newspaper. Over the year, different students have different positions in this company. By doing this, we are hoping to establish a natural understanding on what a company is, how it is run and how it is taken care of. We think that is extremely important in today’s society.

In Tallbacken, we build our work based on our own responsibility and start with the children’s imagination, creativity and sensitivity.

We have a special time that we call workshop time. We have four different workshops:

Music/Drama

Creative Workshop

Read/Write

Nature/Technique

In the workshops there is space to experiment, try, get it wrong and try again. We feel that it is important that the children feel that it is ok to make a mistake, that you do not fail but learn when you make mistakes. During workshop time we work with a special theme. Two themes are selected each term and it can be anything from “This Century”, to “Vikings” or “Rock´n roll”. The workshop groups are age mixed and you work with one workshop each theme, which means that you have a lot of time to really work them through.

The Creative Workshop

In this workshop we work with handicraft and art. We want the children to come up with their own ideas of what they want to do, think about what material they should use and maybe discuss the work with friends and teachers. Hopefully their work differs from time to time, but sometimes they need more guidance from us teachers so that they get the comprehensive education they are entitled to.  We want them to be able to sew a button on, mend a pair of broken trousers, sew on the machine and by hand, embroider, knit, and crochet, among other things.

In art they try drawing and painting with different techniques, for example watercolours, pastel crayon, or charcoal crayons. They can also try clay, papier machié, mini bricks and plaster. But the most important thing is to use the imagination! We appreciate own inventions – old shoeboxes, wrapping paper, sticks, stones, shells - anything can be used!  In home economics the children should be able to read and perform a simple recipe.

The Read and Write Workshop

In this workshop we work with the Swedish language. We read, write and use pencil, paper and computer as our tools. The students are given the opportunity to research a topic they think is interesting within the theme we are working with, using an encyclopaedia, a book or sometimes the Internet. This is also where we teach different computer programs, such as hyper studio and story book, write fairy tales, record radio programs, write scripts, film and edit movies and so on. The only limit is the children’s fantasy. 

The Music/Drama Workshop

In this workshop we work a lot with the body as the instrument. The students work with different drama exercises, such as debates, speeches or acting in front of each other. The goal is to make the children confident in public speaking. We listen to a lot of music in this workshop. It is important to give the students a varied choice when it comes to music, to increase the general knowledge and give them an opportunity to find other genres to listen to. They also learn the basics in reading notes.

The Music and Drama Workshop is mainly responsible for finishing off the theme, which is often done with a theatre or musical. This workshop can give the other workshops tasks to perform, such as building a side-scene or writing a script.

The Nature/Technique Workshop

This is our woodwork and here the children learn how to make an understandable blue print starting with nothing but their own idea. When they make this, they should be able to use a ruler, a slide-calliper and a setsquare. They should also be able to assess the costs. Everybody also learns the ABC in First Aid.

The workshop time is holy to the children and we cannot miss one minute of it, without having a lot of protests.