We do a wide range of activities that are all much more hands-on and creatively based than what you find in traditional classroom based schools, that has become for many students the laborious and dry school they attend. One where they only want to return home as they spend nearly all their time staring at a blackboard or overhead screen copying notes or listening to the teacher. Bronte Creek Project is in its own class all together, what fills the 5 1/2 hours each day changes completely each day. You walk off the bus that's provided for all students up the stairs in the main entrance of the lodge style building and read your group's whiteboard. It may say "Meet in the Dining Hall for a work period", "Meet by the flagpole for a hike", "Meet at the bottom of the big hill for a special surprise" or anything else under the sun literally you go on a large group hike into the woods exploring the acres of forest around you and then sit down in a circle in a valley, inside a shelter or a hill and compare your weekend to a metaphor. This week's for example how was your weekend like a cereal? We do healthy active living activities that relate to the program either through cooperation and teamwork such as indoor and outdoor versions of the beloved classic Capture the Flag or Bronte's very own creations.

One favourite of many is called "Pirate's Gold". "Pirate's Gold has two hula hoops each with a crate inside them on either side of a outdoor area or our Great Hall in the lodge. Filling the crate are chunks of precious blue gold or chunks of foam that each team must bring to the opposing side. You must not get caught traveling to or from or you are sent to jail. It's a face paced game that promotes lots of strategy forming, teamwork and cooperation. A multitude of highly creative activities are done daily. When we were learning about how soil is formed and created we had to go outside with our teacher assistant and collect a pile of decomposing material including leaves, twigs soil and silt. We put these into our ZipLoc bags, sealing them tightly. As the TA led us through a sudden series of extreme and common weather patterns we smashed the contents. She would say "There is a light rain so the soil is getting a light workout as we would crash hammers and mallets into our bags. "Oh my god there is a huge hurricane crashing through the area" and we would pound the living daylights out in the end creating a form of soil.

Perhaps going to a grouping of trees and standing inside our "home" either a hula hoop or marked area and searching for food. Food consisted of various coloured cards representing food, water, shelter and more. We had to run back and forth from our home gathering as many resources as possible. The catch was that 3 of the bears that we became each had their own disabilities. One was blinded, having a blindfold over her eyes. Another bear had a broken leg and scarred head with a partial eye cover and hopping as his only form of transportation. Another was mother bear with a huge stomach created by stuffing a towel up their shirt. She had to gather much more food than everyone else to feed her starving young. We then collected the cards and head inside to the laid back classroom called 'The Fishbowl" and sat inside a taped box. This box we remained in as we totaled the points on of many portable white boards that rotate throughout the lodge and classrooms. The number of food, water, meat and resources dictated whether you remained off dead or alive.

We were asked how we felt about sitting in the cramped taped area of the floor and if we would like to remain living there. This furthered our knowledge as we studied biocapacities and the ecocapacities of the environment and that everything has a limit in a certain area. That all living things in areas across the globe fluctuate naturally and forcefully depending on the circumstances. All without staring at a single overhead sheet. There are also 3 types of teaching programs for younger kids who come up to the site and spend the day, night or three days learning all about environmental studies. These activities that include a wide assortment of subjects all related to how the environment works, how it's being harmed and how it must be protected. The grade 4 program is a much easier more prop based set of activities that's called "Novice Earthkeepers" that takes place over the course of a day. In this secret messages are learned gradually teaching them more and more grade 5 program takes place over two days including a overnight called "Earthkeepers". In this type keys are earned standing for the acronyms:
K nowledge

E xperience

Y ou

S haring

Other programming including campfire, structured free time and a variety of indoor and outdoor games are also hosted. Students have the opportunity to cook and man meals for up to 150 people in the kitchen. During "regular" days cooking and cleaning groups rotate cooking a variety of vegetarian cuisine that can include pesto pasta, chili, stir fries, burritos or any one of a host of hot meals served up daily. This is often accompanied by fresh chocolate chip cookies, chocolate cake or apple crisp among other deserts. Students really bond and create a real sense of teamwork as they hone their cooking skills, problem solve and direct the flow of creating masses of food each day in the commercial kitchen. For one day each semester each student has the opportunity to participate in the "Menu assignment". This involves researching your very own meal of choice, researching its impact, production and ingredients. In addition to going to grocery stores to price each item. On the chosen day you lead the group to help you form your culinary masterpieces kitchen is a good place to express yourself creatively as comments are always welcome and to really get to know your group and improve your skills in many regards. In addition to all of this, there is a more hands-on geography class that takes place by doing a similar creative activity to those previously mentioned and then heading inside.

Notes and speaking are done on subjects spanning the world forming our base of knowledge to earn our Environmental Studies credit, one of four. All the games, activities and how you participate and contribute to the community and work with the kids on those days falls under the Interdisciplinary Skills credit. All the outdoor games, hiking and exercise related activities fall under the Healthy Active Living or gym credit. Your communication and writing skills shown through the journals you keep of your experiences and reflection at Bronte. Different guest speakers come into to speak about various issues including mental health, sexuality, readying yourself for life after highschool and more. All students partake in the learning the safety and skill of rockclimbing in a nearby rock wall gym. Last but not least depending on whether you are in the Fall or Spring semester you will go on a 5 day camping experience. Either a winter trip to Temagami, Ontario on a winter trip where you snowshoe around and use different methods of outdoor survival and skill to go on winter hikes doing various activities. Staying at a combination of a outdoor wilderness lodge, wood heated cabins and quincies, a relative of the igloo. Alternatively in the Spring you go on a 5 day canoe trip to the world famed Algonquin Provincial Park in Ontario where you paddle the lakes and rivers and do very much the same thing as the winter trip.

Bronte Creek Project in a nutshell, it's a highly enjoyable experience that makes you look and appreciate life in a fresh new way. You learn so much about how you want to live as a person and interact with society. You truly enjoy the experience of learning which is too often tainted and masked in boring schools and the common deadendness that happens to students caught in the monotonous traditional school. You form friendship and a family or loving and caring people who all want to be there as they were selected. You interact and truly get to know these people well and become a close knit community. Such a wide spanning jumble of activities are experienced from trust falls to rock wall climbing to teaching to the stimulating activities and everything in between.

School becomes an enriching experience that inspires you in a endless multitude of ways. You are challenged and rewarded in so many ways whether teaching you activity or group leading successfulness a group of younger kids with professionalism and panache, cooking a meal for 40-100 people, participating in the innovative activities or anything else at this excellent, engaging and enchanting experience that you will remember and be rewarded by for a lifetime. The friends and people you meet, the skills you learn, the creativity and sense of wonder and excitement will leave a imprint of inspiration on any person who walks through the gate of Bronte. The gate to alternative education that must spawn across the world giving the opportunity to the countless students who don't see eye to eye with the fact that learning and school can be well done. It just simply isn't as all are stuffed into a system locking them in. Bronte is not just about the environment, it's about a multifaceted 5 months that will truly change you, your life and view on the world forever and ever.

-This post marks the introduction of a weekly series that will be called "The Days at the Creek" all about what it is I do at The Bronte Creek Project as well as sections of my journal and photography that will spotlight this new way of learning -

Teague Neal blogged on 4:05 PM 0 comments

4:05 PM

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