The Nature Explore Classroom at
Gretchen’s House Traver – Preschool
Several years ago Gretchen Preston, the owner of Gretchen’s House Child Care Centers, attended the Nature Explore Leadership Institute in Nebraska. The conference inspired her to design all new outdoor classrooms to meet the Nature Explore standards and to restructure the current ones as well. Gretchen continues to encourage and support center administrators to provide the resources, staff
training and attendance at the Nature Explore Conference each year.
The exceptional features in our space include 2 raised bed gardens and flower patches designed and
cared for by the preschoolers. The children make the plant markers, use tools, hoses, watering cans,
clippers, and have daily jobs that they do to tend to these areas. We also put in 2 bike racks this year with 8 balance bikes for the preschoolers to ride around our entire playground on the new bike bath.
Each fall our administrators get several hay bales and cornstalks for the playground that the children jump on, move around, build with and take apart. Each winter, our families donate old Christmas trees to the space and the children can use them for building forts, taking apart, standing up in the playhouse, arranging in patterns.
We plan to have our first family “Mud Day” in the spring! We plan to have the water pumps and sprinklers on so that everyone can enjoy the huge sand area and simply offer time for families to play in this lovely natural setting.
Our centers have 2 full time trained professional maintenance people and we hire companies to remove extra leaves, snow, or take care of remodeling jobs that require large equipment. Many new families express their enthusiasm for our space and a common expression we hear is, ” Wow! I wish we had a playground like this when I was young.”
