Boots & Roots
T-W-R 9 am - 12 noon
Ages 4 - 6
"Delight-Driven"
Children aged four through six participating in Boots & Roots engage with local flora and fauna. Active exploration and interaction with the natural world is interwoven with literature, literacy, science, music, art, and Biblical content. God as Creator is highlighted throughout the adventures.
Boots and Roots offers your child social, artistic, academic, relational, spiritual and physical learning. A “delight-driven” emergent curriculum includes child‐initiated goals and activities.
"Our amazing Creator demonstrates, not surprisingly, an amazing creativity in the unique combination of talents, learning styles, physical traits and character qualities He has placed within each individual. Redemptive Educators value and appreciate those unique combinations…and seek to nurture the development of each child, by employing those intelligences natural to the child…."
--Amy Imbody, Founder and President of the Center for Redemptive Education, from her book, Wind from the Sea: Essays in Redemptive Education.
A sample week in Boots & Roots
From a teacher's weekly report:
"Oh, what a beautiful day! Thank you, Lord.
We sang and danced as the sun started to shine through the clouds this morning. We explored a nearby pine grove still hunting for open pinecones to make owls out of. Turns out one special tree made frilly straw acorn hats that we collected to use for creative things; some became boats and some salad bowls for fairies.
"Building boats to float the little creek that flowed into the open pond was a popular experiment, and as we played Miss Anna discovered a grasshopper hiding above the creek. He was a one-legged, one-antenna hopper who needed help to get back out of the water and have a meal. Jesse patiently got him out and Sam found him
grass to eat, which he indeed munched through.
"We finished our Pond Walk story and learned about damselfly wings and dragonfly wings, waterbugs that can see above and below the water and water skates that have such light bodies and legs they skate on top of the water!
"Our hiking rope was stellar once again, and we counted all the way to 120 as we tramped back up the cobblestone hill to homebase for a few rounds of the forest animal guessing game....
"Grateful for our time together this week!"
Parent guide & daily schedule
Download the parent guide.
Statement of Faith & Guiding Principles
Who says great art is just for grown-ups?
Article by Redemptive Education founder Amy Imbody
posted in Christian Deeper Learning:
This little “teacher” is showing her even-littler cousin Wind from the Sea, by Andrew Wyeth. She is saying, “See the curtain blowing? It isn’t really blowing but it looks like it’s blowing.” And the little guy says, “Mmm hmm. . .” They stand there together for long moment, a shared moment, completely immersed in that moment that Wyeth captured in his painting.
Great art speaks for itself. Redemptive Educators bring the art to the children, the children to the art, and let the art and the children interact, unmediated.
"Sometimes, love will call us to action. Sometimes, knowing will compel us to doing. But it is also true that action can lead to both knowing and loving. A biblical understanding of the goal of education comprises all three: knowing, loving, doing—each fueling the others, each leading to growth in the others, all choreographing a dance of delight in God, His creation and His people.
-- Amy Imbody, MEd, Founder and President of the Center for Redemptive Education, from her book, Wind from the Sea: Essays in Redemptive Education.
Frequently Asked Questions
Our Annandale, VA campus is the flagship program of the Center for Redemptive Education.
Click here to learn about additional Redemptive Education-affiliated programs and schools around the country.
