It was a magnificent, sunny day and the children were playing outside.

Two one-storey buildings circled a garden space with several zones. One was prepared for children between 10 months and 3 years old and the other one, for the children between 3 and 6 years old.

The garden, rich in resources and material, presented large trees, hills, ramps with various slides and stairs, structures to climb, to be swung, to tumble, tables and wooden banks, tricycles, sandbed, shovels…

The zone of the younger children, open to the rest of the garden, invited to explore other spaces and to contact with other children and adults.

A quiet and pleasant environment was sensed.

A group of the older children developed an activity on the picnic tables and others were sliding down the slides, or they swung… The adults observed them play, or they spoke with some child.

A teacher who spoke Spanish showed us the buildings’ inside.

For me, it was impossible to follow her all the time since we often stopped to take some photos or to observe some corner or situation.

For instance, a teacher entered from the garden with a small girl. She sat down in a low chair and, talking, she removed the girl’s nappy and waited while the girl sat down on the chamberpot and peed. They both observed and touched the nappy before the teacher put it back again on the girl again. The tone of their conversation seemed very natural and friendly.

There was no hurry, and that is something to envy.

The materials used to play and to learn created a full and stable atmosphere of proposals. They were  sofas in several rooms, while the zones shared by children and adults were filled with computers and xeroxing machines, but were still integrated within this homely furniture, clean and full of plants.

Natural corners, tables with mathematical plays, proposals or stories, symbolic zones of play such as a living room were mixed together… Including a small room with a marriage bed, another smaller bed with handrails and a washroom beside those. All was done at children-s height, so that he/she felt invited to play.

We listened to a small boy who played the piano and sung together with other teachers’ and a group of children who sat down in chairs. The children wore slippers or were barefoot, as they wanted.

During the second song the teachers greeted the children naming them and, one by one, they left to eat. At the same time another group expected their food sitting down before some tables with a small tablecloth in their middle and, on top of it, a plant, while a teacher read them a story.

Upon saying good-bye we found two tables with a teacher and five children each one, eating all together in outside

Although this was one of the last centers we visited, we kept finding surprises and commenting the details, which showed us a comfortable, warm life inside the schools, full of interactions and relations, varied and positive, as well as the respect towards the needs and rhythms of the children.