Five Things I’ve Learned from Swiss Primary School That Have Helped Me Be a Better adult
Playing is learning and nature is essential.
1. Do hard things even if they scare you and maybe especially if they scare you.
When I read a sociologist’s claim that children integrating into a foreign language school system are essentially living in a nightmare for the first several months, I found it hyperbolic. It wasn’t.
While the Swiss school system provides an incredible amount of assistance for integration and our international village seems to have a native English speaker in every class, the beginning was still so very hard.
When she realized she was speaking a different language than her classmates, my four-year-old stopped talking at school altogether. My eight-year-old experienced massive mood swings and even at times regressed to throwing tantrums like a toddler.
As much as I wanted to pull the plug and give up, I’d been warned about all this. We focused on the good and I promised myself to be patient. I discovered how resilient and strong children can be.
Within a few months, the tantrums and mood swings of my older daughter eventually eased as her language ability improved. She soon made friends and found things to love about her new school. While it took nearly a year for my younger daughter to start speaking at school when she did it was in fluent Swiss German. Years later both now carry confidence that they can overcome scary and difficult things.
Fear is good. Like self-doubt, fear is an indicator. Fear tells us what we have to do. — Steven Pressfield
Because of their example, I signed up for a marathon (and hated it). I started German classes and began initiating every conversation in German — despite knowing it would result in me performing embarrassing charades just to be understood.
I realized I was too often living in my comfort zone, choosing to take the easy path that is flat, familiar, and well-trod. Real growth requires stretching and friction. It often involves failing but it is in those experiences that we really learn and adapt. Also, I am now a very good charades player.
2. Independence builds resilience, so walk there yourself.
You don’t have to spend long in any Swiss town, or city, to notice the young kids zooming around on scooters, wearing orange safety vests and backpacks but with no adult supervision in sight. It seems like a manifestation from a hundred years ago. Here children aren’t just encouraged to walk to school on their own, it is required.
I will admit it is terrifying sending your kindergartener out to walk to school and cross streets alone (even with a safety vest and a lesson from the local police officer). But Switzerland is committed to this. Every morning the children flood the sidewalks on foot, scooter, and bike to make their way to school — all without the added traffic of parents or carpools circling drop-off zones.
And they aren’t just doing it once. Swiss kids come home for lunch and go back again. All on foot, all unsupervised. It is as archaic and wonderful as your imagining.
The local police train the kindergarten children how to cross the street and return again to teach the 10-year-olds how to safely ride their bikes in traffic. Allowing children the independence to walk or cycle to school, to their friends' home, or to piano lessons is not just for exercise or to reduce traffic. Walking alone as a child is an essential way to form connections in your brain and is proven to help increase one’s ability to way-find throughout life.
Children who are driven everywhere never get the opportunity to make their own decisions or draw their own maps. They cease being explorers. — Michael Bond
But it is not so children can live without a GPS. Careful, concentrated independence allows children to make their own decisions. When my daughter rode her bike to soccer practice alone for the first time (after riding with me several times), she took a wrong turn and got lost in the maze of tiny back roads. She had to backtrack and try again. She admitted to being confused and a bit scared but she found her way and with it, she gained assurance and resilience.
Starting off with an address or destination and then relying on our own ability and choices to navigate our way is becoming a lost art. I admit to rarely walking or driving new cities (and some familiar ones) without GoogleMaps open, tracking my every turn. But when I turn it off and navigate based on my own abilities, I gain resilience through decision making. This resilience can pour over into self-assurance in other areas of my life. But I need to remember to leave extra early, since no one is ever late in Switzerland, well except me.
3. Get outside: there is no such thing as bad weather, only the wrong clothing.
During our first winter, my daughter brought home a school paper reminding parents that children need to spend time outside every day, even in winter. Initially, this seemed to me like another item to add to an overwhelmingly long checklist. Also, we only owned the wrong clothes. We had come from the tropics and barely owned socks — let alone rain and snow clothes.
The idea that solace can be found in nature and we are the stewards to the forest is intrinsic to Swiss culture and taught early and often.
Intrigued by the idea (and admittedly desperate for childcare), I signed my three-year-old son up for Waldspielgruppe (or forest pre-school). Once a week, you drop your 3–5 year old off in the forest to a group leader packed with sausage, water bottle, and, in winter, extra snow pants and gloves in their Deuter hiking backpack. You can pick them up three hours later. They are always dirty, a bit tired and sometimes very cold.
Once a month the kindergarten children (ages 4–7) have Waldmorgen (or forest morning). With (again) a sausage, a Swiss Army knife, and weather-appropriate clothes, they spend the morning hiking, exploring, and learning in nature.
Nature breeds curiosity; it helps us to grow explorers rather than robots. It reminds us that we are part of something bigger. It grounds us, calms us. — Ben Palmer-Fry
I have seen the dramatic changes in the mood of my children when they spend time outside — but more I have seen the change in myself. When I finally bought all the right clothing and got out in nature, I found solace and peace no matter the weather. And the nice thing about being outside on a terrible weather day — is that it is always good to come in.
4. Playing is learning, even for adults.
According to Swiss curriculum, reading is not taught until the 1st grade (ages 6–7). To an American parent (and one who spent time in the hyper-competitive school systems of South-East Asia) this seems late, several years too late. But when I voiced my opinion to the kindergarten teachers, I was regaled with the reminder that real, important learning is happening long before the dedicated book learning begins.
Instead of desks, Swiss kindergarten classes often have a circle of chairs surrounded by several rotating stations of play. This allows the children to choose with what to engage — legos, art, live baby chicks. The stations are curated toward specific topics and allow for them to work with each other — which is really the most essential thing kindergarteners can learn.
Play is the foundation of learning, creativity, self-expression, and constructive problem-solving. It’s how children wrestle with life to make it meaningful. — Susan Linn
One year my 5-year-old spent the entire year studying dragons. I admit to being flabbergasted. It didn’t quite seem like the type of learning that would translate into practical knowledge for a non-magic world. But the reality stands that kindergarten isn’t about developing a foundation in academic subjects. It is about learning how to follow simple rules, how to engage with ideas, and how to play well with others. All of these things can be taught quite well with dragons.
Learning through play shouldn’t end with kindergarten. While I’m not volunteering to play cars anymore, I have realized there were things I loved doing that I had cropped out of my busy, adult life. For me, play can be writing, building a puzzle, exploring, or learning to knit
5. Slow down.
This one hit me like a punch in the gut. A punch in the gut that looks a lot like a two-hour lunch break when all school kids come home. Sure, you can pay for school lunch but usually costs over $25 a day. And did I mention I have three kids in school? Instead, I had to learn to be home every day from 11:30–1:30 and I had to cook.
Gone were the days of food stands and motorcycle delivery meals, life in a Swiss village is geared neither towards fast food nor delivery. I had never loved cooking before and life in Asia and America had convinced me it was a thing of the past. Then I was faced with preparing multiple meals a day. Every day.
Even kids get tired of pre-made tortellini after a certain point. I needed to learn to make actual meals. Cooking for me is more enjoyable when it became more of a challenge or experiment. Can I make something out of these raw ingredients? Will anyone eat it? When I gave myself space and time to meal prep, grocery shop, and prepare real meals, everyone was happier.
The faster the world gets…the more you need to step back and appreciate everything that is old and slow. — Thomas Friedman.
Life in Switzerland is slow. Food shops close at 5 pm on Saturday nights and stayed closed until Monday mornings. Normal weekend activity is a long, meandering hike or walk. The work-life balance seems almost as archaic as the kids walking themselves to school. Roger Federer just promoted Switzerland as drama-free but I would argue life here is slow, purposeful, and drama-free.
You can make a fast, busy life anywhere but I won’t be doing it again. I like the slow weekends, the quiet Sundays, and sitting down together to eat something that is mostly edible.
I’ll admit I don’t love everything about Swiss schools. It’s annoying to me that my son wants a $300 backpack because the other kids in his class have one. I don’t like the pressure to excel at a young age just be to be on track to attend university. But there is so much I love and maybe it will all help me grow up to be as great as my kids.
