Suggested reading

Interested in learning more? Our bibliography is a great place to start. The River Farm philosophy has been shaped and informed by many of the following articles and authors.    

The value of Play, Nature, Sensory Skills, & Movement In School

• Study: Too Many Structured Activities May Hinder Children's Executive Functioning

• Flexible Seating in High School: How and Why

• Children Today Are Suffering from a Severe Deficit of Play

• The More Time Your Child Spends Playing Outdoors, The Smarter She Will Be

• Longer Recess, Stronger Child Development

• Psychology Today: The Value of Play: The definition of play gives insights

• Why Are Our Kids So Miserable: The importance of play in brain development

• LA Times: Why Finland has the Best Schools

• The Guardian: Children should learn mainly through play until age of eight, says Lego

• Video: Dr. Peter Gray on The Decline of Play

• Dateline Australia: Kids Gone Wild (forest kindergartens)

• Children That Play Outside In All Weather Grow Up Resilient

• NPR: What Kids Need From Grown-Ups (But Aren't Getting)

• The Atlantic: Joy: the subject that schools lack

• What Children Need Most is Adults That Understand Development

• Why Kids Build Forts

• How Free Play Creates Emotionally Stable Children in an Unstable World

• More Play Time! How Kids Succeed with Recess Four Times a Day At Public School

• On Risk Taking: I Have To Push My Own Limits To Let My Kids Find Theirs

• The Atlantic: Green Spaces Make Kids Smarter

• Washington Post: Recess: It's Important. Does your Kids Get Enough of It?

• Let 'Em Out! The Many Benefits of Outdoor Play in Kindergarten

• Make Time for Play: How to Balance Structured and Unstructured Play

• Children Need Nature: Why nature fires up a child's developing brain

• CBS: Kids in Daycare Need More Outdoor Play Time

• How Unrestricted Outdoor Play Helps Children Find their Voices

• Turning Nature into the Classroom: a week in nature

• Washington Post: Why young kids need less class time — and more play time — at school

• Losing our grip: More students entering school without fine motor skills

• Free Play is Essential for Normal Emotional Development

• Parenting and Risk: Why one parent decided to let her son climb trees

• The Decline of Play and Rise in Children's Mental Disorders

• Risk is essential to childhood – as are scrapes, grazes, falls and panic

• Washington Post: The decline of play in preschoolers — and the rise in sensory issues

• New York Times: Let the Kids Learn Through Play

• The Unsafe Child: Less Outdoor Play is Causing more Harm Than Good

• The Atlantic: All Work and No Play: Why your Kids are More Anxious and Depressed

• The Rise of Outdoor Preschools in the Pacific Northwest

• The Real Reason Why Children Fidget

• Five Reasons Why I Let My Kids Play Outside In (Almost) Any Weather

• Washington Post: Why Green Spaces are Good for your Child’s Brain

• The Value of Unstructured Play Time for Kids:

• German psychologists find people who were allowed to play freely as children have greater social success as adults

• Teacher Tom: The Knowledge that Children Are People

• Washington Post: A therapist goes to middle school and tries to sit still and focus. She can’t. Neither can the kids.

• Washington Post: The right — and surprisingly wrong — ways to get kids to sit still in class

• Teacher Tom: The Truth About Play

• NPR: More Active Play Equals Better Thinking Skills for Kids

• NPR: Scientists Say Child's Play Helps Build A Better Brain

• The Atlantic: How Finland Keeps Kids Focused Through Free Play

• Can Free Play Prevent Depression and Anxiety In Kids?

• Playing with Blocks, Not Tablets: Why Slowing Down Stimuli to Real Time Protects a Child's Brain

• Teacher Tom: Free Play Within the Context of Community

• Time to Bend the Rules for the Sake of Development

• Core Strengthening through Everyday Play

• The Importance of Playing, Puttering, and Pretending

• Why Heavy Work is important for kids, and 40 heavy work activities

• Reading readiness has to do with the body

social Justice

• The Atlantic: How Well-Intentioned White Families Can Perpetuate Racism

• The Atlantic: The Role of Parents in Improving School Diversity

• The Atlantic: Color-Blindness Is Counterproductive

• It Doesn’t Just Happen at Starbucks: Teachers Need Racial Bias Training, Too

• How to Respond to Everyday Prejudice, Bias, and Stereotypes

• Hate Incidents in School On the Rise

• Moving from Punitive to Resolution-Centered Schools: A little girl’s school helps her deal with trauma at home

• Explaining Charlottesville to my 7-year-old

• How to Raise a Feminist Son

• What White Children Need to Know About Race

• Destigmatizing Privilege (in School)

• The Long-Term Effects of Social-Justice Education on Black Students

• The School-to-Prison Pipeline

• Who Are the Activists in My Community?

• Beyond the Golden Rule

• Kojo For Kids: Jason Reynolds Talks About Racism And The Protests (June 2020)

• Teaching 6-Year-Olds About Privilege and Power

• Race & Privilege: A Social Experiment

• White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack

• Teaching Tolerance (main page)

• The Conscious Kid (main page)

• Embracing Equity (main page)

U.S. Elementary Education: Trends, Testing, Common Core

• Class Size Matters!

• "Micro-Schools" Might Be the Next Big Education Thing: Podcast

• Standardized Testing Is Killing Education

• Gates Foundation failures show philanthropists shouldn't be setting America's public school agenda

• Why Finland Has the Best Schools

• 4 Things Worse than Not Learning to Read in Kindergarten

• Video: The History of Kindergarten

• Don't Say Your Child Can't Read: Understanding the symbolic patterns of literacy

• Making Space for Children's Ideas Through Play-Based Learning

• Homework is Wrecking our Kids: the research is clear, let's ban elementary homework

• NEA: Is Kindergarten the New First Grade? Without a Doubt, Say Researchers

• WSJ: Teach your Children Well: Unhook them from Technology

• Finland schools: Subjects scrapped and replaced with 'topics' as country reforms its education system

• The Atlantic: The New Preschool is Crushing Kids

• What Do I Expect from Elementary School? Not This.

• Washington Post: Homework: An Unnecessary Evil? Research Findings

• Washington post: Early Childhood Education has Become "Twisted"

• Washington Post: Class Size Matters A Lot, Research Shows

• What's Really Hard in Education Today: A Challenge to Bill Gates

• NPR: Behind The Shortage Of Special Ed Teachers: Long Hours, Crushing Paperwork

• Teacher Tom: "I'm Working Soo Hard and Learning Soo Much" (on what education should be)

• Washington Post: Delaying kindergarten until age 7 offers key benefits to kids-study

• Washington Post: "I just cannot justify making students cry anymore." Resignation letter from a veteran teacher.

• Psychology Today: Children’s Mental Health Crises Plummet in Summer and Rise in the School Year

• Washington Post: Elementary school teachers describe how PARCC testing is affecting their classrooms

• A letter about testing from Connecticut superintendents

• Why Preschool Shouldn’t be like School: New research shows that teaching kids more and more, at ever-younger ages, may backfire.

• Research Finds Strong Evidence for Mental Health Benefits to Delaying Kindergarten

• The Atlantic: American vs. Finnish Kindergartens

• The Problem With Kindergarten

• New York Times: The Cognitive Importance of Teaching Handwriting In School

• School starting age: the evidence

• Does Common Core Ask Too Much of Kindergarteners?

• Washington Post: Diane Ravitch: Everything you need to know about Common Core

• Forbes: How America’s Education Model Kills Creativity and Entrepreneurship

• Washington Post: Class Size Matters A Lot, Research Shows

• Video: Teacher Tom asking the questions, "Why are schools set up the way that they are?" and, "Why do we teach students the way that we do?"

• Madison’s superintendent of schools: It is Time to Restore the Innocence of Childhood

• Washington post: A Letter from Two First Grade Teachers: Your children deserve better than this

• How ‘Deprogramming’ Kids From How to ‘Do School’ Could Improve Learning

• Teacher Tom: Who’s With Me? (Corporate Educational Reform)

• Video: John Oliver reports on standardized testing

What Playgrounds Should Be

• Why Natural Playgrounds Are Freaking Awesome

• Teacher Tom: Building your Own Backyard Playground

• NYT: On Governors Island, mountains of junk where children find adventure

• Risky Playgrounds: Taking Risks is Good for Child Development

• In Praise of Loose Parts: data shows loose parts make the best playgrounds

• How kids can reconnect with nature on the playground

• Storytelling and Creating with Stones May Help Unleash Creativity in Young and Old

• Fallen Trees, Used as Climbing Frames, are Tremendous Fun for Schoolchildren

• Parents are buying their kids all the wrong toys

• Top 10 Things to Look for in a Playground

• How an Outdoor Classroom in a Canadian Public School is Changing Behavior

• The Atlantic: Play Freely at Your Own Risk: How Playgrounds Should Be

• Turn Playgrounds into Junkyards

• Bring Back the Merry-Go-Round: The danger of today’s “safe” playgrounds

• Loose Parts on the Playground

• Teacher Tom: Climbing and Loose Parts

• Experts Say Playgrounds Are Too Safe

• The Atlantic: The Overprotected Kid: a new playground in Wales is the way it’s supposed to be

Screen Time

• Teenage Depression and Suicide Are Way Up — and So Is Smartphone Use

• Screentime Defined Millennials and Could Change Their Kids

• Real learning doesn’t “look like 6-year-olds slumped in chairs … staring at iPads”

• NPR: Kids and Screen Time: What Does the Research Say? 

Empathy, Creativity, Conflict Resolution, Critical Thinking

• Why Social-Emotional Learning (SEL Is Essential for Students

• Washington Post: Why adults have to stop trying so darn hard to control how children play

• Study: Focus on Empathy, Not Punishment, Improves Discipline

• What to Say to Little Kids Instead of “Say You’re Sorry”

• How to Explain the News to Your Children

• 26 Things to Say to Kids Instead of ‘Stop’, ‘Don’t' and Other Commands

• NPR: Learning Soft Skills in Childhood can Prevent Harder Problems Later

• Share...Wait your Turn... Playdate rules that limit learning (and what to try instead)

• Florida Teacher Starts Each Day Complimenting Students, One by One

• What If Everything You Knew About Disciplining Kids Was Wrong?

• Washington Post: Former Stanford dean explains why helicopter parenting is ruining a generation of children

• Emotional Intelligence: The Benefits of Teaching Lessons Learned in Preschool to Older Kids

• Teaching Children: Phrases that Nurture Respect, Confidence, and Community

• Teaching Empathy To Boys

• Teacher Tom: Conflict Resolution: Talking and Listening

• Seattle Times: Bellevue schools teach emotional smarts to help boost academic success