Seven kindergarten students of Milford School are shown inside a completed playhouse built by Wawasee High School students and awaiting painting. Sitting in the front are Braeden Foster, left, and Abby Lehman. In the back row are Maxwell Clouse, Maddox Lemler, Jesse Howey, Ava Hettinger and Rhett Bucher.
MILFORD — Milford School students will explore the outdoors when the outdoor classroom is fully launched in the circle drive area. As part of that environment, there will be playhouses used in a small “town.”
And those playhouses are being built by Wawasee High School students. Yet another example of hands-on learning being emphasized more in Wawasee schools.
Students in Jamie McAdams’ construction processes class built the first playhouse earlier in the second trimester, which will end Friday, Feb. 17. It is now in the industrial technology shop at Milford School where it will be painted and then used in the outdoor classroom.
Work began Monday, Feb. 6, on a second playhouse (with a porch) that should be finished within a couple of weeks. Materials for a third playhouse have been ordered and this time, McAdams noted, his Geometry in Construction students may build it or possibly the construction processes class.
Building the playhouses is an opportunity for high school students to use their skills. And they will get to see their finished products being used by students in lower grades within the same school district. Some of the students building the playhouses may have once been students at Milford School.
Heidi Zaebst, a kindergarten teacher at Milford School, said the outdoor classroom idea was developed as a result of exploring best practices for primary development of children. Learning outdoors “allows kids to do ‘messy’ things and not leave those messes in the classroom,” she noted. They will get to explore and use their imagination.
Children will learn how things grow, explore different animals and nature, possibly set up a weather station and more. Each of the three playhouses will be painted differently in order to create a little town.
The playhouses were purchased after receiving a donation from an anonymous donor “who believed in the cause of getting kids learning outside,” Zaebst said.
High school students building the playhouses include Braxton Armey, Zach Avery, Jose Criswell, Jordan Grindle, Ethan Hardy, Steven Hauntz, Ethan Hibbs, Mason Jennings, Austin LaJoice, Gisberth Lopez, Trey Raney, Dontae Salyer, Eric Sechrist, Garrett Stuckman and Braxton Studabaker.
A few of the students in Jamie McAdams’ construction processes class show what a playhouse being built for Milford School will look like when finished. In the front row, from left, are Mason Jennings, Ethan Hibbs and Ethan Hardy. In the back row are Eric Sechrist, Zach Avery and Austin LaJoice.