On the return of the Christmas holidays we went to the San Millán school in Zizurkil. It was with a smile that we received Elena Laiz (project coordinator), Leire Arreseigor (project manager at Abaltzisketa) and Alaitz Zengotitabengoa (project manager at Zizurkil).

They have taught us from within the school and we have been able to see how the workshops are organized: in the carpentry there are wood pieces and construction games to build and deconstruct on one side, and on the other side carpentry and wood tools. Mattresses for practicing psychomotor skills in the movement workshop, as well as tools to work other languages related to movement such as musical instruments, fabrics for dramatization, musical earbuds for dance... In the science workshop, materials for experimentation and manipulation, such as sandbox, fountain, kitchen... The garden and the kitchen are also part of the science workshop, the great laboratories of life. In the library we have found all kinds of readings, bertsolaris images, writings that indicate that they also cultivate English, and sweet places to read at ease, both in group and individually. In the art workshop, basic materials for many expressions: painting, mud...

Each workshop is different, they are teaching us countless possibilities that are calling us nothing else to enter, and we have not missed the usual lines of blackboards, tables and individual chairs. According to the portal board, this building was 100 years old in 2012, so it is possible to adapt any center for its organization in workshops, without the need for innovative designs of magazines, complicated works and expensive furniture.

It is a break and today all students play outside, on other occasions there are children who decide to continue in school. In the schools of Zizurkil and Abaltzisketa the clock only indicates two things: the beginning and the end of the workshops and the three or four workshops that will be open during that time. There is no “class”, no time for each workshop, no time limit for completion of the work.

Each student with their own languages

They started this way of organizing a school that's so different from everybody else's because they want "a school for all children." That all boys and girls feel at ease, motivated, truly valued and respected, means being “a school for all boys and girls” and giving each one the opportunities that interest them “to develop their own personality, what they have inside”. For this, it is essential to understand each student, as each and every one of us expels what we carry within through different languages or expressions. On the contrary, the traditional school system, in particular, promotes languages related to language and mathematics, often rejecting others. In these Eskola Txikiak attempts are being made to allow workshops to reflect different languages. Zengotitabengoa has acknowledged that “there are children in whom we see very clear languages, but there are others that we have not yet identified. But it’s not that those kids don’t have language, of course.” Laiz adds that if children's languages are not understood, it is difficult to give them opportunities to develop correctly: “We still don’t invent it everywhere, we have a great challenge with a child, because we can’t see him at ease, focused… but we’re trying.” Changing the gaze is the key, according to his own words, to know other languages, but Arreseigorri has emphasized that “responsibility is ours, the teacher. It's our job, not the child's. Weight is usually put on the child and not on teachers. And it’s us who have to guess or change our gaze.”

“Children don’t see how adults don’t think.”

This school, organized in workshops, is defined as “philosophy”, as “gaze”, also with the word “way of living”. It's not a closed method, it's not a recipe. The objective is to dress the person and develop what is each, that boys and girls undertake significant learning, for which they start from the evidence: “Children don’t see it as adults, much less as adults.”

They reported with a lot of humor that in the years prior to the workshops, when they worked for projects, the contents that children worked were not really elaborated by them, nor did they really incorporate this knowledge. In Laiz’s words, “some content developed and came to do things, but because it had to be done, and very forced, very guided, used our words, it was not their job, although they chose the subject and everything they want. We were all happy with the result, but they then think otherwise, it has nothing to do with what they have done.” Proof of this is given by the following example: “It occurred to me to work on a subject, to make a presentation and, upon leaving the classroom, to ask a question to one of these students in another way, and the answer he gave me had nothing to do with the work. What you really think is what you answer when you're talking about accounts. Children don't think how we want to. They don't see it as we want -- and if we don't start there, if we don't accept it, it's useless. They're children up to the age of 12. The world of children is that of children, and we ask them what adults do, very quickly.”

The recognition that each child is the guide of their own learning process and the recognition that the view and thought of children is not the most adult have radically changed the view and function of these teachers. As Laiz explained, “students visit us when they need us: to ask us, to say their things, to make sure, to know their opinion and to say their own, to comment on what has happened… That is enough many times to develop their knowledge, to grow and also for us to know more about children. And in the rest of the moments, they don't need us, they move on their own. The role of teachers changes radically in this approach. We are fellow travellers, we are not the ones who say what and how to do. But it is very important that boys and girls feel our availability at all times, as it is important the presence of adults, which would never be replaced by a machine”.

The change of view urges the agents to dismantle the actions that had been taken until then. Zengotitabengoa has set the following example of how he often feels when talking to students: Ah! I have advanced if, instead of explaining myself in that situation, I would have had to wait, perhaps the disciple would have acted differently.” Laiz added: “At first we were doing ‘a kind of trap’. For example, if in the conversation of the boys they made some allusion to the Sun, we were going with a lot of information about the universe so that the boys and girls get as far as possible. And we've realized that no, they don't have any interest in learning it. Boys and girls immediately realize when they are the themes that have emerged naturally and as a result of their interests, and when teachers deceive us by forcing them to do so. The contents appear in all the workshops and at all times in our school: by necessity, by events of life, by the curiosity of each child...”.

Was the resume not mandatory?

It's a melody from almost every school that can't give everything that the résumé promises, that there's no time and no way to work a lot of other things. That is why we have been full of mouths, because in these two public schools they are not based on curricular content. Zengotitabengoa explains what they are required by law and what they are not: “Students have to acquire some skills, but in 4th of the ESO. In category II, that is, they are up to 16 years old to work. Not for 6th EP”. Arreseigorri questions whether the relationship between the competencies and areas in the curriculum makes sense: “They wanted to link competencies with the areas, but the connection between them is not obvious.” They have insisted that their schools work on competences or competences. Arreseigorri has rounded off his actions as follows: “What does a child need to develop their skills? To acquire certainty in their abilities, to get to know themselves, to know their interests and to have the opportunity to develop them”. Zengotitabengoa added that what needs to be questioned is the curriculum itself, which has been accused of lack of adaptation and saturation of content to the characteristics of children: “Is it possible that a person who has been with children thinks you can do all that? But whoever has really been with the children, not the one who enters the room, throws away his own thing and goes away!”

Time to be a child and time to observe the students

Freed from the need to provide curricular contents, without having to follow the exercises that the textbook has entrusted to them and without the minimum and maximum of annual activities, they have regained time in these two Eskola Txikiak. We asked Zengotitabengoa what the secret is. “Prioritize. We give children time to evolve at their own pace. On the other hand, they do not have time to complete the task, task or action they initiate. For each of them needs their time; in every moment and situation, different.” Laiz has specified what it is to give time to children: “It is our responsibility to allow time for students to develop what is inside them. Provide time for their interests to work.” And there's another time in their schools, that of the teachers, to observe the students. “You have to take time, spend time, spend time... ‘We don’t have time’ is said, but we all have time, the key is what we use.”

Examinations of the education system

Every day, the teachers write down what is observed in each workshop and once a week all the teachers meet to talk about the students. In addition, a two-hour training session is held each week. In addition to the authors of the world of education, they study the contributions of the different cultural, economic and social actors, and constantly contrast with the practice of workshops, rethinking whether what they take as a north and what they are doing in practice agree.

Continuous evaluation and non-examination are a reality in some schools. But again the questionnaire: What are schools obliged to do in the evaluation account? Zengotitabengoa explained that “every quarter we have to comply with the reports, but there is also a wide variety there. We do open reports: in them we put what the child does, what he likes to do in each workshop, whether he works with friends or, above all, how he feels, the jobs he proposes or whether he is expecting our proposals... that is, what we see. But we are not included in the evaluations.” Arreseigorri states that: “We don’t say what’s missing from the student and evaluations usually go around. The label is already there, linked to each student’s difficulties, emphasizing what does not come.” At the end of the course they are obliged to complete the minutes and have explained that the minutes are a closed model that comes from the delegation, organized by areas. And there they are obliged to rate it. “But as we have seen that everyone is moving forward and as we are no one to say ‘this has progressed much better than others’ – because we do not compare them – everyone is ‘very good’, of course. Because their development and learning are progressing, continuously, appropriately,” said Zengotitabengoa. If at the end of the stage, upon reaching 6 Primary, it could be seen that a student needs one more year of permanence, this situation would be studied.

From absolute respect

In this philosophy, mutual treatment among all members of the school is fundamental, especially among children. The students have explained that they have to feel affection and respect, and Laiz has pointed out that real respect is a very deep concept: “To respect it is to dedicate time to develop what it is, to offer opportunities to work in different languages, that all we observe is the way to change the way we do things and not to classify or qualify the student... Respecting the child is listening, but not only with the ears, which makes him/her valued, offering individual moments, channeling for nobody to hurt anyone, accepting that they are far from our thinking and that they understand it differently, accepting that they will not address everything we propose and that before a question there may be very different answers, making him/her few and open, not leaving the student to others in evidence, not making him/her feel serious in the public. Treating the student well is everything and more.”

“Yes, yes, but... What to do when going to ESO?”

This is the main question of parents of students from all primary schools. Laiz answers with severity: “Until now, our mind will have to fight. Parents of these children will have to start asking for other ways to do in ESO. Because it is sad and unfair that the children have to fix them there” or, we felt obliged to say ‘calm, adapt in the ESO, they will fix, they will go well’. I don't mean that anymore. I don't want kids to adapt to that. Because that is not, in our opinion, the right educational model.” The road is clear: .

Why not try it? For good living

It is a public school and we have asked them what their assessment is from the Department of Education: “You have to ask them, because we don’t know,” they answered. When this project started, the Innovation Director, Begoña Garamendi, was fully satisfied with it. But apparently they have not managed to meet with the current director of innovation, even though they have asked him formally on several occasions. Personally, yes, many members of the Department of Education have received their praise, “but beyond words, in practice, we do not have any support at the moment. For example, in three years we have had secondment linked to the project, which has brought stability to the cloister. This year, however, stability has not been guaranteed.” The Department of Education considers it necessary that this project be cared for, valued, taken seriously, involved and made known in society.

They think that in all the other Eskola Txikiak there is a possibility to address this philosophy. Sometimes they have started, for example, at Larraul’s school, they say they’ve made a “big leap.” In Aizarnazabal and Ezdox-Itsaso they have also begun to take steps.

Why not try it in the big schools? “It teaches it is one of the professions with the lowest jobs: fighting with children often, throwing, spending time, under pressure... We would all live a lot better with this philosophy. Forget about some things, spend time with other things, don’t mourn with so much content...” says Laiz.

It's not a joke to live to taste. In fact, students live in school. Depending on how children today live so many hours of their day, it will be the people and society of the future. Laiz has left us with this last thought: “The baby is a very special stage and you don’t have to steal it. If childhood, at least in school, is happy with themselves, that must have a good influence. It is impossible not to study here. It is impossible for human beings to be happy and not to learn, because we have that sense.”

THE TONUCCI BAIT

It is 33 years since Elena Laiz was incorporated as a professor at the Zizurkil Small School. In the learning process Laiz has opened a long way to bring advantages to the diversity of ages: they did not use textbooks or do studies, and four levels worked together in the same class. The diversity of ages is the main characteristic of the Small Schools, and given its great influence on the way of teaching, Laiz has worked for many years in the training of teachers of all the Eskola Txikiak.

Laiz met the pedagogues Myriam Nemirovsky and Francesco Tonucci 30 years ago, and although he was not given that name at that time, he started working on projects. “But with all this, we saw that it was not a suitable school for everyone.” Tonucci came in 2014 to give two lectures for Eskola Txikiak teachers and there he threw this hook to everyone. Then, the Schools of Txalburu of San Millán and Abaltzisketa of Zizurkil returned to the challenge: working in workshops and deepening the diversity of ages.

Before they decided to enter the project, they sought the approval of their parents. The parents of older students had the most doubts about the question “what happens when we go to ESO?”. 100% of Zizurkil's parents got the approval of their parents with the presentation of the project and the argument. “We will always be very grateful for the trust placed in us and us,” Laiz stressed. He believes that the fact that the school was already pedagogically innovative facilitated the transition.

In Abaltzisketa they had to do many training workshops and meetings to clarify the doubts of parents. Most of the students made the decision to undertake this project, and most of the days is very comfortable, although there are still parents of older students who worry about the leap from ESO.