Although movement is integrated throughout the day at The Bay School, the children participate in a well-loved Movement and Games class twice a week. Play and healthy movement guide a curriculum that meets the developmental needs of the growing children with age appropriate lessons for the full range of students- from the still dreamy imaginative first grader to the awake eighth grader with burgeoning intellect. We take advantage of our natural setting with activities in the fields, adventures in the surrounding forest, and in our large indoor hall.
For the younger children, the curriculum comprises cooperative and traditional games, circle and rhythm activities, hand clapping, dancing, rope jumping, chasing and tagging, tumbling, balance activities, running activities, body geography, gymnastics, and body management games. Here, imagination is used as the vehicle to introduce the activities. The fifth grade Olympiad is a specialized training in the classic pentathlon events: discus, javelin, wrestling, sprinting , and long jump. In Middle school, skill building happens through sports, circus arts, and strength exercises and challenges.
The goal for the children, in all the activities, from juggling to basketball, tumbling to capture the flag, country dancing to ultimate frisbee, is to move with ease, beauty and lightness of being; to experience the world and the space around them as abundant and life-giving; to win with humility and lose with grace; poised and able to give and receive with equal abundance. The program has lofty goals and a playful way of getting there.