Good times beside Mt. Shamao
Located within Yangmingshan National Park, the view from the school is a vast sea of greenery, including the unmistakable conical profile of Mt. Shamao. “We all call ourselves the happy children from Mt. Shamao,” says Director Zhai of the Hushan kindergarten, who adds that the natural environment was long ago integrated into the curriculum at this semi-rural school of just 150 students.
Every spring, the hills are abloom with azalea and Taiwan cherry. Walking into the school’s 8,000-square-meter campus, one discovers that six special ecological study areas have been set aside for “woody plants,” “amphibious animals,” “ferns,” “nectar plants,” a “stream,” and a “wetlands.” Whenever the weather is good, this is the best place for the kids to learn about the ecology. Each summer, frogs croak incessantly in the school pond, which in turn attracts snakes to prey on the frogs. “So the kids at Hushan Elementary are all familiar with snakes,” laughs Zhai.
“Apart from such birds as the Formosan blue magpie, the Taiwan barbet, and the Formosan whistling thrush, we also frequently see all sorts of insects, butterflies, and amphibians. The kids can develop an understanding of different ecosystems and get a feel for biodiversity,” says Zhai.
In 2001 the school built a hot-spring pool, which the kids more often call the “foot-soaking pool.” The teachers and students all like to go there, and on weekends and holidays lots of people saunter into the school just to enjoy a soak.
According to Principal Lin Minzheng: “In addition to the natural beauty of the place, the special culture we’ve built up here is another attractive aspect of this elementary school.” The special culture of which he speaks is the close interaction between parents, students, and teachers.
Back in the 1990s, schools in urban Taipei had to turn students away because all their admission spots filled up regularly, while some schools on the outskirts had trouble finding enough students. The city government stepped in to remedy things, as Principal Lin explains: “To address the problem of dropping enrolments at schools up in the hills, and to provide families in the city with more education options for their children, the city government began promoting suburban and rural elementary schools. The first step they took was to subsidize school buses to make it easier to attend mountain schools—including Hushan Elementary. The natural environment here at Hushan is so good, and in recent years the thinking in educational circles has been that we need to reduce the pressure that students face and let them get closer to nature and learn from it. Thanks to trends like these, we long ago stopped having problems finding enough students, and in fact many of our parents have gone across school district lines to get their kids into Hushan Elementary.”
Says Lin: “We have all sorts of parents, but one thing they have in common is a love of nature. Some of them choose us so their kids can have lots of freedom and learn in a stress-free atmosphere. And there are parents who support progressive ideas that have gained currency recently, such as the idea of sustainable management of nature and the land. These are some of the factors that move parents to choose Hushan Elementary.”
Over 80% of the students at Hushan Elementary live in other school districts. Most are from the nearby districts of Shilin and Beitou, but some come from farther away, such as Luzhou and Xizhi in New Taipei City. The school’s natural environment has even induced foreign expatriates in Taiwan to enrol their kids there. Many of these parents live in nearby Tianmu, where there is an especially high concentration of white-collar foreigners. Over 20 of the 150 students at Hushan are foreign nationals from more than ten countries, including Japan, South Korea, Sri Lanka, France, and Canada.
“When I first took the job as principal here three years ago,” laughs Lin, “I was often unsure whether adults I saw on campus were visitors or parents.” Later, he discovered that lots of parents, after dropping off their kids, would stick around. “Some are full-time mothers who take part in some way or other in school activities until it’s time to take their kids back home.”
School lets out for the day at Hushan Elementary, and a bunch of happy children go racing about the ecological study areas and the school playground.