Founder of Lismore’s Living School John Stewart has brought the independent school through bush fires and drought, and is now living through pestilence.

“If the locusts come, we’ll eat them,” John laughed.

The new school’s second six week term is already underway for the year and John said teachers were still sticking to the program, with the added challenge of creating an online curriculum for the students whose parents are keeping them at home through the Covid-19 pandemic.

“The challenge is maintaining a balance of offline studies as well as screen time,” he said. “We’ve launched a new online portal and we still have the school open while the government directs us to do so - and are offering a service for those who need it.”

John said the school’s eight staff of mainstream and specialist teachers were still fully employed, and enjoying the learning curve of transitioning their teaching to a virtual environment.

“In the upper primary class sessions, we have virtual meetings like in a classroom, with flexible schedules and broad activities to support parents with children learning at home,” he said. 

John said for some students, lack of access to computers or internet at home was an issue and some of the students had borrowed the school computers to take home. 

“Some parents have numerous children and it’s hard for them to manage online studies between them.”

Some of the home activities given to the students are based in mindfulness and mental health. John said there were also challenging and creative activities given, like gardening activities (plants in pants, and shoots in boots) and a lace fashion parade.

Children at the school before the Coronavirus pandemic changed how things were delivered.

“Kids also get to research projects like naming rainforest species in the Big Scrub, bird watching and journaling, or map out the weather, temperature and rainfall from 1900 to now by accessing digitised newspapers in Trove online,” he said.

“We want kids to be purposeful and still make the most of this crazy time.”

“It’s been important that teachers get this time to band together and develop a teaching portfolio.

“Although we are seeing a leaning toward online, it’s not the great revolution or the panacea I initially thought it would be when I started learning about online education.

“I still like activity based learning and the best teaching is someone sitting in the desert with a stick.

“We need to not forget the relationship side of learning, with someone explaining things in real time and meeting the needs of individuals.”