Waldschule
First school building of Waldschule für kränkliche Kinder.
Unknown author. Zentral- und Landesbibliothek Berlin: http://digital.zlb.de/viewer/i... Pictures from Berliner Leben – Zeitschrift für Schönheit & Kunst Heft VIII, Jahrgang VII, as of August 1904. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
Girls with their teacher of Waldschule für kränkliche Kinder.
Unknown author. Zentral- und Landesbibliothek Berlin: http://digital.zlb.de/viewer/i... Pictures from Berliner Leben – Zeitschrift für Schönheit & Kunst Heft VIII, Jahrgang VII, as of August 1904. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
The Waldschule für kränkliche Kinder (forest school for poorly children) was the first outdoor school of its kind. Located in the Grunewald forest in Charlottenburg, just outside of Berlin, the school opened to children in 1904. Built by Walter Spickendorff and founded by the pediatrician Prof. Dr. Bernhard Bendix alongside Berlin's schools inspector Hermann Neufert, the school was intended as a means to educate children whilst reducing the risk of TB transmission. It offered "open-air therapy" to children seen to be at risk of TB or with early signs of the disease. The school became a model for similar schools across the west embracing outdoor learning as a means to contain and reduce TB in children.