To understand life is to understand ourselves. As a teacher, I should first of all be certain that you are walking without fear.
Elementary
7th - 9th grade
We combine theory with practice. We learn real life.
Teens at our school recognize what it means to take their lives in their own hands.
In addition to learning, they work together and live together for a part of the week, taking care of themselves and their environment. They work in the garden, make, sell, cook, clean, create, engage in sports, and organise events for the younger children, for their parents and for the public.
We develop our students' courage for their life's journey, their feeling for themselves and others.
Through real adult work, the adolescents verify their knowledge and studying makes sense to them. They gain confidence that they have a place and importance in the world and that they can control their lives and have an impact on the world around them. And they start to recognise their calling.
Who we are
Since 2022, in Roblín near Černošice, a village surrounded by nature, small and pleasant and easily accessible from Prague, we are creating a new school for adolescents together. A place where teens can learn and work together, a place that is really theirs.
Because everything that happens and is created here on 2500 m² of ground has been dreamt up and created by our students: a café, permaculture garden, an outdoor music classroom and gym, art workshops, charity and environmental projects and social events for the local community.
For eight years we watched with amazement how children changed. First graders who devoured new information about the world grew into adolescents with a fantastic desire to influence and change it. They gave us the courage to create a school of life according to their desires. To help them step into adulthood when it still isn't fully possible, though it is time to taste it.
Teens still love their parents, but they long to try what it will be like stand on their own two feet one day. They need support, but also independence and success in adult matters. They then enjoy time with their parents all the more and they are wonderful friends.
How we learn
By solving real problems
Educational projects are based on everyday reality. We discuss everything that affects our lives and what we can do about it, what we want to achieve, create, or change. We continue to examine topics from all possible areas and subjects, we just connect them more with practice.
Why learn from textbooks, when I can discover and test biology while tending the garden and forest, chemistry while cooking, and physics while building a water pump.
I learn about history, culture and society by organising events, collaborating with interesting people or in discussion seminars where we form our own opinions through facts, context and the experiences of others.
For ourselves and our growth
We know that the next step into the world is coming, we care about it and we are consciously preparing for it. Through self-assessments and consultations with teachers, we recognise and name our strengths and weaknesses and specify our study plans.
We each prepare for our own entrance exams and develop our interests in personal projects.
We continue to learn about everything, and each of us decides what to pursue most. When we're interested in something, whether it's art, cosmetics, genetics or string theory, or when we are struggling, the teachers support us in the way we need.
In working roles and relationships
We experience real work, the achievements and difficulties of business, and ourselves through cooperation on a shared dream. It’s no longer enough for us to organise events for our parents, we need feedback from new people. We need to create and develop something long-term that will grow even after we leave. And we need to know how money works, how you can spend and earn it.
We dreamed up a café. We do market and customer surveys, think about how to appeal to customers, how to retain them, we plan the design, menus and program.
We choose our suppliers, evaluate and improve procedures, work with budgets and business plans. We alternate as team leaders and share our experiences. We work together, nobody could do it alone. Each of us has an important task, and everyone is good at something.
Self-discovery through arts and sports
Every day we experience creativity, exercise and humour. Art and sports are freedom, self-expression and relaxation for us, without which our heads would weigh heavy. We create paintings, furniture, ceramics, sculptures, street art, posters, music, poetry, stories, essays, plays and we improvise. Each to their own according to what they enjoy and what brings them inspiration.
We ride bikes, roller skate and skateboard, play ball games, run, exercise, and stretch.
We spend time outdoors whenever we can; we have nature right outside witing for us. And we're almost always laughing about everything, joking with each other and with the teachers.
Caring for ourselves and our world
We learn what it means to truly take care of yourself. Buying groceries, cooking meals, cleaning up, chopping wood, mowing the lawn, washing clothes. At home we wouldn't want to do it, but here it's just ours and nobody else will. In fact, this work can be quite fun when you do it with friends. And one day it’ll be good that we know how to do these things. None of us want to be calling our mother for every little thing when we’re thirty.
And we enjoy all of it! You will soon be able to read obout everything we experience in our Roblín diary with lots of photos.
And don't worry, the diary is all in English, because that’s our most common language. We enjoy it, we can't communicate with almost half of our teachers without it, and we know we'll need it in our lives.
I'm happy that I could spend nine years in a school where I wasn't scared to say what I think, or wasn't embarrassed that I enjoy learning.
That I learned to accomplish something together with others, organise events, resolve problems, pass on what I know to younger people. That I managed to be part of our beginnings in Roblín and our first trip to Portugal. And that I'm going to high school with confidence that I will succeed and be helpful somewhere else.
We're grateful for a truly individual and helpful approach.
We see our daughter's increasing self-confidence, her desire for independence and her craving for new experiences and challenges. And I'm pleased that she's learning to not be afraid of making mistakes. Thank you.
Transferring to Willowtrees was the best thing I could have done.
I'm very glad and grateful that I can go to this school. Compared to my former school, it is a lot more fun and interesting here and I also learn a lot more.
The respectful and supporting environment in which Ota could mature once he was a bit older, find himself and gradually develop his potential is, for us and for him, the greatest value.
The possibility to discuss with the teachers and look for ways out of difficult situations that every adolescent faces, and the sharing of joy from his success, that is what makes Willowtrees an exceptional place.
Practical info
Daily rhythm
Afternoon activities
According to the students' current interests and projects.
Art and ceramics with American artist Chris
Painting and drawing with Mexican painter Alejandra
Theatre and improvisation with Adéla
Music with guitarist Vláďa
Aikido with 6th dan Mirek
All kinds of sports with our teachers
Cooperation with parents
- Information and photos in the Twigsee mobile app
- Individual consultation with teachers
- Consultations about high schools and preparation for entrance exams
- Detailed verbal evaluation on report card
- Observation visits
- Inclusion of parents in projects according to their possibilities and skills
- Evenings where parents can experience our methods
- Events and celebrations for parents and the public
- Parent lectures and workshops about work, interests, experiences
Tuition
CZK 16,200
monthly (September - June)
Including our school minivan service, daily operations and accomodation 3 days a week.
Lunches cost CZK 100 per day.
Meals at accommodation (dinner, breakfast, snacks) cost CZK 150 per day.
Sibling discounts:
7% discount on tuition for the second sibling attending our school.
30% discount on tuition for the third sibling attending our school.
Enrolment
We accept children into the 7th to 9th grades throughout the year if vacancies open up.
A transfer is preceded by a morning observation visit by both parents along with a talk with our teachers followed by a week-long introductory stay by the student.