Science and Language Arts Instruction Through Immersive Nature Experiences for Ages 8–12 (Grades 3–6)
Our academic teacher and nature and outdoor project leader collaborate to create an exciting integrated curriculum that draws on each child’s strengths and curiosity.
Interested in registering for the Fall 2026–Spring 2027 year? Email us at info@flyingdeernaturecenter.org.
Tuesdays, 9:00 am–3:00 pm in East Chatham
Tuition: $2,000; payment plan available: $400 deposit + monthly payments
Add another day outdoors, at a discount! Treetop participants get 10% off tuition for our full-year FOREST program, offered Wednesdays and/or Thursdays. Use code TREE10 at checkout.
Being in nature feeds children’s natural curiosity and desire to learn. Guided with care by expert mentors, students will:
- Explore science, geography, and writing
- Engage in hands-on projects
- Learn wilderness skills
- Deepen their relationship with the land
- Build vitality, happiness, deep listening, and empathy
Students will explore a wide variety of topics, including zoology, botany, and local geography, as well as local indigenous history, practical math, and language arts. Through nature-based activities, students will engage in science, writing, and reading on a daily basis. Treetop will support at-home educational programs by working with parents to understand their child’s academic skills and provide opportunities and instruction to strengthen and expand them.
“The Treetop program is designed to grow and mature with kids through the years—something that’s very hard to come by in homeschooling. It is the magic recipe our son needs at his age for success: the ability to learn kinetically and organically in nature, working with classmates to build projects they plan and execute together, combined with having a more traditional classroom experience and a consistent community and friend group. It’s everything we’ve always loved about Flying Deer—with the parts we didn’t know how badly we were missing until we had them.”
Shauna and Mark J., Treetop parents, Sharon Springs, NY
Here are some beliefs and principles that shape our Treetop approach:
We each rise into our best—release our full potential—through frequent immersion in the natural world within a skilled mentoring community. The program will be primarily held outdoors, with a main lesson often taking place indoors. (Dressing for the weather is key!) We employ many Flying Deer mentoring techniques, including the art of questioning, core routines of nature connection, flow learning, and tapping into a child’s passions. All of this is designed to help students access their inner happiness, vitality, deep listening, empathy, and much more.
Children are hardwired for learning outdoors; they possess the latent curiosity, wonder, sensory awareness, and hands-on hunger to dig into topics, projects, and places that excite them. Under skilled guidance, this hardwiring feeds well into an academic education. Our goal is to provide 4th- to 6th-grade students with academic learning wrapped in a classic Flying Deer setting, methodology, and culture.
We are here to learn how to live out the 3 Rs: Respect for Self, Respect for Others, and Respect for the Earth. One of our paramount purposes as human beings is to steward the earth. We explore our deep compassion for our planet, and practice actively caring for it, through both backyard action and global advocacy. We cultivate good relationships with others—express appreciation for good actions, honor one another’s innate gifts, hold each other accountable to expected standards of conduct, fix what goes wrong, and strive to improve our impact on others. We carefully and lovingly treat our own body, soul, and spirit the way we might tend a tree, by developing positive habits, such as rest, hydration, and blood sugar maintenance; speaking and believing uplifting messages about ourselves; and connecting with the things that bring us true and deep happiness.
Children are meant to grow into excellence. We are committed to supporting children as they come to know and love their own body, soul, and spirit. We encourage their executive functioning, including critical thinking, investigative skills, self-discipline, goal-setting, and decision-making. These abilities provide a scaffolding for each child’s educational pathway. We will meet children where they are on their journey and offer the support they need to build the skills to become life-long learners.
