At Peninsula School District, their Transition to Kindergarten, or Transitional Kindergarten (TK) program was inspired by Norwegian education and is designed for children who lack access to high-quality early learning experiences before kindergarten. The curriculum in their Outdoor Transitional Kindergarten, meanwhile, includes at least one hour of outdoor exploration and learning each school day (if weather permits). It’s an opportunity for students to spend time outside learning new concepts and skills that incorporate with the curriculum from the rest of their school day.

Currently taking place at Evergreen and Voyager Elementary Schools, the idea for the Outdoor TK program came from Gig Harbor's sister city Bodø, Norway. Superintendent Krestin Bahr and School Board of Directors President Natalie Wimberly visited Norway towards the end of the 2021-2022 school year, and were inspired by the amount of outdoor learning that Norwegian students experience.

An experienced kindergarten teacher since 2017, Shokai Tyler is an Outdoor TK teacher at Evergreen Elementary in Key Peninsula School District. “We are an early learning program,” she explained, “and we take children from 4 and 5 year-olds who will be entering kindergarten next year. They're children who might not have had a chance to be in a developmental preschool, or in a preschool, before, and so we give them the experience to get them ready for their next year in kindergarten."

Shokai added, "We are a nature-based program where we spend a good part of every week outside on our trail, or here in our meadow, or in our garden, and we're learning through all the different activities that we do outside. We learn about our social emotional needs, we learn about how to care for our environment, and we even learn our alphabet and our numbers. And everything can be done through our experiences with the outdoors."

She described one of the latest topics for her students during the week was learning about birds and what they do in winter. “We've also been learning about how we can help the nature around us, so we've been making bird feeders this week and made bird feeders for our meadow."

"We were super excited, first of all, to get the TK program," commented Evergreen Elementary School Principal Hugh Maxwell. And then to transition that to an outdoor TK program just gave our kids a lot of opportunities to be outside. We have been working on being a green school and on outdoor learning for probably about 8 years now, and one thing we know is that when kids can spend some time outside, it's just a natural way for them to relax and calm down." Principal Maxwell noted that they also see that more and more kids are spending time inside. “But we know from some of our research -- especially around our learning -- that kids are just healthier and happier when they get to spend time outside,” he noted. “Especially if we can incorporate learning into that."

Shokai observed that the program’s excellence is rooted in the fact that it encourages educators to learn to make larger connections and to share those with their students. “First, to make connections within our school community, and then we can think about how we can make connections with people and different places outside of our school. So we learn to make connections from whatever our daily activities are and where we go. So they can start to see a bigger picture and a bigger value for what we're learning."

"I've been in education now for 38 years, and what I see that has always concerned me is that students start to lose that natural sense of curiosity and creativity as they sit in classrooms," Principal Maxwell added. "There are a lot of great benefits to direct instruction, but we have to allow kids to continue to build their creativity, to build relational pieces of their characters because that's what makes fully rounded adults."

Program Prerequisites:

• Children must turn five between September 1 and August 31 of the current school year.
• They must not be enrolled in another preschool program.
• They must reside within the Peninsula School District boundaries.

Qualifying Criteria:

• Needs in academics, social/emotional development, motor skills, language development
• Lack of access to licensed preschool due to availability or financial reasons
• Qualify for free/reduced meals
• English Learner

How to Apply:

To apply for Outdoor Transitional Kindergarten at Peninsula School District, fill out an Early Learning Interest Survey! Visit https://forms.gle/U82vPHCm1TdEgK2G9 for the 2025–2026 Interest Survey.