L’Enfant, l’École et le Cheval. Lisa Paret and Alicia Vaïsse

14 × 19 cm 160 pages softback october 2021 retail price: 18 €

Lisa Paret is responsible for the equestrian section of the Domaine du Possible School. Alicia Vaïsse is a teacher in visual arts at the Domaine du Possible School.

CHILDREN, SCHOOL AND HORSES

Lisa Paret and Alicia Vaïsse

Today most children live far away from the natural world and the countryside. For anybody living in the city, it is difficult to encounter the animal world. But that encounter is essential for life.

What if, somewhere in our relationship to nature and to animals, lies a key to happiness? What if this relationship could help children to know themselves better and find their place in the world?

With this conviction in mind, two teachers at Arles’ Domaine du Possible School decided to bring together the worlds of education and horses. After four years of experimentation, their instincts proved right and they discovered that children have a whole host of things to learn from horses and, through horses, children found the answers they were looking for. The school in Arles does have an equestrian center nearby so its structure made the experiment possible. However the authors’ aim was to show just how possible this relationship is. Most schools will find equestrian centers or animal refuges within practical reach, so their approach could be applied to a whole range of establishments from kindergarten to high school. The work maps out their theoretical thinking and how it applies to the national education curriculum as well as providing a whole host of concrete practical examples.