Fundamental ideas

Ses Milanes-créixer a la natura is based on five ideas that, although presented below as formally separate sections, do not function as independent concepts, but there is an interrelation between them.

  • Respect for nature
  • Spontaneous play
  • Respectful accompaniment
  • Healthy and vegetarian diet
  • Microeconomics based on sustainable and community self-management

Combining nature, spontaneous play, emotional accompaniment, exploration, experimentation and observation, accompanied by a healthy and vegetarian diet, promotes the integral health of children.

In nature because…

  • Promotes movement; fine and gross motor skills.
  • It benefits our immune system. Our body begins to remember the natural reactions and adaptations to different climates, thus decreasing the chances of getting sick, reinforcing and creating acquired defenses.
  • Enhances the capacity for observation, concentration and attention. Our perceptual field naturally expands and allows us to focus on a single point.
  • It facilitates reasoning, critical thinking and problem solving, as well as decision-making in the face of different challenges.
  • It favors the formulation of hypotheses, verification of them; opens the way to the scientific method through the observation of nature.
  • It favors the development of language and enhances the breadth of vocabulary.
  • Develop imagination and enhance creative processes.
  • Decreases stress and anxiety. The energies of the children are released, the muscles develop better with different movements, forces and tensions necessary to play and move through the forest. The balance, the calculation of distances, forces and capacities of the body itself are adjusted and the senses are sharpened.
  • Natural spaces are not overstimulant and allow moments of expansion and others of recollection.
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In nature, the child contacts their most intimate needs, allowing a dialectic with the environment, through which they build a relationship and thus lay the foundations for the construction of their own self, their personality. The relationship with the other, as a natural element or as part of a group where there are different ages allows us to define ourselves and create the bases for our identity and for a good capacity for relationship and communication with others.

Free and spontaneous play because…

Ses Milanes promotes free and spontaneous play, where all activities are created and developed from the needs and curiosities of children with the support and support of the companions. Forests, groves, reedbeds, thickets and undergrowth are part of the play space. In these spaces where recollection and expansion alternate, nature happens as the place
to learn. Children use the materials present in nature such as earth, branches, stones and leaves to discover and learn together.
Occasionally they are provided with some tools to interact and experiment with the environment such as magnifying glasses, books on flora and fauna or ropes, among others.

In the first years of life it is important to give children the possibility of being in relationship with their peers in a natural environment where they can find all the necessary elements to develop their creative and expressive capacity through spontaneous play.

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Respectful accompaniment because…

Together with the families, the companions act from the presence and active listening. In this way they can accompany in the process of growth and learning of the child at an evolutionary, physical, cognitive and emotional level.
It is from the physical and emotional needs of age, as well as the bond established between companion and child, and between companion and family, that this type of respectful accompaniment is generated.
The childhood stage is the basis of the formation of our personality and relationships with others so it is very important the involvement of families together with the companions for an integral support to the growth process.

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Vegetarian food because…

There are numerous arguments that have led to this decision. From an ethical point of view, putting respect for animal life first. From a nutritional perspective, there is enough scientific evidence that corroborates that a vegetarian diet in childhood can provide all the necessary requirements for growth, at the same time it reduces and prevents the development of multiple diseases such as obesity or diabetes among others.
It should be added that there is numerous literature and evidence that show that the first cause of deforestation worldwide is the intensive production of meat products, so it seems coherent, in a project in which we work immersed in nature and feeling part of it, promote the cessation of its consumption.

Microeconomics based on sustainable and community self-management because…

The families of Ses Milanes are part of an associative, cooperative and community project. It is a citizen initiative, a prepaid service is not offered, nor a consumer good, and therefore energy, involvement, dedication, commitment and presence are required to maintain and contribute to the growth of the project. Each person involved undertakes to assume different responsibilities during their period of stay at Ses Milanes. In this way, with the contribution of working hours, the association saves extra expenses that would entail having to raise the fee.

At the same time, the self-managed and sustainable nature of the project is supported and also depends on the economic commitment of the families with the quotas. The balance between affordable quotas and living wages is substantially fragile. One of the objectives of Ses Milanes – creixer to nature that no child is deprived of their participation in the project for economic reasons. Therefore, it is intended that families that can contribute more than the base quota, contribute with a greater economic contribution to the project, and thus, access will be facilitated to those that momentarily can not reach the established quota.