Our daughter sleeps outdoors in an unheated shed (unless she doesn’t want to)

One of the things we were most excited about for this trip was the opportunity to embed Annalise in the Norwegian child care system, which is very impressive.

We don’t love the US system. A safe child/teacher ratio means you need a lot of workers, and it’s impossible to pay them all what they need to make and still charge parents a reasonable and accessible amount; this makes them simultaneously expensive and underfunded. Teachers leave often for less stressful and better paying jobs and must be quickly replaced with others whose skills may not have been deeply checked. Many parents have to decide if it’s worth it to work, since so much of their salary would go to day care. It’s clear to us that the math on private day care just simply doesn’t work. Not surprisingly, our favorite day care center in the US was Navy-run (i.e., paid primarily from tax dollars).

In Annapolis, we were paying $1400/month. In contrast, Norwegian day cares (a day care center is called a barnehage) are community-supported through tax dollars. Annalise’s barnehage costs us 3000 Norwegian kroner (about $285) a month, which includes care from 7:30-4:30 and three meals a day. For 29 children, they have a staff of 7, each of whom is better paid, less stressed, and more prepared than most child-care workers in the US. Norway offers free undergraduate education to everyone, so each barnehage teacher has 5 years of post-high-school education in early childhood education.

Norwegian child care also reflects a different set of priorities than in the US. For example, in order to train children to be Norwegians, they think children should be outside, regardless of the weather. If it’s 30 degrees and sleeting, the children will be bundled up heavily and marched outside to play in the freezing rain (in a later post we’ll talk about the clothes we’ve bought for her). There is a temperature where they start to keep kids indoors, but it is very, very cold. In comparison, Maryland day cares are only required to have kids outside for a half hour in the morning, and a half hour in the afternoon, unless the weather is remotely bad (or the teachers just don’t want to). The rest of the time, they run around in small rooms screaming and licking things and getting sick.

Norwegians also believe in self-determination for children. There is less emphasis on class-wide guided activities, and instead children are allowed to make most of the decisions of how to spend their time themselves, with much more acceptance of risk. For example, when I arrive to pick her up, Annalise is often climbing a tree. An adult is nearby watching, but is not hovering, and would not be able to catch her if she falls (which I assume she has). Children are given more responsibility for themselves, allowing for a more competent and confident child.

Below is an informational official video explaining Trondheim barnehager to new arrivals from a variety of backgrounds.

The enrollment process was also super nice. At home, enrollment requires a spreadsheet containing every day care in the area, keeping track of where you are on a million different wait lists. Here, we filled out a single Google form with our preferences, and were assigned a day care three days later.

There are some minor weaknesses to the Norwegian system. The government funding and oversight means nearly all the barnehager follow the same philosophies, and it would be difficult to personalize the experience if you needed or wanted to. For some families from different backgrounds, there may be some discomfort as Norwegians are quietly insistent that while they respect where you came from, this is where you are now, and Norwegian priorities are now going to guide your child’s care. But, we think this model is better for Annalise, and better for the vast majority of children and families. A country investing in its children as a society, rather than only allowing each child what their parents can afford, is a refreshing thing.

The tour

Annalise is enrolled at the Singsaker Barnehage. Singsaker Barnehage has two classes, with the older kids like Annalise (aged 3-5) upstairs, and the younger kids (aged 1-2; infants are usually at home with their parents, who generally have generous parental leave) downstairs, sharing outdoor space. There is various playground equipment like slides, climbing areas, a sandbox, a box of trucks, and a fleet of tricycles. There’s a hill, which I imagine comes into its own once sleddable snow falls. There are picnic tables for outdoor meals. There’s also a garden with raspberry and currant bushes, an apple tree, kale, etc. Annalise loves foraged fruit, and has largely stripped the berry bushes all on her own; the fact that currants are pretty sour has not slowed her down. There are puddles to jump in; she comes home muddy and with wet shoes every day.

The front gate has a set of flags featuring some of the other native countries children have been from (it does not contain an American flag for us, so it’s at least a little out of date).

One wall of the shed proclaims their commitment to the 17 UN goals of sustainable development. Admirable goals all, if not all equally applicable to an early childhood education environment (I would be surprised if Infrastructure Week came to barnehage). One goal that is well reflected at Singsaker Barnehage is equality between the genders: two of Annalise’s three teachers are men, while Annalise has had zero male caregivers in the states.

Of course the children have naptime. Given that they’ve perhaps been outside in the freezing snow all morning, and are muddy, wet, and tired, they like to come inside, curl up where it’s warm, and take a cozy protected nap. After all, small people don’t have to be tough Vikings all the time.

Nah, just kidding, they sleep in this shed:

You’ll notice it’s open-air, to allow the cold winter air to circulate, and to make it easier for an adult to monitor from outside. It doubles as stroller storage; Norwegian strollers are different from American ones in that they are essentially wheeled sleeping bags. At naptime, children are asked if they want to nap (self-determination!). If they do, they’re put in the sleeping bag in their stroller for the nap. An adult hangs out outside the shed, to make sure nobody falls out or otherwise gets into trouble.

We caused a problem here – Annalise doesn’t like strollers and Norwegian strollers are expensive, so we don’t have one. They had to find a mattress for her to put her sleeping bag on.

Despite these personal accommodations, Annalise does not really like the shed and has been declining naps (“I like to sleep in my bed”). We hope she adjusts! By Friday she is very tired!

The inside is not so different from US day cares. The children each have a cubby, there’s a special place for rainy and muddy clothes to dry off, and they have a couple rooms in which to play and eat.

We are going to have a lot more to say about barnehage!