Fog City Explorers Forest School

Our Teachers

Welcome to Fog City Explorers!

Let’s meet the teachers!!!

Rachel Weiss, the Director of Fog City Explorers, was inspired to start her own outdoor, nature based school because she saw a need for high-quality care during this uncertain and unpredictable time. Rachel started her teaching career in New York City, right after she graduated from the University at Buffalo. While teaching , she went on to further her career, where she studied Early Childhood education and studied in a Duel Master’s Program - in literacy and early childhood education. Rachel moved to San Fransisco 10 years ago and has worked in a school setting for the past 15 years. Rachel met her husband in SF and is a mother to a very active and sweet girl named Lily. Her favorite days of teaching and as a parent is when she goes on adventures, exploring the magnificent and vibrant city of San Francisco and the Bay Area. Rachel loves circle time, songs, reading to children, and laughing with them. She feels so fortunate to live in a city where so much nature and beauty is right at our fingertips.

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Allie Smith is our program coordinator, and Yoga Instructor. Allie has been in San Francisco over 10 years. She has a Masters Degree in Early Childhood Education from Mills College (‘18). Before teaching, she worked as a nanny for a Waldorf family and became familiar with the concept of nature and the outside world being a child’s first classroom: learning themselves first, and how they connected to the physical world around them. Allie has a child-care provider for 10 years and a teacher for 4. Her favorite things to do as a teacher are reading aloud, exploring and climbing, and engaging children with humor (her masters’ thesis was on using humor to promote cognitive flexibility and emotional regulation).  She also teaches Cardio Pilates with Burn Pilates SF, a woman-owned SF local business, now online. Allie tries to bring energy and humor to her practice, encouraging children to ask questions and create stories together.

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Jesse Rothenburger: Teacher; grew up in southern Massachusetts, spending much of her childhood exploring and learning in the outdoors with her family. She graduated from the University of Massachusetts Amherst with a degree in Art and Art History.  She began her career in education by curriculum writing and leading an after school and summer program for grades 6-8. After being a substitute teacher for a local preschool, Jesse decided to focus more on preschool aged children and education. She studied Early Childhood Education and child psychology at Bunker Hill College in Boston, and got her teaching certificate in 2009. Jesse taught preschool and curriculum development at the Cambridge Family YMCA  from 2009-2013, focusing mainly on art, nature and movement based learning. Jesse moved to San Francisco in 2014 and got certified to teach in the state of California as well.Jesse was a lead teacher in the Sunset district from 2014-2017, along with caring for the child of a private family and working in the restaurant industry.Jesse’s favorite aspect of teaching this age group is being able to share a renewed passion and awe for the amazing environment that we are able to live in and explore. She believes that flexible and curiosity based, hands on learning is the best way to reach every child on an individual level and get both teachers and students to bond and learn. Being able to laugh and learn new things from students this age is what keeps each day memorable and almost always unique.

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Colby Waggle: Teacher; graduated last year with a degree in Environmental Studies. She is passionate about the environment and equal educational opportunities and hopes to continue towards a career in outdoor education. She believes nature connection is a vital tool for young people and children to encourage the development of healthy habits that are geared towards an environmentally friendly and sustainable lifestyle. She completed an Americorps year of service in 2020, working as a coordinator for a literacy intervention program at an elementary school in San Francisco. After which, Colby chose to pursue a job as a forest school teacher where she looks forward to the excitement each day brings. Colby loves to encourage the children to use components found in nature for art and believes in the creativity that being immersed in a natural environment can bring forth in each child

Testimonials

“ We used Fog City Explorers this summer for an outdoor camp and it was AMAZING! Teacher Rachel & Allie are so good at incorporating nature into play and learning. They are extremely patient, loving, and fun with kids. They come up with creative ways to problem solve and allow the kids to ask questions that develop into meaningful conversations. They are excellent at communicating with parents and very good about following CDC guidelines for Covid concerns. I felt at ease leaving my son with them and he had a blast!! HIGHLY RECOMMEND! “

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“I have taught alongside Rachel over the past few years. She is compassionate, light hearted, well educated and full of great ideas. Her warmth draws in students and parents alike and I have watched her form many deep connections within her school community. The Fog City Explorers is destined to be a success under her leadership”.

Philosophy

How does a child see the world?

At Fog City Explorers, we believe in children constructing their own view: to be the architects and builders of their world together, a community of doers, diggers, climbers, wanderers and seekers. We are the gatherers of rocks and twigs and dandelions, spending our days outdoors connected to the things we love most. We are an outdoor school focused on creating a caring, conscientious community that asks more questions than answers, that explores all places, that tries things, and that plays with abandon. We seek to facilitate a safe space for children to roam, to discover, to inquire, to climb up toward the sky while rooted in respect for the earth. It is our goal to provide an environment that helps each child to feel confident and capable. In our program, children will feel empowered to follow their wonder in a safe space.

Fog City Explorers is a Forest School, which is an outdoor school that provides children with the opportunity to spend time immersed in nature, socializing without the confines of a physical classroom. Forest schools are child-centered, interest-led, and play based. At Fog City Explorers, we believe in Inquiry based learning, an approach that emphasizes the stakeholder: what does it mean to us? We that ask are the meaning makers, and our wonder is the fabric of our process. Together we question, construct, frame, and experience the world. Natural environments inspire creative play, inspire concentration, develop problem solving skills, invite teamwork and cooperation and boost gross motor and fine motor development. Children have the opportunity to learn through all of their senses, connecting to nature and building positive relationships.

Location

Fog City Explorers is located in San Francisco’s Nature filled landscapes. Such as Golden Gate park, The Presidio, Glen Canyon Park Stern Grove and other rich terrain. Our locations are driven and designed around the children’s interests. Teachers make careful observations and document the children’s interest and learning to support curriculum planning for the following classes. We start and end each day with a group gathering to share about the day and strengthen our community. Each day is filled with dramatic play, climbing and running, sensory explorations, observations and time to reflect. Teachers bring age appropriate tools to support fine motor and cognitive growth. We have shovels and buckets, bowls and spoons, magnifying glasses, books, paper and pencils for furthering our play and discoveries. We will also bring art materials (paint, clay, collage, etc.) to use with natural materials for creative explorations and expression Connecting with nature is vital to a child’s happiness and growth. At Fog City Explorers, we want to provide an environment that supports the cognitive, social, and emotional growth of each child.

Fog City Explorers will be outside in all weather, which can change rapidly in the San Francisco Bay Area, from warm and sunny, too cold and foggy. Dressing properly, in layers, with appropriate foot gear and clothing is required for a safe rewarding learning experience. If you need references for gear please ask and they will be provided.

About our program

Fog City kids spend their entire day outdoors in SF’s most magnificent parklands. Children are curious by nature, and in this natural setting their curiosity is truly boundless. Towering redwoods, native flowers, and coastal shrubs are the habitat of play and theater of imagination. Songbirds and an ancient spring-fed brook found in the presidio provides a rich sensory environment that rewards both quiet attentiveness and derring-do.

There are no screens or plastic toys here. Instead, the children use their limitless imaginations to engage with each other and with the many natural materials available to them. Fog City kids enjoy unparalleled inspiration for play and opportunities for cooperation, problem-solving, risk-taking, and scientific observation of the diverse flora and fauna that surround them. Whether turning over stones to see who might live in the soil, collecting shells and stones, or foraging for fruits and edible flowers, children are present, invested, and engaged, and reaching for the next tree limb. In this rich environment, children learn with all of their senses engaged.

Our school is social. Hiking together, we encourage both autonomy and community. We work together, we listen to one another, we wait for each other, we root for each other. We believe in ourselves as capable, positive, resilient, and inquisitive people: our questions are not answered, they are discussed, and our woes are not dismissed, but considered. We talk, we walk, we wonder!

What are “the rules”?

We have three rules:

• Take care of yourself.
• Take care of others.
• Take care of the Earth.

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How do we look out for the children’s safety?

Our educators encourage children to cultivate the powers of self-awareness, independence, and observation every day, allowing them to better assess risk during active play. Research shows that letting children take and manage risks is an important life skill that can actually help keep kids safer (cite: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3499858/). Fog City kids will sometimes get scrapes or bruises; these experiences are essential to the process of learning about our bodies and navigating our physical world.We offer support for any situations the children cannot handle, facilitated by our very low 1:4 teacher: child ratio.

Admissions

Join the Fog City Explorers community in a few easy steps:

Explore our website

We’ve provided information about our philosophies and offerings to help you decide if our program may be right for your family.

1. If you would like to enroll in Fog City Explorers, or are interested in finding out more…
2. Please familiarize yourself with the material on our website.
3. Send an EMAIL to the director [email protected] and tell us about your child, name, date of birth, and what has drawn you to our program, as well as any information about previous programs your child has participated in.
4. Schedule a “tour” which is a scheduled time to “meet” and talk about your needs as a family, what you are looking for in our program, and what we can offer you. We can “meet” by speaking on the phone, or set up a zoom meeting.
5. Submit an Enrollment Application. If you would like to enroll,

Come see what makes Fog City Explorers unique. We are currently hosting tours, you can request or schedule a tour at the top of this page. Submit an Enrollment Application

If you would like to enroll, please submit an application.

Enroll

After reviewing your application, we’ll send an enrollment invitation. Upon accepting your invitation you’ll pay your enrollment fee, fill out enrollment documents and review our Parent Handbook.