Environmentally friendly education: a passive solar, straw-bale school

摘要

The Waldorf students in the Roaring Fork Valley of western Colorado are learning their reading, writing and arithmentic in the cozy confines of a solar heated, naturally lit, straw-bale school. The Waldorf education system, founded in 1919 by Austrain Rudolph Steiner, stresses what's appropriate for the kids, not what's easiest to teach. In constructing a new school, the Waldorf community wanted a building that would reflect their philosophy. There was a long list of requirements: natural, energy efficient, light, warm, alive, and earthy. Passive solar straw-bale construction brought together all those qualities.