Switzerland's Forest Kindergarten 

In recent generations, the American school system has placed increasing academic demands on children from an extremely early age, with less and less time to play and explore. 

 If you've ever thought that your child might be a little overscheduled, you may want to learn more about an intriguing new documentary that highlights a forest kindergarten in the town of Langnau am Albis, Switzerland. In this kindergarten, the children do not have walls, classrooms, or books; they arrive in the forest every day - rain, shine or snow - and are encouraged to play, explore, and create using what they find in the woods.

Read more about this fascinating school here, and see the trailer (right). 

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Israeli "Love Notes" to Parking Officers: 
"Please Don't Give Me a Ticket - Here's Why..."

From PRI.org: "Israel is a tiny, crowded country with not enough parking spots. Hence, all the illegal parking, and the note writing."

"Note writers follow a standard format. They begin with a courteous greeting: “Dear Officer.” Then they explain why they’re parked illegally, and why that’s ok, and why they do not deserve parking tickets."

Here's what the parking officers think of them - and some humorous reasons why they may (or may not) help drivers evade a parking ticket. 

“It started with the great tradition in Judaism of negotiating with God. There are several cases in the Bible of negotiations...So, if you can negotiate with God, why not with a traffic officer?”
--Yaron Ezrahi, political theorist

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Image: Flickr/Julian Stallabrass

A Look into Mexico's Zapatista's Communities

From Huffington Post/WorldPost: "Since their uprising 20 years ago, the Zapatistas of southern Mexico have lived in five secretive, closed-off enclaves that they hold in the poor state of Chiapas. But the rebels recently opened up their communities to more than 7,000 Mexicans and foreigners who came to learn about how the movement self-governs and maintains its autonomy and way of life."

See some rare photos of the Zapatistas and learn more about their communities here. 

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