Open air school

Open air schools or schools of the woods were purpose-built educational institutions for children, that were designed to prevent and combat the widespread rise of tuberculosis that occurred in the period leading up to the Second World War. The schools were built on the concept that fresh air, good ventilation and exposure to the outside contributed to improved health. The schools were mostly built in areas away from city centers, sometimes in rural locations, to provide a space free from pollution and overcrowding. The creation and design of the schools paralleled that of the tuberculosis sanatoriums, in that hygiene and exposure to fresh air were paramount; open air schools however also provided education.

The schools were purpose-built educational institutions for children, that were designed to prevent and combat the widespread rise of tuberculosis that occurred in the period leading up to the Second World War. The schools were built on the concept that fresh air, good ventilation and exposure to the outside contributed to improved health. The schools were mostly built in areas away from city centers, sometimes in rural locations, to provide a space free from pollution and overcrowding. The creation and design of the schools paralleled that of the tuberculosis sanatoriums, in that hygiene and exposure to fresh air were paramount; open air schools however also provided education. Schools were considered to be part of the anti-tuberculosis campaign.

The schools were residential, "set up in tents, prefabricated barracks, or repurposed structures, and were run during the summer". Children were taught in classrooms designed to be partially (in rooms with large open windows) or fully exposed to outdoors, and sleeping was done outside or in wards that were exposed to the elements.

The architecture of some more advanced open air schools in Britain and Europe was built on the traditional 'pavilion plan' which was also used for sanatoria, with a similar internal layout to that used in hospital architecture, with long window-lined hallways. A distinguished example is the École de plein air de Suresnes not far from Paris, which was built by Eugène Beaudouin and Marcel Lods at Mont Valérien between 1932 and 1935.

Open Air Schools were part of a larger open-air school movement which began in Europe with the creation of the Waldschule für kränkliche Kinder (translated: forest school for sickly children), in Charlottenburg, Germany, near Berlin, in 1904. Built by Walter Spickendorff (born 1864) and founded by the paediatrist Prof. Dr. Bernhard Bendix and Berlin's schools inspector Hermann Neufert it offered "open-air therapy" to urban youths with pre-tuberculosis as part of an experiment conducted by the International Congresses of Hygiene. Classes were taught and fed in the surrounding forest. The movement quickly caught on throughout Europe and North America; construction of the buildings began in the first decade of the 20th century and carried on until the 1970s.

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