Design Thinking, Night Hikes, and Real-World Discovery: A Look Inside Terra’s Fall Learning Experiences
At Terra School, learning doesn’t stay inside a classroom — it moves through forests, across fields, into local neighborhoods, and out into the city. This fall, our students have been immersed in a powerful blend of human-centered design, outdoor education, and real-world fieldwork, all grounded in Terra’s mission to help young people become curious, capable, lifelong learners.
From night hikes to STEM labs hidden inside escape rooms, here’s a closer look at how Terra students learn by doing.
Middle School: Human-Centered Design Comes to Life
This quarter, Terra’s Middle School launched a deep dive into Human Centered Design, a project that teaches students to solve problems by observing, experimenting, collaborating, and iterating — the same methods used by designers, engineers, and innovators around the world.
To spark this work, students completed a hands-on Design Thinking Bootcamp on campus. Working in small teams, they navigated a custom code-breaking challenge designed to strengthen collaboration and flexible thinking.
That experience prepared them for a field trip to The Battery Atlanta, where they stepped into a live engineering environment:
Escape Room Challenge — Students tackled a real-time breakout experience requiring teamwork, communication, and creative problem-solving
Behind-the-Scenes STEM Program — A guided session revealed the engineering behind escape rooms, including the set-up, facilitation, control room operations, and the central “brain” computer system
Engineering + Empathy — Students learned how these immersive experiences are designed for real humans with real needs — a perfect parallel to their Human Centered Design work
Back at Terra, Middle Schoolers are creating their own breakout games for Fall Expo. Families and guests will get to see students demonstrate the full design cycle — from empathy and brainstorming to prototyping, testing, and iteration.
This is project-based learning at its best: hands-on, imaginative, and grounded in real-world relevance.
Lower Studios: Light, Shadow, and the Natural World
While our Middle Schoolers explored engineering and human-centered challenges, younger learners stepped into immersive experiences of their own.
Mountains & Temperate Rainforest Studios
These groups are studying light and shadow — and to bring science to life, they’re visiting Illuminarium Atlanta, an interactive venue where light becomes something students can walk through, experiment with, and wonder about. The field trip builds on classroom investigations of movement, reflection, and how light helps us understand the world.
Tropical Rainforest Studio
This studio is heading to Wild Animal Safari in Pine Mountain, GA, where learners will observe animals up close and study external structures, behaviors, and adaptations. For young scientists, this kind of firsthand observation fosters deep curiosity and helps them connect biology concepts to the living world.
Across all age groups, Terra’s approach is simple:
Children learn more — and remember more — when they experience it.
Outdoor Education: Learning From Nature, Day and Night
Terra’s outdoor education team continues to expand students’ connection to nature through daytime exploration and night hikes right here on campus. Led by our outdoor educator, Marika, these experiences help students build:
confidence in natural environments
sensory awareness
teamwork and trust
ecological understanding
resilience and independence
Research shows that time outdoors supports academic performance, mental well-being, and creative problem-solving — which is why nature is not an “add-on” at Terra. It’s a core classroom.
Why This Matters: Innovative Education Just South of Atlanta
Families choose Terra because they want more than traditional schooling. They want:
hands-on experiences
outdoor learning woven into daily life
project-based work that develops real skills
a Montessori-inspired approach that honors each child
a nurturing community in a nature-connected environment
This month’s learning highlights show exactly what makes Terra unique: an educational experience that feels alive, relevant, and deeply human.
From engineering control rooms to wild animal habitats, our students are discovering that learning isn’t something that happens to them — it’s something they do, explore, and create.
See Terra Learning in Action
Interested in how Terra integrates art, design thinking, outdoor education, and real-world experiences?
Explore: Terra’s Method and Values →
Or schedule a visit to see campus for yourself.
