Photo: Courtesy of Charlestown Nursery School

“In 1918 in New York City, they took all the children outside,” Kelly Pellagrini, the co-founder and co-director of Charlestown Nursery School, tells NBC’s local news station, describing how people coped during the 1918 flu pandemic.

Just over a century later, Pellagrini and her staff are doing the same thing, moving the 85 children in their program to a local park.

“Every morning… we pack up everything that we have inside the classroom, and we bring it outside,” Pellagrini says.

The nursery school moves its materials in wagons.

Photo: Courtesy of Charlestown Nursery School

NBC news adds:

“Co-director Cady Audette said while they are bringing things like books, paint blocks and even magnifying glasses out to the public space, the biggest thing to note is, ‘none of it is extraordinary or out of the ordinary.’

“The result is a class with no classroom but plenty of space for learning.”

Photo: Courtesy of Charlestown Nursery School

Once it gets too cold, Charlestown Nursery School will move back inside.

Photo: Courtesy of Charlestown Nursery School

But for now, the program will stay outside — showing how a strategy plucked from history still has the power to keep today’s children safe, healthy, and learning.