Radio New Zealand - Te Reo Irirangi o Aotearoa

In 1910 a Polish Jewish paediatrician and children's author - who wrote under the name Janusz Korczak - established an orphanage like none other before it or since.

It was a fully functioning democracy with a parliament, courts and its own newspaper.

The orphanage and Korczak's ideas became internationally known and celebrated.

Sadly the radical experiment in democracy came to a tragic end with the invasion of Nazi Germany in 1939. Korczak and his 190 orphans - all of whom were Jewish - were sent to the gas chambers of Treblinka.

But the idea of a truly democratic education lives on. In Israel the democratic school movement boasts 25 schools and and another 400 public schools are going through the process of democratisation.

This week on Ideas we talk to:

Yaacov Hecht the founder of the Israel's Democratic School Movement;

Freya Donoghue - a year 13 student at Christchurch's Unlimited Paenga Tawhiti High School and a former student of Tamariki - a democratic primary school, and;

Former Children's Commissioner Ian Hassall - a fan of Janusz Korczak and long time advocte of children's rights.

Links:

Israel Democratic School Movement

Janusz Korczak biography

Korczak's Declaration of Children's Rights

Tamariki Primary School

Unlimited Paenga Tawhiti