As enrollment reaches its peak with just a few weeks left to enroll for the 2019-20 school year, we’re happily meeting all kinds of new families.
During one recent meeting an educated mother asked, “So how do you incorporate all kids’ interests?”
A valid question. Our cohorts are intentionally small so that we can individualize the content for them as often as possible, but without sounding harsh – we don’t live in a bubble. Not every kid gets lessons catered to their interests every single day. We value make learning engaging and relevant, but we’re also here to address what all of our kids need as a collective.
What does happen is that our kids learn to trust us and learn to look out for one another. It doesn’t take long for our kids to see that they are seen and heard and it doesn’t take long for them to see that their days won’t be boring with us. (Check out any of the prior posts from the last few weeks to see how our learning activities are engaging and varied.)
There is a trust that is established that our kids know that whatever it is we’re doing, that it will be beneficial. The ability to remain open is a skill that is valuable on many levels. To people, to opportunities, to experiences, to mistakes, to successes.
So while their academic and personal interests, growth, and needs are incorporated, sometimes our flexible nature allows us to be treated to experiences that are unplanned and serendipitous.
Like getting to be extras in a Hallmark movie. You read that right.
Our kids have been working on a variety of botany, biology, and chemistry topics through their first and second units this year. They cultivated both a real garden and an aquaponic garden. They also chose to take a videography course this year which built off of their interests from last year’s photography classes. So when we got the call to be in a Hallmark movie entitled, “True Love Blooms” that centered around a woman trying to save her community garden, we cleared a morning and went for it!
In a few short hours, we got to see examples of collaboration and leadership at work. And because we remained open-we all walked away with a great, likely once in a lifetime, experience!
If you would’ve asked any of us if we were going to do that at the beginning of the year, we wouldn’t have seen the possibility. But if you ask our kids now if they were glad that they were prepared and remained open to the opportunity, I know they’d say, “Yes!” … just like their one line in the opening scene.
If you’re open to flexible learning via experts, experiences, and real life, we’d love to help your child “bloom” too.