The Walkabout

The Walkabout education model is a self-directed learning experience that is based on an Aboriginal coming-of-age ritual.  The core of the model is five "Challenges" (called "Passages" by the school we visited). These challenges cover areas of life:  adventure, practical skills, creativity, logical inquiry, and community service.  The student selects the specific project for each challenge (with the help of an advising group) and creates the plan to accomplish it.

To be clear, these challenges must really be challenges.  The student must select challenges which are really hard, ones which force them to face fears or require a lot of physical and/or mental exertion.  These things are meant to take years, not months.  This is a plan for all of high school.

When they have completed these challenges, the idea is that they are ready for adulthood.  They have proven their readiness to be a responsible member of the tribe.  I highly recommend Maurice Gibbons' article introducing this idea http://www.selfdirectedlearning.com/walkabout.html.

This model seems quite logical to me as a road map for the high school experience.  It creates an experience where learning has real meaning.  There is a reason for the learning.  The teen is highly engaged in her high school experience.  By creating the challenges, she will grow as a person and learn along the way.  This is not an easy way out.

As my daughter weighs the pros and cons of different high school options, we will incorporate all or some of the Walkabout model over the next four years.  She will be an active participant in her education.  She will do more than simply pick courses and satisfy requirements.  Hopefully, when she is 18 years old, she'll have completed some challenges, faced some fears and feel ready to join the world community as an active and engaged adult.

Re-thinking high school

As my daughter finishes her 8th grade year, we are confronted with what to do for high school.  It seems the beginning of middle school and high school are common times that homeschoolers enter "traditional" school.  It has always puzzled me since, I feel, that as kids get older and have more maturity, the opportunities for learning in the community expand greatly.

However, as our family approaches this point ourselves, we are confronted with the reality that homeschoolers can have a difficult time finding peers with whom to socialize.  The "easy" answer is to jump into a place that has lots of kids the same age:  a school.  But is it worth all the sacrifices:  the loss of control over your time; the negative peer pressure; the bells, whistles, hurtles, hoops, etc.?  These are the questions we face.

Parenting choices are rarely easy.  This is merely one more in our quest to provide our children with the most healthy and nurturing environment that we can.  We want to prepare our children for the adult world that they will eventually have to enter.  What is the best way?  Traditional school hardly seems the answer.

We visited a non-traditional school the other day.  I was excited by their model.  Thrilled to find an educational institution that did not seem like an institution.  It is a wonderful place...if you have to go to school.  However, no matter how wonderful the model, it is still, alas, a school.  It still has the trappings of school:  the shallow interactions, the peer pressure, the posing.  This school, I admit, seems to have less than a traditional school, but it is still there.

This school, however, has introduced us to a potential model for our high school experience:  The Walkabout.  Read my next post to learn more.

TTFN