A speaker explores how to break free from traditional education's constraints by examining alternative models like Waldorf, Montessori, and self-directed learning. He argues that giving students freedom builds responsibility and intrinsic motivation, and that learning must be continuous and inseparable from life, requiring community support and diverse perspectives rather than hierarchical structures.
Chapters
I think that something really important is the awareness, awareness of the limitations that this system has, because there are many. And even if you ignore the really bad problems, like, I don't know, maybe school dropout or lack of motivation, Even if you're a super good student and everything goes super well, you finish university and then you turn out that you don't really know what are your passions, what do you like, what do you want to pursue in your life, and you are completely lost. And even if you end up finding a job, still, when I, when I started working, there were so many courses to how to learn in teams, how to trust in yourself, and it's like, how didn't we learn this at school? So we even need to get reinvented and keep learning all the time while we are in that position. So this is super essential, like the fact that we kind of separated learning from life and recluded to the school, and learning is happening all the time. And that's the beauty of that. We are in that constant learning process. So I think that when we say about the inertia, how do we break up the inertia? Maybe at some point really soon, we might not have another option because the things are changing so fast and so drastically that we might need to adapt fast to those changes. Like for example, as it has happened with the pandemic. So I think that creating that awareness, having those conversations more often, because sometimes we, I start those conversations and people get a little bit scared, but Starting those conversations, starting to speak about how could it be and what things can we do, it make us— once that we see the problem, it's really hard to stay blind to it. If you are a teacher and you are teaching and you're using the same methods and then you're like, well, this actually is having these consequences, then I'm going to try to do something different. And for that, we definitely need awareness and a community of people that is also supporting you in that environment. Because it's hard. We tend to always imitate what we have seen, and we have been taught in that particular way. So now we have— when I started teaching, I was like, I want to do it differently. And it was like, but how do I do it differently? It was so hard to think out of the box. But that's where diversity comes in and learning the patterns comes in. That's one of the things that happened during the trip, seeing all these people doing so many different things and having the opportunity to be inspired by that diversity. That was magic. And then only with that inspiration is when starting to experiment and try different things can lead to a solution that might work for you in your particular context. And that way, it's not going to be a solution forever, or for everyone. But in that context, and for this particular situation, and keep evolving from that, not I reach here and this is it, but keep evolving that.
So that's a great segue to the last question, which is how do we instill curiosity and persevere with creating new models? And I want to go to you because you travel the world in search of new educational models. So what did you find? You were just talking about diversity. Can Can you elaborate a little bit more about what did you find in terms of new models?
Yeah, so I started the thesis into innovative education, educational methodologies, and I started with really simple stuff like Waldorf, Montessori, but once I was traveling, it was a wow. Then I discovered democratic schools, self-directed education, unschooling. So it was like the full spectrum from super directed to kids try taking their own decisions. And it blew my mind when I saw them taking those decisions and taking control of their lives. And like the super— the thing that surprised me the most was that when they had the freedom to experience and to experiment and to take control of what they want to do, responsibility comes in. And they do it and they keep going with that decision that they have taken and remodel it and keep going. And that for me was because One of the main challenges teaching was, oh, the kids are not motivated. Well, they are not motivated by the things I want to teach them, but they are motivated about other things. What happens if we leave that opportunity, that space to learn in the way that you consider the best for that particular thing? So the trip was just just going, crushing, like, what every time that I thought like there was— I couldn't learn something more, there was something else and something else. And he was like, wow, this is— and that's where diversity really blew my mind, to be able— also, I think that it would be super fantastic to break the hierarchy inside the school, and that then the diversity of that 30 people that you have there comes in. And we start learning all from each other. And there was one, one guy that we met in India. He's teaching in, in a university called Eswarag University, and he said that the, the spark of curiosity always was alive because he was always learning from all the people that were surrounding him. And he defined like it was— it is a vibrant learning community. And for me, it was like, wow, that Learning from all those different perspectives and being open to listen and communicate, what it makes, what it allows you to, to, to open up a little bit more your point of view and your spectrum of things. So yeah, the, the trip has been that succession that almost— because it's really hard to think, for example, in freedom, what— when you come out from a from a system where everything is structured, as Nora said. If we come from a system where these are the steps and these are the objectives, it's really hard to go out of that. But creating that awareness and listening to that diversity, being inspired and being humble to accept that we might not have the solution and that there might not be a solution for everyone, I think that's probably the hardest thing to accept. That there's not a single solution that fits everyone, but each of us and each in each particular context have to find their own way of working and adapt to the context.
It's interesting that you said that curiosity can be nurtured by giving people the freedom to create, which eventually leads to responsibility.
