Regenerative Learning

Standardised education has domesticated children’s minds: rewilding education will help young people of all ages to explore and freely inhabit the landscapes of the mind.

Humans learn as naturally as plants photosynthesize. Education is a process of growth, nourishment and communication. Concerningly some inflexible, unresponsive education systems are functioning like factory farms, doggedly churning out undernourished individuals packaged and stamped with various standardised seals of approval.

Children are born curious. They arrive in the world equipped with a powerpack, and a set of genetic instructions trialled and tested by natural selection. Nature has ensured we have a long childhood to give us time to play, question, cooperate and learn in our own good time. So why are we diminishing playtime and determinedly educating children out of their curiosity? Given trust and freedom children are very good at educating themselves. Not because they are genius, simply because they are human. Unschooling, homeschooling, and alternative schools offer different approaches towards similar objectives: supporting children to grow at their own pace; giving them the freedom to follow paths that interest them, and not squeezing them into a standardised frame. We at Rewild the Mind would like to see that practice in mainstream education. Regenerative education embraces children’s and adolescents’ innate skills while paying attention to the specific and urgent needs of digital native 21st-century children.

In regenerative agriculture depleted soil is regenerated by applying naturally derived nutrients, and soil health is maintained and protected by biodiversity above and below ground. Across the globe, successful regeneration and conservation are driven by site-specific, flexible and responsive management strategies.

Regenerative learning takes place in city streets and parks, at home, on the internet and strolling through a redwood forest. It is an intentional movement that knows no cultural, social, gender or economic boundaries.

Humans are lifelong learners­. Knowledge flows in all directions and learning is a communal experience. In nature, we learn within mixed ages groups, adults guiding from experience and children opening out fresh pathways that can benefit the group. Formal education unnaturally segregates learners into age-defined closed compartments. Of course, age-dependent mental development needs to be considered, but the current education system isolates learners into peer groups throughout the day. This thwarts social and intellectual development and can lead to lifelong ageism. “The true direction of the development of thinking is not from the individual to the social, but from the social to the individual.” Lev S. Vygotsky

At Rewild the Mind we are not homeschool or unschooling evangelists. Schools are vital hubs in communities, for many children, they provide both academic and emotional stability. We would like to see these community 'hubs' expand their activities into the home and into the community. Flexible working hours are becoming the new normal for parents. Why not flexible learning hours for children? Why not let learning be an integrated community-based activity? There are many, often undervalued, individuals in our communities who could contribute to our children's education.

The essence of community is sharing. The essence of effective sharing is communication.

Nature has had billions of years to evolve efficient systems for sharing and communicating. Sunshine, made possible by quantum tunnelling in the sun’s core, is converted into glucose by microscopic cells in leaves. This sugar feeds the plant and the excess feeds the filigree roots of fungi, which form an entangled network through which water, nutrients and information flow across entire ecosystems. The wonder of that is poetry in action.

Teachers in cooperative groups can act like mycelium helping students to nourish and be nourished by diverse interconnected topics.

The power of interconnected knowledge shared through communication networks is boundless. Humans learn as naturally as plants photosynthesize. Education is a process of growth, nourishment and communication.

Blades slicing through soil indiscriminately cut off nature’s underground communication networks: unchecked and repeated this can do lasting damage. Education programmes slicing through the cords of human narratives are cutting off the flow of knowledge that links us to our past, nourishes our present and empowers unimagined futures. Separating chemistry, from biology and physics; history from geography; music from maths; philosophy from technology, and imaginative creativity from exploratory logic is preventing children from engaging with fundamental aspects of human knowledge.  21st-century technology is offering us access to fresh information that is deepening our understanding of the universe, nature and humankind.

The bio- architect Neri Oxman’s 21st Century take on Da Vinci’s Vitruvian man provides rich fuel to explore the cyclic connections between the imagined, the material, the aesthetic, the sensory, the emotional, and the tangible. She calls it Material Ecology. For more on this click on the button below.

Rewilding learning is as essential for our survival as rewilding the soil. We are at a critical moment in human history. We need engaged thinkers and creative problem solvers who are equipped with a body of knowledge that will enable them to ask good questions.

We are living in the nano and bio revolution and yet our education systems have made no attempt to integrate teaching children about the quantum world.

The earth and the sky and the stars have always driven children’s primal fascination and scientific inquiry. Rewilding means re-exploring the stars, the sky and the soil and applying 21st-century knowledge and technology. Children find ‘hard’ science easy because they have wonder. Wonder is a powerful resource: sometimes squandered in education systems that are driven by standardised grades and narrow expectations.

As things stand a diligent student who has followed the world-renowned English system may leave school with 8-10 GCSEs and 3-4 A levels but they will have moved through a vertically directed system with a progressively narrowing focus that is disappointingly unnutritious and very time consumming.

“Most of my interesting learning takes place out of class. I look for things online and my friends show me so much stuff they are interested… way better than most of the stuff we get in class.” Arseney (16)

“ I feel pretty angry, A’ level biology is really hard and half the things I learned in my GCSE bio are rubbish. Leo (17)

“ I am so bored, I thought A’ levels would be more interesting. I hate what was my favourite subject. I just want it to stop.| Eliza (17)

These representative quotes come from well-motivated, bright students with excellent predicted grades.

A student who has been educated through the International Baccalaureate system will have had a broader, more balanced education that supports creative independent thinking. Click here to learn more International Baccalaureate

The liberal arts IB programmes offer intra-school constructed highly integrated curricula that are teacher-guided and student-inspired. Through direct practice, independent learning, active problem-solving, and questioning assumptions students gain the skills to be effective lifelong learners. Progress is monitored by teacher assessment and standardised testing is introduced in the final two years. The IB offers a highly respected internationally accepted enriched education. It is a formalised, prepacked version of rewilding education that has a great deal to offer. Sadly there are very few schools that offer the full programme. Click here for up to date information. Global IB programmes. Equally concerning is the external and parental pressure currently being exerted on IB teachers to standardize younger students' journeys.

It is common for students to take the IB as an alternative to A’ levels. Many years teaching bright students transitioning from the GCSE’s to the IB has been salutary. A surprising number struggle: for one simple reason. They are not well practised at joined-up independent thinking, and they are not used to the liberation of answering open questions. It is not the children’s fault, nor is it their teachers’ fault. The exam-based system designed for another century has broken beyond repair.

Rewilding tests and assessments.

Assessing students can, and should, support multiple means of expression: exams and tests predominantly assess memory. However, teacher or student-generated tests have a place and can act as a net to catch misunderstandings. Specific, unstandardized tests and quizzes can be creative and supportive.

Standardised static curricula in a rapidly changing world cannot serve the needs of 21st-century digital native children. Often following the requirements of a curriculum means that students are not kept up to date with relevant and fascinating knowledge. This is frustrating for teachers and students alike. Universal courses fail to offer diverse and site-specific relevance.

Trust teachers and students and let them develop cross-discipline connected curricula that will offer narrative and context. These can be internally assessed via multiple means to suit the needs of individual students: film, design, dance, experimentation, analytical reports, plays, cooking and of course in writing…the list is endless.

Exams are unimaginative, outdated and limiting. Universal standardized courses cannot offer diverse, relevant, site-specific courses to a global audience of students.

We need a revolution. We want to hear your ideas: students, educators, caregivers, family members and members of the community.

We at Rewild the Mind have experienced homeschooling as both guides and learners.

To learn more about our homeschool practice please go to: