Alcott Learning

Three common education mistakes we see are rooted in an understanding of The Phases of Learning. When you understand the phases, you can make the right educational choices for each phase!

Check out our courses to learn ALL about the phases! Head to our profile for the link. 👆🏻

Check out these sweet holiday activity ideas from families on IG.🎄♥️ Share with us in the comments, what special activities do you have planned this year?
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The holidays are a great time to revisit the best books. What are your favorites?🎄♥️📖 Here our some of ours…

♥️ A Christmas Carol
🎄The Gift of Magi
🤶🏻 The Tailor of Gloucester
❄️ A Little Match Girl
⛄️ How the Grinch Stole Christmas!

And our very favorite, “Alcott Family Christmas”! 🍞♥️🎄

The holidays are a great time to revisit the best books. What are your favorites?🎄♥️📖 Here our some of ours…

♥️ A Christmas Carol
🎄The Gift of Magi
🤶🏻 The Tailor of Gloucester
❄️ A Little Match Girl
⛄️ How the Grinch Stole Christmas!

And our very favorite, “Alcott Family Christmas”! 🍞♥️🎄

Our $49 courses are ✨$15✨ TODAY ONLY!! Don’t miss out!! Cyber Monday Sale 🙌🏼

Website link on on profile or head to AlcottLearning.com.

(Does not include the multiple ages combo course.)

Many families sit in front of the tv during dinner these days. 🥗They may feel there’s nothing to discuss but a little investment in the conversation and connection will go a long way! Consider some of these ideas at dinner tonight.

If you’re a homebased educator, you probably have plenty to discuss every day from what you learned.

Learn all about homebased education at AlcottLearning.com!

The Phases of Learning naturally lead students to purposeful adulthood. The best way to figure out how one can contribute is not through repetitive, superficial learning experiences in a million subjects. Significant time must be carved out for students to focus on what they love. This leads to a greater sense of one’s gifts and increased skill in creating value in the world through those gifts.

Ready to give homebased education a try? Check out our courses! Head to our profile for the link 👍🏻.

Dual enrollment or early college courses can be a fun and engaging way for Scholar and Depth students to get ahead!

Check out our Scholar and Depth Phase courses. Link in profile!

The spookiest character we know at Alcott. 👻🎃

Check out our education courses. We don’t believe in these kinds of scary views! 👻Link in profile.

Happy Halloween! 🎃

The spookiest character we know at Alcott. 👻🎃

Check out our education courses. We don’t believe in these kinds of scary views! Link in profile.

That sums up so much of Scholar Phase (ages 13-6). 🙌🏼🖋📙

Check out our Scholar Phase course at AlcottLearning.com.

It’s easy to overthink or overplan the homebased education experience. Let yourself off the hook by remembering that in Core (ages 0-7) and Love of Learning (ages 8-12) phases so much learning can happen when kids are left to themselves in a space full of creative resources! 🤖🧶🎨🎹🔬✂️🖋🎥🎷♟🩰
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There are so many benefits of homebased education but only some have been studied. Here are a few. 👍🏻

Learn all about homebased education in Alcott courses! AlcottLearning.com
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Let yourself off the hook! It’s tempting to think there is some perfect schedule out there and if we could just dial it in - everything would move smoothly. That’s just not true, especially when it comes to raising a growing family!

Most families need to make some tweaks every 6 weeks or so. Your routine can be just right today and need to be updated a little tomorrow without anything being wrong.

The process of nature unfolding is an integrated process of immense complexity that will take its own course. That said, we can work WITH nature instead of against it by making space for those natural changes.

Feeling stuck? Are there tweaks that that would benefit your family? Check out our course at AlcottLearning.com 👍🏻

At the core of a growth mindset is the belief that we have a RIGHT to learn. Making mistakes and not a knowing are totally legitimate parts of the process.

There is joy, not shame, in growing beyond our old capabilities. We shouldn’t know what we don’t know yet and neither should others. The learning is quite possibly the greatest and most beautiful part of the journey. 💛

Want to learn more about learning? Check out our courses at AlcottLearning.com

Before schools became so focused on high stakes testing, the role of educators was to support families. Schools, and the unhealthy systems supporting them today, were not authoritarian and self-serving in the ways they are becoming so today.

The idea of schools attempting to usurp the role of parents or drastically encroach on family life is recent. There’s been a recognition in the past that parents have, in the great majority of cases, far deeper and greater concern for their children than anyone else could possibly have.

At Alcott we believe that is the proper role of educators! We stand against any institution that attempts to insert itself between parent and child.

Learn all about our courses and coaching at AlcottLearning.com.

Have you tried a Core Phase toy rotation?🐻🚒 Unstructured play is one of THE primary ways kids learn.

To maximize that learning and encourage greater engagement, we can take some tips from a Montessori approach.

What ways do you help inspire and support play in your learning spaces at home?

Learn all about Core Phase (Ages 0-7) in our phases course! Head to our profile for the link. 👍🏻

Why is a “nutrient-rich” environment important? A friend and I went to an art space recently with her sweet little girl. The space had several rooms filled with various art supplies that kids can play with however they’d like. 🎨

It was so fun to see her enjoying this creative space! She was totally engaged and could’ve stayed for hours. These helpful spaces are popping up everywhere. We need them!

In traditional schools, the assumption is that adults should be leading every educational experience. This is so wrong! 🙈

Adult modeling and projects with specific objective are only part of the Core or Love of Learning experience. Children keep their natural desire to learn when they are FREE to learn. They need to be allowed to take their time - especially in an environment full of materials or “nutrients”. This is some of the BEST learning out there!
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Did you know that School Board elections aren’t always held on the same day as general elections? Teachers Unions push for this so the general public won’t know the date. They make sure their members are aware of the date but the general public may not be. When is your School Board election?

Regardless of whether or not your children attend public schools, School Boards may have a direct affect on your life. They are very involved in the education laws and finances that affect homebased education families.

This year, get out and vote for pro-school choice candidates!
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People often ask what the very BEST education looks like. Of course, great education looks different in each phase. In Scholar Phase, it looks like this. 👍🏻

Want to learn all about Scholar Phase? Check out our courses at AlcottLearning.com ⭐️

Don't be afraid to follow your gut, plan in more activities based on your child's interests, take what seems like a detour here or there and leave some curriculum on the table this year. 👍🏻

Many of the best learning experiences grow spontaneously out of planned experiences. There is profound logic in how our brains uniquely unfold which often can’t be explained in the moment.

Learn all about your child's learning styles in Alcott courses! Head to our website to access our courses AlcottLearning.com
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Let us help you too! We offer coaching, courses and a year long course to help newer homeschoolers. (Enrollment reopens in March for the New Homebased Educator course.)

Check out our offerings at AlcottLearning.com.

The Phases of Learning is the MOST powerful tool I have found in over 20 years of educational experience. This model encompasses the best research, data, and theory. But most importantly, the phases are rooted in the human developmental process, which means they will bring simplicity into your world, not complexity. 🙌🏼
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Core Phase (Ages 0-7) 👼🏽is a time for learning focused on unstructured play and family routines, supported by the family in a safe, protected, and loving environment.
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Love of Learning Phase (Ages 8-12)🌻is a time for exploration, fun, and discovery! The brain is looking for exposure to lots of new ideas, skills, and experiences as kids gain confidence in their ability to learn and love the process.
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Scholar Phase (Ages 13-16) ✍🏼 is a time for more rigorous academic study, meaningful challenges, and learning how to think. Youth are developing critical thinking skills that will serve them their whole lives.
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Depth Phase (Ages 17+) 🎤 is a time for young adults to have real-world experiences while still having some parent support. The focus is on getting out into the world, developing self-reliance in all areas, and using their unique abilities in meaningful ways.
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When we know what phase our child is in we are able to give them the right resources at the right times! 🔑

At Alcott, we LOVE helping parents use The Phases of Learning! Check out our online courses and resources at AlcottLearning.com for more.
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Did you know that almost any learning experience can be turned into a project? Add these elements and you’ve got everything you need. 👍🏻

Learn more about how to teach your child in our courses at AlcottLearning.com!
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Project-based learning students who designed real toys to test magnetic forces, argued Supreme Court cases and created an irrigation system for a local farm were recently evaluated as a part of a nationwide study.

The findings are pretty awesome! We love PBL for all of these reasons but ALSO because it’s so much fun!! Students, parents and educators really get lost in the beauty of the learning experience.

Create a great project to do with your kiddies this week. 🙌🏼

The studies, conducted by two universities and funded by Lucas Education Research, looked at over 6,000 students in 114 high school and elementary schools across the nation.

Project-based learning students who designed real toys to test magnetic forces, argued actual Supreme Court cases and created an irrigation system for a local farm were recently evaluated as a part of a nationwide study on project-based learning.

The findings are pretty awesome! We love PBL for all of these reasons but ALSO because it’s so much fun!! Students, parents and educators really get lost in the beauty of the learning experience.

Create a great project to do with your kiddies this week. 🙌🏼

The studies, conducted by two universities and funded by Lucas Education Research, looked at over 6,000 students in 114 high school and elementary schools across the nation.

I knew an elementary teacher who often received complaints from parents. Students didn't want to be in her classes, but the school viewed her as a top teacher.

She didn't seem like a lazy or unkind person to me. I was curious as to what was driving this response so I talked with her a bit about her approach.

She told me she felt a lot of pressure and fear about "helping" children prepare for all the required tests. She said, "If 4th graders aren't prepared for the 4th grade test, they will never pass the 5th grade test and so on. That's just reality."

She never mentioned anything about a love of learning or engaging students.

She was tuned into the machine. The school liked that because it meant good tests scores and more funding for their school.

I'm sorry, but - yuck. This is the opposite of the driving force in homebased education where we are tuned into the whole child. Students are not a test score to homebased educators. Period.
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Hitting some snags in the new school year? Let’s talk! Let’s get you the relief abs direction you need to make this year amazing!

Head to AlcottLearning.com to sign-up for a 1:1 coaching session!
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Are you familiar with your state's homeschool association? Are you aware of the Home School Legal Defense Association ?

You are not alone when it comes to dealing with the rules and bureaucracy surrounding homebased education in your state!

It's a good idea to connect with these organizations. They offer great resources and support for homebased education families. 👍🏻

The goal of the Love of Learning Phase (ages 8-12) is to do just that-gain a LOVE of learning 💛. That is developed through exploration, discovery, and sampling as well as opportunities to make choices and exposure to a wide variety learning experiences.

Why is this phase important? It takes place just before the “synaptic pruning” process where the connections in the brain that are not being used will be discarded. And, it’s a fun and beautiful phase!