5 Tips for Your Family’s Epic Learning Journey
With the return of travel, and many parts of the world opening up to post-pandemic travelers and their families, we have had much interest from millennials in understanding how we took off for a year and half to unschool our daughters by curating educational experiences around the globe.
A large proportion of millennials who had so far dedicated themselves to building financial assets, now have children. They want the best for them and the best parenting experience for themselves too. No trade-offs, please. Sabbaticals are being contemplated and bucket lists are being finalised. Much advice is out there for families wanting to go on that epic journey of their lives and having their children learn on-the-road (or boat, or space-ship… well, soon!) However, very little of this is about focussing on the education of the young minds, and much more on having a good time.
Quest-based learning through travel
Our approach was radically different. In 2019, my husband Shashank and I took tandem sabbaticals from our jobs, pulled our kindergartener and pre-schooler from “school” and left on a journey that would allow our kids to learn from the world that lay outside the four walls of their classroom, instead of the one which was inside. At that time, we had no idea that worldschooling was a thing or was about to become one. What we did know was that a tantalising educational journey was calling out to us from the future. All we had to do was to heed it, and be open to emerging on the other side, wherever in the world it would be! So we did.
Some part of you is probably itching to go on your own quest, your family’s unique epic journey. There is a certain romance to throwing caution to the winds and taking off. Yet, quest-based learning is a more conscious way of, well, casting off the sails. Through being led by our children’s curiosity emerged a whole way of learning and a model for designing such learning for other families. Let me share a few principles that shaped our family’s first-hand experience. I believe they will enrich your own!
