Resources

A Hero’s Journey

The Hero’s Journey prepares children for their own individual Hero’s Journey in life, asking four questions:

• Who am I?

• What commitments must be made and kept?

• Who will walk beside me? and

• Why am I here?

The primary purpose of the Hero’s Journey is to inspire students to define their gifts, strengths and deep burning interests.

Another important part of the Hero’s Journey is earning a series of LAKE badges. A LAKE badge is a challenge designed to mark progress towards becoming the leader of a healthy organization or movement.  Earning badges gives students more rights and responsibilities in the classroom.

The current badges are:

• Independent Learner - Proving you can learn without a Guide. Usually earned in elementary school.

• Running Partner - Showing you can affirm and hold another learner accountable. Usually earned in late elementary or early middle school.

• Socratic Badge - Demonstrating you can design and lead a Socratic discussion. Usually earned in middle school.

• Project Leader - Qualified to design and lead a project, as part of a quest. Usually earned in middle school.

Students are supervised by adult “Guides” who serve as a support resource for students, rather than as traditional teachers who lecture in front of a class. Guides are responsible for leading discussions and they facilitate individual student learning. Guides are trained to ask A LOT of questions in an effort to encourage children to think for themselves and seek to understand topics at a deeper level.

Badge

LAKE Academy children celebrate the mastery of tools, skills and character by earning badges (not grades), assembling professional portfolios (not transcripts) and taking part in public exhibitions (not tests).

Parents use badges (not national exams) to track academic progress in Core Skills like reading, writing, math and spelling and character development.

Electronic and hard copy portfolios capture rough drafts, photos, videos and other creative work daily.

Public exhibitions at the end of most sessions allow LAKE children to present and celebrate their work to parents, extended family members, or the public for a real world test.

Blended Learning

A style of education in which students learn via electronic and online media as well as traditional face-to-face teaching.

Independent Learner

Someone who can research questions, follow instructions, solve problems—admit that they don’t know something and figure out a solution when they hit a roadblock without asking an adult for help — participate in discussions, and strive for mastery.

Quests

Quests are a five to six week long series of challenges, connected by a narrative and leading to an exhibition of the completed work. 

Quests are designed to deliver 21st century skills, including learning how to apply Core Skills to develop something useful to an individual hero, a community or civil society.

An important part of Quests is that almost all have some way to measure and track outcomes, in a way that mirrors as closely as possible the real world.  For example, if building a bridge, the costs are calculated based on the time and materials required to build the bridge, and the benefits calculated based on the span of the bridge, how much weight it will bear and for how long or the aesthetics based on feedback from citizens or a panel of experts.

Examples of Quests are:

• A Survivor Quest, where children learn CPR, First Aid & Winter Survival

• An Electricity Quest, developing patents for new electrical devices in Edison’s Menlo Park lab.

• A Game Quest where LAKE children design computer games and board games, to be played by the general public as an exhibition.

• A Detectives Quest that delves deeply into forensic science.

• A Psychology Quest that requires dream interpretation, active imagination techniques and experiments in group psychology.

Studio

At LAKE Academy, you won’t find traditional classrooms with children sitting in rows of desks. Instead you’ll find children of multiple age groups working together in studios (think art studio!) creating, learning, teaching and growing together in a relaxed and stress free environment. LAKE Academy offers multiple studios including our Sparks Studio (ages 5-7), Elementary Studio (ages 8-11) and Middle School Co-op (ages 12-14).