After understanding the need to restructure the current education model, it is important to think about the deconstruction of practices that are usually dominant within schools. In the case of physical education, several approaches were used, such as Hygienist, Pedagogical, Sportsman, Technicist, attitudes totally controversial to the objectives of education.

According to studies, these practices were used as a way to control the social, as they sought to transmit knowledge as something unquestionable. In them, education was organized according to the logic of development of specific areas, that is, plastering the way of teaching and not allowing students to think freely, be creative, autonomous, independent and solidary. These physical education models are still used in many educational institutions.

Body practices, without due care, can value trends of inequality or lack of inclusion, which reinforce prejudice, social injustice and the right to differences. Thus, it is necessary that they stimulate students to different experiences, such as; reading, re-signification of beliefs and deepening in games such as dances, fights, gymnastics and other sports. All this applied in a critical way, promoting the rupture of the idea of ​​hierarchy established in the curriculum and the view that teachers teach and students only learn.

In order to change this scenario and social demand, it is necessary that teachers consider the student as a whole, respecting cultural differences, individuality, values ​​and beliefs. With the main focus on students, acting as learning mediators, promoting knowledge through mutual relationships and thinking primarily about the collective. Including political and ideological approaches, breaking the model that has the individual as its main focus.

It is essential that learning is a process in which the student feels a part, where he has the opportunity to participate in the choice of activity, carry out research, share knowledge and evaluate. That is, the practice must be accompanied by factors such as; emergence, main rules, their influence and ideological factors in society. Students must be treated as autonomous beings, capable of managing time and space, exercising their right to citizenship. Assessment is continuous and contributes to the improvement of the learning process.

Finally, physical education must provide contact with the various contents, not only the hegemonic and legitimate ones. All practices must be problematized, with the objective that students have the opportunity to question their experiences, in addition to contributing to a possible debate on the meanings of body practices and their practitioners.

The Open Learning School’s pedagogical proposal involves the formation of people and citizens who are increasingly cultured, autonomous, responsible and democratically committed to building a society that enhances the affirmation of the noblest and highest qualities of each human being.

For the Open Learning School, the school is a social formation in interaction with the environment and other social formations in which, permanently, processes of desired and reflected change converge.

The educational intention of the Pedagogical Proposal includes organizational and relational practices of the School that will also reflect the values ​​that inspired and guided the Open Learning School Project.

The Open Learning School recognizes parents’ absolute right to choose the educational project they deem most appropriate for their children’s education and, at the same time, has the right to propose, to society and interested parents, the educational project that it deems most appropriate. to the integral formation of their students.

The Pedagogical Proposal, being a reference for those looking for certain educational principles and objectives, delimits and guides the intervention of all agents and partners in the life of the School and defines its position in relation to the educational administration.

The curriculum

As each human being is unique, each child’s experience at school, learning and developmental path is also unique. Bearing in mind the principles of the project, the fact that your child is in permanent development must be valued.

The individual needs of each child are met in a particular way, since the specific characteristics of each one imply different ways of assimilating reality. For this reason, every child has specific educational needs, manifesting itself in different forms of social and cognitive learning.

For all these reasons, we always guarantee that:

We pay attention to the student as he is

We recognize what makes you unique, welcoming you in your complexity

We discover and value the culture it bears

We help you to discover yourself and be yourself when interacting with others

These are the educational attitudes that encourage the need and desire to learn.

Both at an individual and social level, the journey of each student presupposes an increasingly in-depth knowledge of himself and a solidary relationship with others. The educational path of each child presupposes the individual (subjective) appropriation of the curriculum, which is evaluated by tutors, parents and herself.

At Open Learning School, we define as curriculum the set of attitudes and skills that, throughout the child’s school career, and according to their potential and interests, they must acquire and develop. The concept of curriculum is understood in a double dimension:

Internal or subjective curriculum

It is a (unique) path of personal development. Only the subjective curriculum (the set of acquisitions of each student) is able to validate the relevance of the objective curriculum.

Objective Curriculum

It is the learning reference: it guides the process and personal fulfillment that results from the Open Learning School’s Pedagogical Proposal in line with the affective and emotional development of the child, as well as the development of attitudes related to the value framework of the pedagogical project.

In this way, your child builds their curriculum according to the evolution of their learning, which is recorded and evaluated on the learning platform. All guardians will have access to all records as well as the family.

How do we evaluate

At the Open Learning School, assessment is formative, continuous and systematic as a regulatory process for learning, constructively guiding the school journey of each student. It also allows you, at every moment, to become aware of what you already know and what you are already capable of.

We accompany your child’s path in the construction of his life project, we manage his learning path in the construction of his Subjective Curriculum and also the progressive consolidation of all the attitudes that define the profile of the individual designed and desired by our educational project.

The evaluation of school performance is understood as a mechanism for diagnosing the possibilities of the student that guides the next steps of the educational process, also having a formative character. It is a continuous, dynamic and cumulative process, with the prevalence of aspects of quality over those of quantity.

In addition to the cognitive dimension, the development of affectivity, socialization, self-knowledge, self-esteem, creativity, ethics and autonomy constitute an essential part of the education of the student and the evaluation process.

The portfolio with evidence of the child’s learning will be duly registered in the computerized system so that parents, children and tutors can follow their evolution. In addition to containing the student’s curricular path, the necessary interventions to help the child are also noted, both in relation to cognitive aspects and in relation to emotional aspects and attitudes.

Your child will have weekly meetings with their tutor. Here, he shows the tutor everything he has produced and, orally or by recording, explains what he has learned, clears up doubts and receives new guidance for the continuity of his learning process.

Every day when your child arrives at school, he plans his day. Depending on your level of autonomy, you can do it alone and then show the tutor to make the necessary interventions, or together with the tutor. The day’s planning is based on the biweekly study guide as a reference base for its elaboration.

The tutor will have individual meetings with the family whenever he feels the need to communicate the student’s evolution. When the family feels the need to better understand the child’s learning, it can also schedule meetings that it deems necessary.

Tutoring

A tutor is responsible for the permanent and individualized follow-up of each student’s curricular path. This will be designated by the School Council, among the School’s educators.

The educators of each learning space are also responsible for the development and learning of each student. Educators are guided by the planning of each child’s day, based on the study guide.

School Assembly

The School Assembly represents the students of the school. Its main objective is to unite and move students to discuss their rights and duties, debating various issues about the school, community and society.

This allows students to discuss, create and strengthen countless possibilities for action, both in the school environment and in the local community. It is also an important space for learning, citizenship, coexistence, responsibility and fighting for rights.

Objectives of the School Assembly

It is important to make it clear that one of the main objectives of the school assembly is to contribute to increasing the participation of children in school activities, organizing championships, lectures, projects and discussions through the formation of Responsibility Groups (elected together and with the objective of to solve problems), making them have an active voice and participate – along with parents, employees, tutors, coordinators and directors – in programming and in the construction of rules within the school.

In the Open Learning School, as a direct intervention device, the School Assembly is the educational organization structure that provides and guarantees the democratic participation of students in decision-making by consensus, which respects the organization and functioning of the School. In this way, the children of the Open Learning School exercise their citizenship and develop their autonomy.

“You cannot give to drink a horse that is not thirsty”, a famous phrase by José Pacheco.

You don’t learn through memorization. Memorizing is not understanding, it is not questioning, it is not exploring or delving into a topic.

Historically, the traditional school was made to form legions of workers around the world during the industrial revolution. It served to teach hundreds of workers, simultaneously, to read, write and do arithmetic, so that with these bases they could be trained in the different manufacturing operations, capable of reading manuals and working in the office. But it hasn’t evolved any further. Subjects were added, and when this became excessive, more curricular years were added. The worst thing is that the material introduced over the years, in addition to the basics of reading and writing and doing arithmetic, added little social value.

Most of the learning relevant to the longest period of a person’s life, the adult phase, is learned within the scope of their profession and guaranteed by professional experience.

Everything that came from the school was useless, and that certainly many readers will understand to be true and will be able to identify with it. All of us adults go through the process and all we need to do is reflect on what we actually learned at school about what is relevant and useful to us as adults: do the square root? Remember who are all the Kings? know that water is two molecules of Hydrogen and one molecule of Oxygen? Do we find this indispensable to our well-being or social productivity? Of course not!

The future belongs to those who will be able to adapt to a world with more and more information and new technologies. New industries and professions. New opportunities and new challenges. They will have to learn to continually learn. They will go global and work anywhere and from anywhere. They will have to know how to sell and be entrepreneurial so they don’t depend on anyone or be hostage to salaries. They will have the tools that allow them to have independence and self-sufficiency without having to sacrifice their freedom.

This is the world that Open Learning proposes. End the traditional/instructional school and introduce the open learning model worldwide!

My entire professional career has been representing and recruiting internationally for the “best” colleges and universities in the world. Imagine schools with over 600 years of history or with campuses so modern they look like an amusement park, equipped with stables, a golf course and the latest technology. Colleges where monthly fees are over 24,000 reais and which house the world’s elites. Up until a certain point, I was convinced that these were, in fact, the best educational institutions in the world.

However, even though I knew this reality well, when it was my turn to make a decision about my children’s education, I started to consider what kind of education I wanted for them. I began to deconstruct and analyze education critically. I forgot the labels I used to represent quality education, such as “it has more than 600 years of history”, “it has multiple sports such as swimming, rugby, golf, tennis or equestrianism”, “President X’s son went to this school ” or “has the finalist students with the best college entrance grades”, commonly used by all of us as a way of attributing quality to the Institution. If we look purely at education, none of these labels have any value for an educational decision.

Another value that these schools have and that I personally devalue, is the fact that they are the so-called elites, where the children of the most influential people study and, of course, the richest. The child with the worst results in this type of school will certainly have a much higher income than the best student in a public school, despite the fact that the type of education is exactly the same. The differences are purely aesthetic and, in themselves, sales tags. In a practical way, the classes will have 8 students instead of 20, the teacher will be a doctorate instead of a licentiate, and the physical activity will be golf or tennis instead of soccer or volleyball. Despite this, what is certain is that, in terms of type and quality of education, they all offer the same.

The first analysis was about what system and teaching model I wanted for my children. Having knowledge of all teaching methods and models, in deep analysis I understood that all of them are instructional, giving instruction rather than allowing learning. Learning and memorizing for a test are opposites, and my interest was in learning. I want my children to learn any topic that interests them, passionately and in depth. I want them to know how to think instead of copying.

At Open Learning, each unit is a learning community. Every child follows their interests. Many think this is wrong, arguing that children will not acquire all the basics they need, not absorbing knowledge of the 8 subjects that, apparently, and in their perception, represent all the knowledge in the world.

For those who think in this way, it is important to convey to them that each of our children, when doing projects based on their interests, does so with maximum dedication and responsibility because they love and respect what they are doing, because they feel motivated to do something that arouses curiosity and interest.

As a learning community in which each child presents their projects, there is a transversal sharing of all this knowledge with their peers and educators. By presenting a project with which you identify, the message is conveyed in a clearer and more meaningful way. In this way, the child acquires, from the earliest years, a general knowledge of various topics and a deep knowledge of topics that really interest him.

Think about it: normally, we start to specialize knowledge already at university, at 18 years old. If we study continuously and until we finish a PhD, we end up with 25 years. Since it is factual that the peak of human learning capacity is when it is born and that it has been decreasing over time, does it make sense to have 7 years of learning according to our interests, instead of 25?

Bearing this in mind, I decided to delve deeper into the most popular alternative educational methods: Montessori, Waldorf, Piaget. All of them are methods, in fact, with a good scientific basis, such as Montessori adapting everything to the size of the child or Waldorf giving primacy to learning through play. Nevertheless, they are all instructionalists, in the sense that a teacher is in charge of the children’s day and makes decisions that control the timetable and calendar to be followed. Despite being much better and more suitable models than the traditional one, they were still not exactly what I was looking for.

I left the circuit even more in search of a model that I didn’t know and went to see initiatives in China, India, USA, Italy and the United Kingdom. One day, a friend of mine, who knew I was exasperated in this search, with my daughter about to be born and I still without a solution, introduced me to two names that changed my life: José Pacheco and Escola da Ponte. That was my initial inspiration. In research, following the trail of José Pacheco, who had left Escola Ponte in 2004 and gone to live in Brazil, I found a reference to Projecto Âncora, an incredible evolution of what Escola da Ponte was. With the coordination of Edilene Morikawa and Cláudia Santos, and inspired by José Pacheco, they created the most daring, remarkable and innovative education project in the world. There, I saw that children really learned! They followed their interests, delving a lot into each topic and on their own initiative, as it was in their interest to learn. It wasn’t forced. There were no schedules, grades, rooms or exams, and these kids looked like they acted twice their age in reference to their level of experience and knowledge. They even had more than twice the experience and knowledge of ordinary children because they devoted all their time to delving into topics that are of interest and retaining information because it is significant to them, because it has value for them. They didn’t waste time memorizing futile and unnecessary material that they will never use and that has no intellectual or human value.

Meanwhile, the Âncora Project, a social project, ended up being extinguished for various reasons. Fortunately, Edilene Morikawa, brave and enterprising that she is, did not let the flame of this incredible project die and founded the Escola Aberta de São Paulo (EASP). EASP has become the soul behind Open Learning. In this institution, I met the most competent people in the world in education and learning.

With the help of Edilene, I founded the first nucleus of what would become Open Learning in Portugal. The project took the name of A Quinta, for its insertion inside a Quinta with 7500m2, with a vegetable garden and animals and which serves 24 children, two of them my sons, Viktoria and Henrik.

The Quinta helped me to understand even more the importance of expanding the Open Learning Method all over the world. The results were beyond my expectations. My 3 year old daughter spoke 5 languages ​​and read and wrote in 2. From the first year of age, both my children communicated using sign language. The children of A Quinta, in just a few months, show an incredible evolution that amazes me day after day. Seeing the satisfaction of the parents and feeling their gratitude were some of the best feelings of my life. I found the solution, Open Learning was born!

It is possible to learn more and better, without classes, classes and tests.

We have divided the practical explanation of how it all works into 4 areas:

1. How we organize
2. What is our pedagogical proposal
3. How we evaluate
4. Education Model

Organization at Open Learning School

The organization of work at the Open Learning School is based on the relationships between all those involved in the learning process. Only in this way can we help your child learn to be, to be, to know and to act.

At Open Learning School, we prioritize the transition from dependence to autonomy. Children, of all ages and levels of learning, occupy the same spaces and learn together.

Tutors accompany each child’s process, guiding them in the preparation of Learning Project Planning, study guides, organization, study practice and day planning.

The Project Centers begin the pedagogical organization of the work of tutors and children, being units of learning and personal and social development.

Projects are divided into 4 phases

1. Initiation Stage I
2. Initiation Stage II
3. Development
4. Deepening

Initiation Stage I

Playful learning situations, new ways of relating to the world, new possibilities to read and formulate hypotheses about the phenomena, to test them, to refute them, to draw conclusions, in an active attitude in the construction of knowledge, guaranteeing the development of competences and abilities described in the BNCC, as well as the competences and the learning of attitudes consistent with the project, taking into account the action of the family and the community.

Initiation Stage II

Learning situations are developed, articulating the experiences lived in Early Childhood Education with new forms of relationship with the world, new possibilities, new conclusions. In the first two years of Elementary School, the pedagogical action focuses on literacy, so that students take ownership of the alphabetic writing system in an articulated way, the development of other reading and writing skills, and their involvement in diversified practices. of literacies.

Development

Students will be guaranteed the progression of knowledge by improving previous learning and by expanding language practices and cultural diversity, considering both their interests and expectations as well as what they already know and what they still need to learn.

Deepening

Intellectual autonomy, understanding of norms and interests in social life are expanded, which will allow your child to improve their relationship with others, with nature, with history, with culture, with technologies and with the environment. .

The work proposals with the students use the project work methodology. In this sense, the definition of the objective curriculum is dynamic and requires constant adaptation by the team of educators, so that it is possible to facilitate resources and materials in the acquisition of knowledge and in the development of essential competences.

How do we monitor children’s work?

Your child’s learning path, the evaluation of their work, as well as the most relevant documents produced by them, will be included in their individual file.

This document will show his evolution in the different dimensions of his school career. Your child’s work is permanently supervised by an educator, who is assigned the role of tutor. The tutor assumes a mediating role between family/society and the school. You can schedule a meeting with the tutor at any time and the tutor will periodically schedule a meeting with the family to inform you about your child’s learning.

What are the learning spaces?

There are no classrooms here. Learning happens anytime and anywhere.

The excellent conditions of spaces, structures, means and pedagogical relationships make it possible to provide an experience that does not stop at disciplines and textbooks, allowing them to learn through research that gives meaning to children’s doubts.

The Open learning School units have several spaces that aim to also be platforms for learning and creativity. From an auditorium, a room for physical and musical activities, dressing room, study rooms, kitchen, pantries, cafeteria, library, scientific and artistic experiments room, meeting room, secretary, board, break room, balcony and outdoor area with nature.

In addition to the School spaces, the Open Learning School uses other areas of learning, such as:

1. Public facilities close to the School, which allow the incorporation of children’s knowledge into local knowledge, thus experimenting with other ways of learning.
2. Cultural, socio-environmental and sports facilities around the school will serve as learning points and activities for the construction of a Learning Community prototype.

The definition of educational practices to be developed in these spaces will also be available to all those who wish to rethink the role of the school institution in society.

The conclusion is clear: there is a clear, strong and better alternative to learning compared to the way education is structured today.

The reason I created the Open Learning School was not altruistic, it was the need to provide the best possible education for my children. In addition to having experienced education in 5 different countries, where I grew up, I have been in the Education field for over 15 years, more specifically in the recruitment of international students for colleges and universities in the UK. During this period I had access to the most elite schools in the world, with greater national and international renown, those called Schools of the future, schools prepared for tomorrow, schools that, as they claimed, were different from the others. Despite all these parchments and self-proclaimed virtues, as a parent, I didn’t see a school different from traditional schools.

No matter how many rooms, spaces, horses, teachers’ doctorates, and other characteristics they had, they were nothing more than schools based on the same classic, factory and old-fashioned model of instruction and not learning. “You can’t give a horse that isn’t thirsty to drink” – José Pacheco. In other words, learning is not memorizing; only those who want to learn learn, the rest memorize. And as such, all these schools do nothing more than produce the same results as a traditional school, this is not intended. In no school did I find learning, only the memorizing of futile information that masked ignorance.

It took me 3 years of national and international research and I ended up meeting pedagogues and educators who ended up influencing my life. I began to think about learning and not instruction. So little did I know, that I knew nothing. I admit, my light came from the most unexpected corner – José Pacheco.

José Pacheco was the founder and promoter of Escola da Ponte in Portugal. Those who still don’t know the legend should read The School I Always Dreamed About Without Imaginar Que Pudesse Existir – written by Ruben Alves, one of the most influential Brazilian pedagogues, himself a legend of his own. This book describes the school on the bridge, and José’s work with the dignity it deserves.

A world reference school only unknown in Portugal. Approves? The main economic activity of Vila das Aves is educational tourism. People from all over the world come to see this project over 40 years old, which many of you, myself included, never heard of until recently. 40 years after Escola da Ponte, José was the co-founder of Projecto ncora, considered one of the most innovative schools in the world.

José from an early age defended that the School we have today is an outdated school. Thought, created and designed to serve a population based on the work of industries and workers. It is a school to educate people en masse: they put education on the assembly line like everything else in the 19th century. A school designed for the past when the future has already arrived.

“An educational model in which 21st century students are “taught” by 20th century teachers with 19th century practices is not acceptable.” – José Pacheco

A school where the average number of children per teacher exceeds 25, when we all know that we are all different and need different monitoring. He knew there were alternatives to education, and he’d already demonstrated it. I traveled to Brazil to meet him and learn a little more about his history and motivations. I was not disappointed. It was when I got to know more about the projects he was involved in that I realized that what I had imagined was not a utopia. Through him I ended up meeting other fantastic people, some of whom are now part of the teaching staff of the Open Learning International School. I make special reference to Edilene Morikawa (Co-founder Projecto Âncora, Founder Escola Aberta de São Paulo and Pedagogical Director of Open Learning School).

School will never be an end but a means

I started this school with a very simple and selfish objective: to give my children the best possible education. However, a school is for people. There had to be a space, not mine, but everyone’s.

Like me, I assume, you all seek a different education. A different pedagogy, a different way of seeing learning. And that’s why today we are here. This journey was only possible thanks to parents like you who, like me, think differently and who believed in this project even before any other. Together, let’s change education.

“Education, being an act of love and courage, has a complete translation in the Open Learning School. It is an act of love of the tutors’ dedication, and an act of courage that you as a father assumed to create an education of the century. XXI. an integral education that meets the cognitive, emotional, aesthetic, etc..” – José Pacheco