| Reason 1: If your children love what they do, | | | | discover life. School is simulation; even the best of |
| they will learn without effort! | | | | school is simulation. Project-led learning is real. |
| With all their hearts, middle school children want to | | | | Reason 4: Your children will become motivated |
| explore the world in which they live. The want to | | | | learners because they are fascinated with what |
| make things, to work with their hands. A child | | | | they do. Choosing projects that interest them |
| wants to fix a car, build a go-cart, cut mommy's | | | | gives them ownership in their own education. |
| hair, make a dress, build a dog house, grow | | | | Children who are busy doing what they love need |
| flowers for the table, build a canoe, go fishing with | | | | little help being motivated. A child reads if he or |
| Grandpa, ride a horse. | | | | she needs to know how to make a car engine |
| Reason 2: While creating value for the people in | | | | run. A child finds fascination in natural science, |
| their lives, your children will find a deep sense of | | | | when it surrounds taking care of those cute little |
| self-respect. | | | | bunnies Mom brought home. A child measures and |
| Children know whether they are needed or not. | | | | figures if that is what it takes to make the |
| Those children who put food on the table, who | | | | clothes he or she is making look good. Learning is |
| design a shed Dad needs and help him build it, | | | | important because the project belongs to them. |
| who teach other children how to play the piano, | | | | Reason 5: Does any child want to study logic? |
| know that they have value. "You'll need to know | | | | Hardly. But to learn logical thinking through the |
| this for someday," a line that never meant | | | | patterns of reality found in doing projects will instill |
| anything to anyone, becomes, "We need this right | | | | in your child the ability to conquer all "higher-level" |
| now." | | | | learning. |
| Reason 3: Utilizing what they already know in | | | | Logical thinking comes from a continual connection |
| real-life activities, your child may find his or her | | | | between designing or strategizing with the mind, |
| life-long passion, or more than one! | | | | seeing with the eye, and constructing or tending |
| Children want to explore their world. We discover | | | | with the hand. |
| what we want in life, what makes us sing - what | | | | Planting, tending, harvesting, and cooking beans will |
| we are made for - when we have the | | | | create a deeper ability to think than any number |
| opportunity to try many things. The middle school | | | | of worksheets or math problems. Raising a lamb, |
| child has already learned to read and write, to add | | | | helping in its birth, taking full responsibility for its |
| and subtract. They don't want to learn it all over | | | | care, harvesting its wool, and making useful |
| again, and again, and again. A child wants to take | | | | products from that wool, creates an ability to |
| what he or she already knows and use it to | | | | understand that will stay with your child for life. |