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Founding Team
We started as three moms dreaming of a project-based learning cooperative where children joyfully cultivate the confidence, creativity, skills, and resilience to prosper in a changing world.
We came together out of the desire for our children to have the best learning experience we could imagine for them - one that is expansive, holistic, and natural. We are inspired by the Forest School, Waldorf, and student-led home-schooling approaches. Blending these innovative approaches allows us a unique opportunity to meet our children’s physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual needs.
The more we imagined this possibility the more we realized that families in our community are also hungry for an alternative learning environment that weaves together the best and most progressive learning methodologies for raising the next generation. It is our sincere drive and desire to provide this nurturing, nature-centered educational experience as a service to our community and the world at large providing the opportunity for these children to grow into the integral humans our earth and society truly need.
We're looking forward to joining forces with other like-minded parents to support each other in one of the most meaningful tasks we can undertake -- creating an environment where our children can thrive and become the greatest expressions of themselves.
Lead Learning Mentor - Jamie Hall
This being human is a complicated and often confusing journey fraught with trials and challenges. Throughout the course of our lives , this will feel insurmountable. Most of us adults are trying to remember our own innate self worth, and reconnect to our intuition, inner fortitude, creativity, resilience, and sense of self because somewhere along the line it was disregarded, devalued, shamed or squelched.
My goal as the Heartsong Learning Mentor is that our children never forget these things in the first place. That they not only learn and excel with standard curriculum but they truly know and are proud of who they are. That they are leaders and collaborators. That they know how to honor, respect and listen to others, nature and themselves. That they never forget that they are a part of the larger web of life and what they say and do matters.
By providing a safe and loving environment for the childrens minds, bodies and hearts, I honor each child for who they are and who they are naturally becoming. My wish is to ignite their love for learning, orinent them to the present moment, foster their spontaneity and creativity, and fuel their passion for loving and protecting life. We have no idea what our world will be like when our children are adults, but I do know I will do everything I can to help them have the tools and confidence necesarry to meet each challenge with courage and grace.
I have a keen understanding and embodied sense of how to support and inspire human development at every stage of change. I bring a plethora of skills, education and experience to our integrated “classroom”. With a BFA in Modern Dance and a Masters in Dance and Higher education, a bulk of my education was focused on age and developmentally appropriate curriculum creation, and developing my own embodied, creative and inclusive pedagogy. Over the last 12 years I have honed my skills as a personal development and whole health coach, integrating indepth studies of Positive Psychology, Motivational Interviewing, Transtheoretical Model of Change, mindfulness theory and practice, emotional intelligence and communication and conflict resolution skills. I am accredited my the International Coaching Federation and was certified by the National Board for Health and Wellness Coaches. Over the last 20 plus years I have taught children of all ages in diverse settings all over the world.
I am a mother of 6-year-old identical twin boys. I have a deep love for music, dance, healing arts, nature, travel, gardening, permaculture, building community and the art of being human. I look forward to collaborating with other families to build a creative and wholisitc learning center for our children.
Setting
The Heartsong Learning Co-op is situated 20 minutes outside of Bellingham in a beautiful, peaceful country setting under the steady gaze of Kulshan (a.k.a. Mt. Baker). Our host is the Heartsong Transformative Arts Center, home to a movement studio and adjoining community kitchen/dining area, gardens, forest, wide-open fields, whimsical nooks, and play areas. The Heartsong Center's five open acres offer our children the space and freedom to express their natural joy and exuberance. This is a place where they can connect to the land and feel at home in themselves and on Earth.
