We believe:
 

1. Children are innately good.
    
2. The most important work of the child is the creation of Self and who that Self will be in the greater community, the World. Guides and all members of the Village strive to preserve students’ self-esteem, self-regard, and self-discipline.
    
3. Every activity and lesson offered in our environment aims not only to teach academic information, but also to teach responsibility to Self, to classmates, and to the community at large. We guide students in the development of social responsibility and participation in a community. This is taught through adult modeling, through “teachable moments,” and through carefully planned and prepared lessons in the classroom.
    
4. Children want to do well and to please the adults around them. “Misbehavior” is a child’s miscommunication of a need, and our primary aim will be to discover and address the need while teaching more appropriate ways of recognizing and communicating needs.
    
5. Children are inherently curious and joyful learners. If a student is avoiding work or a particular area of the curriculum, there is a reason for the avoidance. We seek not to force the child to work, but to discover and remove barriers to their success and enjoyment.
    
6. Children need the opportunity to develop focus and concentration in order to learn. We establish classroom routines that ensure and protect the child’s right to uninterrupted time in which to engage in educational activities that interest and inspire them.
    
7. Children learn through Meaningful Work. Our lessons and activities are real, purposeful and authentic, thus offering children the opportunity to experience learning not as an intellectual exercise, but as a joyful accumulation and internalization of understanding.
    
8. Each child is a unique individual. Our Guides recognize each child’s individual strengths, abilities, and learning styles, which they then use to create learning opportunities that are individualized for each student.
    
9. Children learn best in an atmosphere of discovery and exploration. Our Guides create materials and lessons that inspire and engage the student’s natural intellectual curiosity.
    
10. Learning is what children do; it is not something that is done to them. Guides prepare the classroom environment with academic opportunities that are introduced with lessons as needed, then offered for the student to explore and discover at will.
     
11. Children have a natural intellectual curiosity and eagerness to learn. Our Guides support students in utilizing these qualities to inspire and fuel their academic exploration and instruction.
     
12. An inviting environment will inspire the child’s natural curiosity and joy of learning. Each activity is designed to be aesthetically pleasing, didactic, and self-correcting so that the child can be independent and self-directed while learning through the well-prepared environment.
     
13. Mistakes are embraced as opportunities to learn. Members of the classroom community –and the greater community – are not criticized for mistakes, but rather, encouraged to seize the opportunity for learning that a mistake offers.
     
14. We believe that students learn from one another and more fully integrate their learning when they teach a new skill to a peer. We are committed to three year age groupings so that students can experience the materials, activities, and skills as novice and as mentor.
     
15. We believe that Spirituality can’t be taught or fostered, but nurtured and encouraged. Our guides strive to recognize the students’ natural spirituality and respond to it, nurturing the child’s sense of wonder and awe in the Universe.