Episode 97: High Agency Learning Environments. A Conversation with Tyler Thigpen.

We talk with Tyler Thigpen about building student agency through self-directed learning, and why kids thrive when they have purpose, strong relationships, and real choices. We dig into practical frameworks for families and educators who want to move beyond compliance without losing rigor or essential skills.

• Tyler’s origin story and the mission to help kids flourish
• Why boredom and drudgery persist in conventional classrooms
• A clear definition of agency as skill, will, and goals
• The DRIP pathway: desire, resourcefulness, initiative, persistence
• Adult formation and unlearning control to become guides
• How to think about a national “floor” plus deep personalization
• Mastery transcripts as a portfolio and competency-based alternative to grades
• Moving from external validation to intrinsic motivation in learners and adults
• Freedom levels, consequences, and gradual release of autonomy
• Helping kids “make deals with themselves” to build integrity and ownership

About our guest
Tyler grew up in Georgia and has worked in innovative district, private, and charter schools, as well as statewide and national nonprofits. Tyler is co-founder and CEO of The Forest School: An Acton Academy in Trilith, The Forest School Online, and the Institute for Self-Directed Learning. He is Academic Director at the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education and a Guest Lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

Connect with Tyler
Institute for Self Directed Learning
The Forest School
@weareforestschool on Instagram
@tylerthigpen on Instagram
The Playbook for Self-directed Learning

About the podcast
The KindlED Podcast explores the science of nurturing children's potential and creating empowering learning environments.

Powered by Prenda Microschools, each episode offers actionable insights to help you ignite your child's love of learning. We'll dive into evidence-based tools and techniques that kindle young learners' curiosity, motivation, and well-being.

Got a burning question?
We're all ears! If you have a question or topic you'd love our hosts to tackle, please send it to podcast@prenda.com. Let's dive into the conversation together!

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Transcript

Welcome And Why Agency Matters

SPEAKER_02 0:00

I think you're in my school, we're trying to do the same thing for kids, really help them figure out like what's inside of you that's not yet in the world, and how do you want to find the motivation that you could work on that thing the rest of your the rest of your days?

SPEAKER_01 0:10

Hello and welcome to the Kindled Podcast. I'm Katie Bradman, your host for today, and I'm so excited to bring you this amazing conversation today. We are talking to Tyler Thakepin, who I'm about to redo his bio. Here we go. Tyler grew up in Georgia and has worked in innovative district, private and charter schools as well as statewide and national nonprofits. Tyler is co-founder and CEO of the Forest School and Acton Academy in Trillith, that's in Georgia, the Forest School Online, and the Institute for Self-Directed Learning. He's academic director at the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education and guest lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, along with a whole host of other things that he will tell us all about in this amazing conversation where we really focus on how to bring agency into education. And we spotlight his book that just came out a little while ago, The Playbook for Self-Directed Learning, which is one of my new favorite education reads. Highly recommend it. So please enjoy this conversation with Tyler Thickpin. Tyler Thickpin, welcome to the Kindle podcast.

SPEAKER_02 1:08

Thanks so much. Great to be here. Appreciate you having me, Katie.

SPEAKER_01 1:12

We're super excited to chat with you today and to learn from you. You are someone in the education world that I look up to and that I've learned a lot from in the past. So super excited to have you on the show today.

SPEAKER_02 1:21

Well, the feeling is mutual. And it sounds like we even uh kind of started our own microschools around the same year, by the way, 2018.

Tyler’s Origin Story And Purpose

SPEAKER_01 1:28

Right. Yes. Exciting. Yeah. Kelly started the first parent of microschool in 2018. And that's when you started. Let's let's jump in right there. Give me Tyler's origin story. What is the change you're trying to accomplish in the world? How did you start on this journey? Take me through it.

SPEAKER_02 1:46

Well, in terms of the change that trying to achieve, Katie, and I think you and I share this, but you know, it is sort of the goal of like that kids would flourish, you know, that they would have a purpose in life that's bigger than themselves, that they would have positive connections with themselves, with others, with nature, they'd have experiences of beauty. They would be able to get into flow states, you know, and find what they love and do what they love. And for me, it's a it's been a lifelong process. And I I grew up in the rural south. My father was an interim financial consultant for health rural healthcare systems. So my mama taught elementary school, first and second grade, some kindergarten. She eventually pivoted to do English language learners, worked in a lot of Title I schools in the rural South. And we moved around a ton, which was, on the one hand, exciting and on the other hand, kind of hard. And so I was sort of isolating in some ways. And finally, you know, my family sort of put down roots in my fourth grade year in Atlanta. And my father worked away from the home for the most part throughout the rest of my childhood, but would come home every other weekend. And I remember when my parents, when I was 12, my parents told me, like, hey, if you want to, if you want a car, you know, when you're 16, you're gonna have to pay for it. And so I started my own lawn mowing business called uh executive lawn care, is what I named it. And uh, you know, I made flyers and I passed them out of my neighborhood. And uh, sure enough, from the age of 12 to 16, by the time I was 16, I had saved up$5,500 and I bought a 1989 black Chevrolet blazer, the best car I've ever had. And and for a while, Katie, like, you know, I thought, oh, I'm so amazing. I worked so hard, I gave up so much time on the weekends. And look at me. And then the older I've gotten, the more I saw, wow, I had a ton of help. You know, I had a bunch of families who would trust a middle schooler, you know, instead of a professional lawn care. My parents lent me their mower. I, you know, I my grandfather taught me how to save money. And I even got the idea for the business from a friend at my school. And it was this idea of social capital, you know, it was like the support network that I took for granted that I had that, you know, a lot of kids in our nation don't necessarily have. Maybe they have uh, you know, one or two family members that care, but not that, not the connections that they need to really make connections for them to like opportunities. Maybe not the connections, deep connections that they would have with people who are different than them. But those can be just such a game changer. And so I've been on a sort of pursuit to help create for young people a sort of safe, nurturing, caring environment that really helps them become, you know, what we call like interdependent, self-directed learners, where, you know, they can, they're very resilient and they can learn, they've learned how to learn for themselves. And uh, I remember when I so I became an ordained minister and worked as a Christian pastor for years, uh, right after uh college. And I saw a youth group of high schoolers grow from about 35 kids to about 500 kids. And these kids, Katie, were really excited to use their, you know, skills, their passions, their preferences, their, you know, talents and knowledge to help people and like building an orphanage in Peru and you know, doing hurricane relief on the Gulf Coast and other things like that. And uh, after a time, I ended up transitioning into Georgia's largest public high school and to teach Spanish. I spoke Spanish, I speak Spanish. And when I got there, I immediately saw the kids were bored out of their minds. And I was like, it doesn't have to be this way. And that's really how I started to get a vision for, you know, for public education and for education broadly in our nation that we could create really fun, agentic, environment, you know, inspiring, empowering environments for kids and and really help make sure that they had the kind of supporting, caring adult relationships around them. And so I've just been working on that problem, you know, for all my career. And that's kind of how Forest got started and how I got into it. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:48

That's amazing. It's a really inspiring story. I love how you've like grabbed hold of hold of like that thread and you've you've been working on that, like improving culture and education for youth, like in a variety of different ways. Like it's clear that that like that mission has set into your heart and like you've been trying to, you know, like it just looks like you've been pushing that boulder up the hill from a lot of different angles. And I think that that is just really cool. I love that.

SPEAKER_02 6:12

Thanks for the kind words. You remind me, one of my mentors, Katie, actually once told me, he said, like, think about if you want to try and figure out what your purpose in life is, like, think about what really upsets you, you know, what in addition to what you're passionate about, think about a problem that you feel like you could work on like your whole life, you know. And then just like you're saying, you know, figure out different ways to work on that your whole life, paid or not paid. And I think for me personally, like there's kind of three big problems. One is, you know, just boring teaching and learning. You know, I hate that. And uh, you know, the other, like I said, is surrounding kids with caring adults. And then the other for me, because I'm a person of faith, it's you know, it's uh connecting people with higher power, you know, an ultimate reality. And so in some form or fashion, for all of my career, I've been working on those, on those things. And, you know, I think you're in my school, we're trying to do the same thing for kids, really help them figure out like what's inside of you that's not yet in the world, you know, and and how do you want to find the motivation that you could work on that thing the rest of your the rest of your days.

SPEAKER_01 7:10

Yeah, it's it's such a such a beautiful mission. Two things you said stand out. Um, it doesn't have to be this way. And I think that that's something that like a lot of adults are waking up to. It's like we don't have to actually create like 18 years of drudgery. Maybe like the 18 years of drudgery was at once, one time like the best we could do. And it was great for kids to be able to learn. Kids who wouldn't typically have gotten that like education are able to get it. But when we've scaled these ideas and like we've lost the the meaning, the message, like the purpose of it, and it does just feel like drudgery to them, wouldn't you say?

Boredom In School And A Better Way

SPEAKER_02 7:45

I I would say that. And I'm curious your experience of this too. But one of the things I've been thinking about a lot recently is how to educate parents who are kind of waking up to what you're describing about how they can enact their agency to shape their child's learning. I mean, obviously our homeschooling communities around the world are some of the best examples, right? Of ones who've sort of taken it by the reins and said, hey, we're gonna design learning, you know, and make sure that our learners have the kinds of experiences that we're wanting. But I think we've got a whole host of other parents and caregivers who maybe don't have the capacity to be able to do that, but they still want to shape learning, but they just don't know how, you know? And so, like even with your microschools, with ours, it's like helping them figure out, okay, how can I help my learner choose what they're reading, for example, or choose what apprenticeship they're gonna do, or build a team of mentors around them, or switch an e-learning platform, like whatever all those options are, you know. I've been thinking a lot about that, um, about that recently, but but totally agree. Uh parents are are coming around and it's an exciting time.

SPEAKER_01 8:50

So you just used the word a few minutes ago, agentic. And I love this word, but I want you to tell me what agentic means from your perspective and what like what does having an education that is agentic or agency-based like mean to you? Like, how is it different than the norm?

Defining Agency With The DRIP Path

SPEAKER_02 9:07

Yeah. So I I think Bandura is a researcher I respect and have learned a lot about agency from. The agency can be defined, I've seen, as like having the skill and the will to achieve your goals. And all three of those things are are crucial. You gotta know where you're headed, which takes work. And then you gotta have the motivation, the will to do it, and then you gotta have the skill to pursue it, you know? And so an agentic environment would be a learning environment that really celebrates all three of those things and gives time and space to kids, young people, and staff and parents, frankly, to think through and develop their skill and their will and their goals. And some of the research we've done over the years, uh, my colleague, Dr. Caleb Collier, um, who has a PhD in self-rected learning, did a peer-reviewed study years back on sort of a pathway to build this kind of agency. So for your question, Katie, about like what is it like to create schools that that develop this, this pathway is big for us. And and sort of Caleb and we identified four phases. The first phase is just desire. This is when a kid, you know, uh, first of all, they're not hungry, they're not thirsty, they're not tired, uh, they feel like they belong, they see relevance in what it is that they're learning. This is phase one. And we can't assume that everybody's there there because they're not. Um, you know, some kids need they need food, they need uh, you know, some rest, uh, they need some like emotional care. They need to feel they need community. And then the real hard one, you know, is they need to see uh like how what is in front of them connects to their own life goals, you know, from a learning standpoint. Um and so I think schools that are starting to build agency, they think meaningfully through all those things. And then phase two is uh we call it resourcefulness, which is where a kid starts to uh make hard choices that are good choices. You know, they'll maybe choose to do something hard rather than something that's easy. Like instead of surfing on their phone, they'll choose to do a hard math problem, or instead of talking to their friends, they will read a book that's that's hard for them to understand, you know, and they're practicing good habits. And so I think schools that build agency, they give kids an opportunity to make those kind of choices and experience the natural consequences of the choice that they make. And that teaches them a lot. Phase three, we call initiative, which is basically where you know kids are now, you know, not just problem solving, they're problem finding and they're making plans and they are making goals and they're making, they're identifying obstacles that they're gonna face along the way to achieving those goals, and they're making plans to overcome those obstacles. And then lastly, is uh and so by the way, with the third phase initiative, I think, you know, schools that really foster agency, they have dedicated time and space and processes and systems to let kids, you know, really make those plans and to think through the barriers and to have time and space to be able to do that. And it's kind of built into the, you know, the the structure formally and informally. And then lastly, it's it's uh persistence, which is where we we want all kids to be. We want them to persevere, you know, and be resilient regardless of whatever happens. Like they're gonna be able to achieve their goals, they're gonna learn how to learn for themselves. Nothing is gonna stop them. And so, you know, there, I think schools that give kids a lot of choice, especially the more autonomy that they're able to demonstrate, and schools that really celebrate resilience and celebrate overcoming failure really can foster this kind of stuff. And so for us, the the acronym for those four phases is drip desire, resourcefulness, initiative, and persistence. So I think agentic schools, agentic learning environments really bring learners along that pathway in various ways, formally and informally.

SPEAKER_01 13:06

That is awesome. And here's the thing that I think is so powerful about what you just did. A lot of parents are scared to do something different because traditional education is presented as like the safe like railroad tracks, right? Like you just stay on this like study progression, make sure your kid is on grade level, like use these curriculums and things like that. Make sure they're sitting in their seat for a certain amount of time, like and you'll get success, or right? Like you'll be fine. And I always like hate when people say, like, I did this and I'm fine. It's like fine should not be your goal, right? We should have higher aims than fine. Um, but what like that drip like framework that you just laid out does is it gives parents a new mental framework, new train tracks where it's like, I'm not it it becomes less scary to do something different if I'm changing to a different system. There is a framework, people have thought about this, people have walked this path before because it's scary to be like, okay, now I'm homeschooler and now I'm my kids are going to a micro school and they're making choices. Like it takes a lot of courage to get off of the traditional train tracks because there's a lot of perceived safety in those train tracks, right? But it's nice to know that like you can have self-direction. And I also appreciate that you mentioned skill because sometimes when we talk about self-direction, what people hear is let kids do whatever they want. And it's like, yes, but also there's a lot of like scaffolding and frameworks and like all sorts of things that we're doing to put into their environment, their relationships, the mentoring. We're not doing nothing, right? We're just doing different things that promote that internal locus of control in a stronger way than the traditional method does. But what I love about your work the most is like you so tell me, I'm so curious about the institute, Institute for Self-Directed Learning, and then how you actually work alongside traditional educators in school districts to help them pull some of these principles in. So that's my question. But I also wanted to just mention quickly, you mentioned Caleb, and Caleb is actually episode 33 on the Kindle Podcast. It's called, yeah, it's such a good episode. It's called The Value of Choice.

SPEAKER_00 15:05

Oh.

SPEAKER_01 15:05

And it's so good. So definitely dig into that. Caleb is awesome. And I just wanted to plug this book that Tyler and Caleb wrote and um some other authors. I don't I'm not familiar with Amber Bryant or Britney Tolls. Are they their team members, your co-authors?

SPEAKER_02 15:20

They are co-founders of our uh schools and institute along with me and Caleb.

SPEAKER_01 15:25

I love it. I can't wait to meet them. Um but this is called the the Playbook for Self-Directed Learning. And I love it because it goes through if you want to get these principles and ideas into your educational educational setting, no matter what it is, it like outlines them and goes through them. And so give give like a little overview on the institute's work and what it's been like bringing these these ideas into traditional education. And then I do, I just have some like I just want to go through the book and do a kind of like a deep dive if that's okay.

SPEAKER_02 15:53

Sounds great. I could totally dork out about the book.

SPEAKER_01 15:57

It's so good.

Adult Formation For Agentic Schools

SPEAKER_02 15:58

The the institute really arose out of a need, I think, for adult formation. There's I mean, I teach at Penn um and sometimes at Harvard. You know, there's not many graduate schools of education, let's just say there's not any, actually, right now, that have been uh designed to create the kind of educator that would lead the sort of agentic schools that we've been describing, Katie. And so how do you solve for that? You know, how do you bring adults on a learning journey to really know what it means to be a guide, you know, what it means to be a game maker, what it means to be a facilitator, a coach, a designer, a facilitator of learning rather than an explainer, you know, rather than somebody who's just lecturing. And again, really great teachers don't just lecture and explain. But there is uh there is not enough productive struggle in classrooms in the United States of America, you know, today. And and not only that, you've got uh we have we're we have a system in our nation that that really can be dis can describe most of our private and public schools, regardless of their size, which is standardized. You know, it's they're they're sort of built off the average theory of average, that there is such a thing as an average person. And, you know, if you've learned as a kid, if you've learned more than that average human by a certain day and time, then you're above average. If you learn less, then you're below average. And if you've earned just about the same amount, then you're average. Um, I mean, I don't think many of us really believe that that is true about humanity.

SPEAKER_00 17:37

Right.

SPEAKER_02 17:38

Uh I mean, uh we we we all bring different strengths, you know. I mean, actually, almost every, I've looked into this, almost every major religion in the world has some version of a understanding of like that we are a body, you know what I mean? That we we we we serve together as as a society, we serve different functions and different roles, you know. And so how do you create at scale learning that you know really appreciates that nuance, that unique calling, that unique purpose that every you know person has. So our institute, you know, we're we're trying to help adults. Uh, we're trying to help them with the mindsets needed to do this work. Because in many cases, we step number one is we have to unlearn some things. And then, you know, once we unlearn some things, then what are we believing? And then what are the tactics and what are the strategies and systems and processes that kind of follow that? And so, you know, in examples of a couple projects we got going on, we we've been working with enthusiasm. There's a really great leader and his team in Eastern Hancock, Indiana, called George Philhour, and uh public school district superintendent, and he just and his team just launched a micro school in uh it's a public microschool called Nature's Gift. And it's got some really beautiful features. It's it's self-directed, it's you know, it's nature focused, it's got flexible attendance. And uh they just launched in August of this past year, and they've got about 60 learners, and about eight of them came from the traditional district, and the others came from homeschool. And then they have a waiting pool of about 70 or 75 kids right now.

SPEAKER_01 19:14

So if you want to learn more about this, George Philhauer is episode 79 of the Kindled Podcast. So we're on the same track. Yes, so good, so cool. I love all of his work. It's awesome. And can I just like highlight some of the things that you've been saying from your book? Because I'm like, sure. Okay, common struggles that happen here. It's hard to convince an experienced teacher that they should have less control in the classroom and give learners more responsibility. Add to that, there will be a belief gap in many educators that they won't they won't believe children are capable of guiding their own learning. And that was powerful to me because it's like it is hard to imagine a different way, especially like your your call out that there aren't graduate programs that teach these things, right? And so a lot of educators who like feel like their gut is like, I want to give the kids more choice, I want to lead in this way, right? But then like the systems that have that have been built up over the years don't support that. So they find themselves kind of in this state of cognitive dissonance where they're not allowed to do what they feel is best for the kids. Do you find that a lot working with educators across different systems?

SPEAKER_02 20:18

We we do. And uh they they just feel and see and perceive the constraints in their system. And I think we find that those get changed most when you have all the leadership, basically everybody at the table talking about it, and how do you overcome those barriers? Well, I was gonna say what what that quote makes me think of too is I don't know if you've seen that gif of Homer Simpson disappearing into the bushes. Have you ever seen that before? Yeah, from the Simpsons? So, like that's as guides at our school, we that's like we aspire to that, you know, like a lot of caring adults when there's like issues happening with kids, they want to like lean in and fix and solve. And instead we do the opposite. We're like, let's lean out and see what happens here. That's kind of the go-to move. And I think for for educators who have that belief gap that you're describing, if they can have the, you know, constitution, the fortitude to like lean back and watch and observe and watch what how how amazing kids are, um, then you know, they can they can overcome that over time too.

SPEAKER_01 21:16

Yeah, I've even found myself, like now that I guide a microschool, this is cropping up for me too, naturally. And I'm like, you know, deep in this research and in this work. And it even comes up for me sometimes where I'm like, I need to fix this, I need to solve this. And then I was just reflecting on this this week, like imagining, like we, you know, kids are these kids are 11, 12, 13. And they're in the messy middle of growing up. Right. And so there's a lot of things that happen or that I see that I'm just like, ah, like I almost think like I can't wait for them to grow out of that. But then I've caught myself thinking this and I reflected on what they were like just a few months ago in September when we started, right? And to recognize them for the growth that has happened helped me trust their natural maturation. And like the effect of agency that had already happened. And seeing just getting a little bit of that perspective helped me lean further back into the bushes to be like, okay, like this is actually working. And once you see that, like actually the less you do for kids, the more they grow. And like that they can be trusted with big decisions. And that when you trust them, that's when they grow the most, right? Like when they feel this responsibility and they feel like their agency matters, that is when you see the most growth. But it takes like, I'm just saying, I I also still experience this belief gap some days, right? It's hard.

SPEAKER_02 22:33

Yeah. Yeah, same. Same. And then they're time, I don't know odd about you, but with your team, are there sometimes people who like model it for you and you and you remember, like, oh yeah, I can step in because that happens to me all the time too. So thank goodness for great, you know, teamwork.

SPEAKER_01 22:48

Yeah, for sure, for sure. Okay. Then one other quote here. And I think this is like, this is like a pretty broad discussion. And I I see this a lot come up. I take all of Prenda's social media comments from all of our like ads and posts and things like that, or you know, for promoting these ideas, and there are people that disagree naturally, and that's wonderful. And we have really cool discussions with people that don't see things quite the way we see them, and we learn and they learn, and it's it's really it's great. But this question of how much education should be standardized or regulated comes up a lot. So this is from chapter three. Is education primarily for the individual learner or is it primarily a public good? How much of education should be standardized and systematized, and how much of it should be customizable? So this idea of like standardization being really pervasive. And I think that there's like a safety, right? Like we there's a safety in the idea of standardization that standardization means quality and that it means equity and things like this. But in practice, like I feel like the standardization of it is also kind of where the meaning and purpose is lost because you when you stop being an individual, then you're not pursuing your goal and your will and your skills. It's like you're kind of just treated as part of the pack almost. So like lean into that a little bit. Like, how do you guys think about this? When should we standardize? When is it better not to? How can we balance that those things?

Standardization Versus Personalization

SPEAKER_02 24:12

Yep. Um well, I'd be curious your take too, Katie. And the opinion I share will will be sort of my own and not necessarily representing our org, because I think we're as an org, we're sort of agnostic to folks take on that because we work with, you know, very independent microschools as well as huge public school districts with thousands, tens of kids, you know.

SPEAKER_00 24:34

Right.

SPEAKER_02 24:35

They obviously have different, you know, viewpoints on that. I think about it from two different lenses. One is at the parent view, and one is at a national view. You know, from a parent standpoint, I I mean, you were talking about fear earlier, Katie, and how you know uh parents can can feel afraid of doing something new. I've I really try and encourage parents to take full responsibility for their children's education and to do so by you know sitting down and thinking about the the day when their you know child is going to be 18 years old. What do what do they want them to know and be able to do when they're 18? And and then work backwards from that, you know, and what sorts of experiences do they need in order to practice, you know, at those skills. And then how do we want to celebrate those things as a family in our house, you know, between now and then, and then make sure that that happens, you know, and take full responsibility as a parent and and recognizing that no school is gonna meet that, you know, because schools have different values, schools have different goals, and uh and and kids are only in schools for roughly 18.5% of their waking hours over the course of their childhood, which is not a lot of time, actually. Most people think it's fucked, but it's not it's not a big intervention. So so I think that's one way I think about it. Um, and and for that, I don't think that is standardized at all. I think that is based on the family, and it's one of the great things about our nation is that we we seek to welcome people from all over the world and you know, integrate and helpful, you know, be helpful to one another. And and so I think that parents' goals vary, and I think that's lovely. I think as a nation, I've been doing some thinking about this too. I do think there is a floor that, you know, as a nation, we want our learners to be agile with. I don't think we there's there's agreement right now on what that floor is. I think it's evolved, you know, the the common core, the creation of the common core standards, which is very controversial for uh probably some of the folks, you know, you know, uh who are listening, and less so for others. I mean, that's probably the latest attempt at aligning, but but even that didn't go so great because, you know, it's not not not ever not all states adopted it. And so it's kind of a state-based decision, but I think there is agreement that there's too many and there's too much in those state standards right now. I'll tell you what I'm compelled by is I'm I'm compelled by the applied literacies. You know, I'm compelled by a level of math up to algebraic thinking and statistical thinking that can be transferred and applied in the real world. I think communication, you know, reading and writing are are crucial, you know. I think and then understanding the scientific method, you know. Uh for me, those four categories of learning are something that as a nation, I think really makes us is important for us as a nation to just keep learning, uh, you know, and to appreciate those who have gone before us as we've tried to make sense of ultimate reality and the world. But again, that's kind of how I think about it. Uh and and I think outside of the floor, there there leaves a ton of room for personalization. A ton. And so I think that's how it might be approached at scale. But but I don't know. What do you think?

SPEAKER_01 27:44

No, I I think I'm I'm on the same page as you. I think that there we've tried to like micromanage the it's like we've pushed all of our caring for kids into this micromanaged like set of standards, right? And like the teacher, then it just becomes drudgery. Let's if you if you're a teacher and your principal walks into your classroom and you haven't written the standard on the board that you're teaching, right? Like there's you get a teacher demerit, right? You're in trouble. It's just like become this chokehold and and a lot of joy is lost. But then we're we're left in this position where we feel like we have to choose skill or joy. And it's like, well, joy doesn't feed you, but skills will. So let's like push really hard on the skills. And that's kind of our belief set that's driving this behavior of like, let's make sure that all of the standards are taught and we're shoving so much stuff into that education that has to be standardized. I think it's done out of fear a lot of time. But fear from a place of care, not I'm not criticizing that. We want good results and we want high expectations and things like that. And this is kind of how uh we've expressed that. But I think that you're spot on on if we simplify what is standardized, we can still get skills without losing will and without losing personal goals and direction. Right. I think that a lot of times when we talk to people about self-direction and they hear like, let them do whatever they want, they learn, they they think like, well, the kids aren't gonna learn how to read and write, right? Like they're they point to the floor that you're referencing. It's like we don't have to throw the baby out of the bathwater. There is a balance here in the middle where we have, like you're saying, like so much choice and voice and so much like opportunity for personalization while we still haven't let that floor go. And I think because that floor is not well defined and accepted, there's confusion about what that floor is. It's kind of like what that what that good faith guarantee to parents is coming into a microscope that maybe is more agentic. Um, you have to kind of meet that floor before people will like put put down their fear enough to like listen to about agency. But it goes back to belief, the the parents' belief and the educator's belief.

SPEAKER_02 29:42

Yeah. Well said. Well said.

Practical Levers To Increase Agency

SPEAKER_01 29:44

Okay. So let's get into some of the like nitty-gritty like things that you do, right? It's like if I am an educator, if I'm a parent or if I run a microschool and I want to bring more agency into my microschool, what should I change? Like, what are the factors? What are the different axes that I think about? What are the different like cultural frameworks and you know, systems? And in your book, like this is where you go super deep into like, here are new way, new things. It's like almost when you say, stop controlling, when you said tell people not what to do, when you tell people what not to do, it's like you leave a vacuum for what to do. And this book, I feel like really fills that. It's like, hey, here's what to do instead. And I love how you guys take this. Like, it could look like this, it could look like this. It could, you could do this in a really small way, you could do this in a really big way. So, whatever your goals are as an institution or as a family, like I feel like there's something here for everyone and that you can understand these principles and get a wide exposure to a wide variety of applications and then pick and choose which way which ones, like which factors you want to push on first, where you want to start and to what degree you want to push on. So the first one that stood out to me is you talk about grades. And I didn't know this, but it says that you guys were the first people to pilot the mastery transcript.

SPEAKER_02 30:59

We were.

SPEAKER_01 31:00

That's so cool. I love that. So tell us a little bit more about mastery. Like, how do you think about grades and assessment broadly? And I don't know if you still use mastery transcript or if you guys have like come up with something else or you do. Okay, yeah. So just like lean into that. I'd love more details.

SPEAKER_02 31:15

Yeah, you know, grades, grades are an interesting thing. A lot of states are still very linked to them, and a lot of colleges are as well. But but the reality, when you look at, you know, most high schoolers in the United States right now, they get A's or Bs. And that's just what's given to them. So there's a lot of grade inflation, a lot of grade inaccuracy. And then when college admissions officers, if you talk to them, they and they're looking at a transcript and they see something like algebra 2, 86, B, 3.0, they're like, what does this tell me about this child, you know, this young person? Not a whole lot. So the mastery transcript is sort of like a portfolio of a learner's best work over the course of their life that really shows who they are. The the metaphor that comes to my mind is that of a window, like, you know, a stained glass window, maybe like in a cathedral or something, is ornate and beautiful, but you can't see through it, you know? But and then, and and I think the old school transcript is kind of like that. It's like, okay, this looks good, but who is this person? I can't tell who it is. And I think the mastery transcript is like a clear glass window where it's like you can actually see who the child is. I've actually had the very first, our first learner, her name is Hadley. She piloted the nation's first mastery transcript. Her parents cried in my office one day, saying that they felt like a school had never seen their daughter the way that Forrest had seen their daughter, because in putting together the mastery transcript, she was drawing on learning from her entire life, you know? And so I think that that speaks to I think what some of mastery is, right? It's like it's a very asset-based approach. What have we done? What do we know? What can we demonstrate? And let's feature that, you know? And so very practically, it's the mastery transcript is kind of like a LinkedIn profile that would have maybe, if you as a listener or UK, you know, you and I do have them, but like if it had our best work on there, like the five best things we've ever done, you know, in our opinion, we get to choose, you know, and then I can tell you like this is what I think it says about me, you know, that maybe I'm entrepreneurial, I'm faith-based, or whatever it is. And uh that's what a that's what a learner can do when putting together their mastery transcript. And then, you know, it's really transforming the handshake between high schools and colleges. It was hard early on, and I had to be on the phone with the heads of every college admissions office, you know, to get this going and get it promoted and do a lot of education together with a team from the Mastery Transcript Consortium. But now it's it's way more familiar and accepted, and you know, there's definitely momentum there. So, but but again, in order to form it, and I'll end with this for this part, you know, it it's I don't know if you have any friends who are firefighters or who uh do martial arts, you do. You know, firefighters go some go through something called practicals, where like if they want to get a promotion or a job, they have to show what they know and demonstrate their skills. And then, you know, martial artists have to, you know, they have to, if they want to test for a belt, they have to do their their katas, their forms, and they have to answer questions. And if they don't pass, it's not the end of the world. It's just like, hey, you haven't quite learned this yet. You know, go and learn X, Y, and Z and come back. And and that's kind of what we do to put together the mastery transcript is learners have to go through their own version of practicals in order to show what they know and prove it. They have to get through me and uh two of our guides, Brittany and Aliah. Brittany, one of my co-authors there on the book. And it's an incredible process. It's probably the best, deepest reflection activity for young people I've ever seen or been been a part of. But that's a little bit how we think about mastery-based learning.

SPEAKER_01 34:45

Uh here in the book it says, choose what competencies you're measuring. So get clear on like what you want to see. You also talk about portrait of a graduate, which is a growing trend in schools that want to kind of rethink things a little bit to really define what kind of like learner, what success means. And you mentioned practicals, badges, and public expedition exhibitions and like making learning very public is also something that's mentioned in here a lot, which I love. And the thing that I love broadly about this concept is that when you say you need to get an A to a child, you're essentially saying, like, here is the bare minimum that you need to do to like get this like mark that we've all agreed is like means success, right? Whatever that is. It's like the currency of education. But with a master transcript or something like more portfolio-based where you are trying to create a clear window that shows who you are, that asks for someone's highest self. It doesn't put them in a bare minimum type of mind frame where they're like, I need to get an A and I can choose my book, how agentic you're letting me choose the book. Which is the shortest book? What is the simplest book? That is the one I will choose because I will be able to get an A, you know, in that experience. So it like sets them up to choose the minimum, and this sets them up to choose like their best highest self.

SPEAKER_02 36:01

That resonates a ton, Katie. Um, and what else for me it brings up is the notion of validation. I mean, the standardized industrial age model really does train kids to to seek validation from outside themselves through the praise of teachers, through grades, through awards, through GPAs. And I personally have experience with this. I mean, I I, you know, as I mentioned, growing up and and moving around as much as I did, I looked for validation in those places as well as through sports and you know, scoring goals or whatever it was and winning games. And I've been trying to, as an adult, a healthy adult, undo a lot of that and find that that validation from from within, you know, intrinsically. And I think mastery-based approaches, agentic approaches that really honor the purpose and calling of each child, of each young person, do a much better job of setting kids up to not rely on external validation to just feel okay as a human.

SPEAKER_01 37:00

Which cannot be understated, right? It's like so few of us have gotten to this point, like where we do feel that way. It's like so powerful when you get there. And I'm obviously like not perfect and not done growing or anything. I don't want it to sound like that. Um, but it's hard to help a child reach that if you're not there yourself, which is why like I love to hear you're like leaning into like adult formation and like helping adults become better mentors and guides. I have a book back here called Becoming Better Grown-ups. And it's it's actually by the guy that made Kid President. Have you like seen that? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 37:36

So it's like he was at our school last year. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:38

Okay, yes, perfect. Yeah. So I love is it Brad Montague? I can't remember his name.

SPEAKER_02 37:42

That's right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:43

Okay, yeah. He's a great example. But I just I love that as like uh, like if you want a more agencing or if you want to like, you know, have your child have a different experience in school, like it really does start with you and how you're thinking about yourself and where you get external validation from. Because so much of the time, like a decision about if I'm an adult who is making an educational decision about like where my child's gonna go to school, you know, I'm talking to my friends and my friends' opinions about what's a good school and what success looks like and what kind of kids we're raising. Right. If you have a lot of friends who send their kids to maybe like a back to basics like charter school where they wear uniforms and like the like the ethos of that school is like discipline and rigor and like sit in your seat and like comply essentially, that it's a lot harder for me as an adult to make a different choice when I am socially predisposed to choose what my friends choose and to think like if I want my friends to think I'm a good parent, then I need to have to raise kids that those parents think are good kids. And if the currency is like obedience or compliance, like I'm definitely gonna have a lot. There's like a social risk almost to me as a parent to make a different choice when that is like the culture. But if I'm a person who is very agentic myself and doesn't mind being different from the crowd and has my own set of values and like seeks internal validation, then I'm gonna have a a much easier time making that choice and feeling good and feeling confident in that choice and leading my children in a way that is like healthy and doesn't like transfer the I need external validation. So you need to behave or you need to get A's or you need to score the soccer goals or anything that we don't want to transfer those things.

Escaping Validation Culture And Metrics

SPEAKER_02 39:19

Well said. And to me, Katie, I've been wondering for the last five or so years about the impact on our nation of and in our culture and society on what you just described, which is that that compliance-based culture, that culture of external validation, what sorts of generations is it graduating into our society? And do we see evidence of, you know, generations of dependent learners? I don't know. I would I would put it to the listeners, do you do you see qualities of uh you know dependency in our in our nation today? And then how might we kind of, as you're talking about, Katie, you know, switch be for ourselves, you know, fully responsible uh for for the the purpose that we have for our own lives and then you know help our help our children who are not us and who are on their own journeys, uh, you know, do the same thing.

SPEAKER_01 40:10

I feel like it's so much harder now with social media because it's like now I have like an actual number that shows how much people like this certain thing. So it's like even harder for me just not care. Like have talked to like teens who use social media and they're like, oh, if I put something up and it doesn't get like an a certain amount of hearts or likes or whatever in the first like 10 minutes, I take it down. Where it's like, oh, the people didn't like that, right? So they're using these metrics as like it's like become even harder. It's not just a story in my brain that, like, oh, like I'm more popular if I dress this way, or if I'm more popular if I act this way or think these things or listen to this music, whatever. It's like, no, now I like have hard data that like everyone likes me more when I'm this way. And so it's really hard to get out of that thinking and to just like this sounds harsh, but just like to stop caring about all of that. It's just, it's just noise. And when you can like really dial in to like your own heart, your own mind, your own purpose, your own mission, you can live such it's like your life just gets so much quieter and more peaceful. And I want that for kids, but it's like you can't just bundle that up and give it to someone. Like you have to lead them through this journey of like discovering that for themselves. And I I love that that's like what your work is on a mission to do, right? To help every child that you interact with to reach that level of like self-actual actualization and like internal dependency. I love this quote from the book. It says, The longer children live, move, and have their being in environments where they're regularly told what to do and what to learn, the more they become dependent on others. And I don't want to sound like you can never depend on anyone else. Like you want to be interdependent, actually, which I think is part of your definition of like success, right? That they know how to depend on other people and like live in relationship and like learning is inherently social, right? So, like, how do we have these relationships and to to care about others without completing letting it completely override our own like compass, our own internal compass?

SPEAKER_02 42:08

Yeah, that resonates. And for me, the a big motivator is for me and and and for those in my care, helping helping us to become rightly related to the things that are most important in our lives, rightly related to ourselves, rightly related to the social world, to one another, and rightly related to the natural world. Something you just said, you know, reminded me that, and I think as it relates to the social media component, Katie. I heard this fascinating perspective on addiction that's really stuck with me in my 20s, and how it's really defined as when anything that's a part of the natural world exercises dominion over people rather than the other way around, which is really how it's meant to be. You know, and so for example, like I, you know, maybe I have a friend who is barley is exercising dominion over him, you know what I mean? And he's addicted to uh whatever stuff's associated with barley or the tobacco leaf, you know, is or the urge to work. You know, in your example, uh, you know, a a like from a social media app, if it's exercising dominion over, you know, an individual, it's we're not in right relationship with that thing, you know, in many ways as a people, because people are very special, people and powerful, not perfect by any stretch, but to be rightly related to those things, people should be in charge, you know. And I think especially as AI grows and you know, really any part of the natural world, I think it's important for us to stay rightly related and not to relinquish the authority of humanity, you know? And I agree with you, Katie. Like I think when our relationships are rightly placed and healthy with ourselves, with the social world, with the natural world, I do think there's a piece there that can transcend, you know, a lot of the the just how hard life is, frankly.

Freedom Levels And Self-Made Deals

SPEAKER_01 43:58

Yeah, absolutely. Going back to how do we help a developing human become more agentic? In the book, you talk about different you call them freedom levels.

SPEAKER_02 44:07

Freedom levels, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 44:08

Yeah. Freedom levels. So talk about freedom levels a little bit and like how you set up in a school environment, like how you kind of gradually relinquish. Like it's like there's a there's a balance in how you hand autonomy to a child that's developing, right? So like talk talk through that. How do you think about it?

SPEAKER_02 44:26

Well, I've I've learned a lot from our the Acton Academy Network on this. So freedom levels essentially are a structure of points. And it's really typically for younger learners and maybe some middle school learners. And we actually let the learners decide if those are going to be applicable or not, you know, if they want them or not. But based on an individual's choices that they make, they can earn certain freedoms. And there's, you know, the lowest would be uh uh nesting. Sorry, reset would be the nest would be the lowest, and then nesting is the next highest, and then flying and then soaring. And in soaring, I mean, you can sit wherever you want, you can eat whenever you want, you can go outside whenever you want. I mean, because you've proven that you uh are a person who can make responsible, productive choices in our community. And uh, you know, what we find is that some learners, not all, but some learners are very motivated by freedom points, freedom levels, and and they want to be on soaring, you know, and so they make these choices. And I think more broadly, Katie, for us, we have designed our learning environment at the Fourth School and Acting Academy and the Fourth School Align to include a set of both individual as well as group motivators and intrinsic and extrinsic motivators. And so we're sort of agnostic to including those and you know, recognizing that different things motivate different young people. And as long as we have something in there that some learners are going to be excited about, then we're doing our job. Obviously, we think, as we've mentioned here, that internal validation and intrinsic motivation is is is um you know the most important, is paramount, and we're working towards that. And sometimes it helps to get a prize. Sometimes it helps to experience the consequences, the negative consequences of the choices, you know, that I make and not have the kind of freedom that I would enjoy. We've got a mixture of both.

SPEAKER_01 46:17

Yeah, well, I think that really respects the whole human experience, right? Like we aren't all just inherently intrinsically motivated to make all the right choices, right? Like the world doesn't work like that. And so I think definitely incorporating a mix of intrinsic and extrinsic and holding these things like intention is actually very realistic and helps kids learn how to manage themselves instead of be managed by others. Like one of the things that we try to tease out, like in our student onboarding, we talk about how a lot of adults will try to make a deal, like a deal with you, like clean your room and we'll go for ice cream, or like it's like an if-then statement that is essentially like a very soft threat where it's like if, you know, right? It's like if we want to be honest, it's like this is a bribe or a threat, depend on how it how it's phrased, and you can do it in lots of friendly ways. But essentially you're trying to make a deal with the kid, right? The premise that we use is kind of like adults make deals with you because they love you. They want the best for you and they want good outcomes for you, and they've lived life and they know kind of like generally speaking, like what things like make humans happy and what things will lead to kind of these negative results that you're talking about. But the goal of learning how to manage yourself and not be managed is to move from just being really reliant on adults making deals with you or like, you know, manipulating you with prizes and rewards and punishments, right? Um, to where you are now saying, like, I am going to make a deal with myself. And we see this in adults all the time. Like, I'm gonna be really good on my diet, and then I'm gonna have a cheat day. Like I'm gonna have this brownie, right? Like I I remember making, I had to write a big paper in college and I had really put it off and I had to write 30 pages. And so I took 30 chocolate chips, they were white chocolate chips, and I put them up on my desk and I was like, every page I'm gonna use chocolate chip. It's like, this is what I need, right? To feel like motivated in this moment. And it's silly, but it would be weird if as an adult, my roommate came in and said, like, hey, you need to write this paper. I'm gonna put these chocolate chips on here and you get one, right? It's like it's where the deal's coming from that like a lot of the agency lies in. So it's like, I want you to understand that how to motivate yourself and I'm gonna help you see that. Like maybe we'll make some deals initially and stuff like that. But eventually, like it's like, what deal is motivating to you? And it's tricky because if you're like kind of allowing a little bit of extrinsic motivation there, it's like you as the adult control all of the sugar, all of the screens, all of the money, all of the things that like would all of the free time, right? Like you control everything. So it's like you have to relinquish some of that control so that child can then like make a deal with themselves to like allow. It's like if I wanted to get all of my, we call it conquer our academics done for the week, and then I wanted to make a deal with myself that I got to like have extra free time or have a treat or something. Like I would need an adult to be like like access to a treat, please. Like I can't like go drive myself to the store with my own money and buy a brownie when I'm seven, right? Like I need the adults' help to like facilitate that. So just like sharing this power, like living that space of shared power and helping the child make deals with themselves eventually. Um, and then along that path, they do discover purpose and like that it feels good to serve others and to solve problems and things like that. But we we learn these things in parallel often.

SPEAKER_02 49:27

That's a great framing, Katie. Just uh let's to just name what parents are actually doing with kids. We're making a deal here, but what but it's so that you can be making deals with yourself ultimately as quickly as possible, really.

SPEAKER_01 49:39

Yeah, definitely. And I I think um it's like you can you can move to make a deal with yourself really quick. Like five-year-olds can do this. You just have to facilitate, like you have to be okay with like what the prize is, right? Like um one time my son was he was maybe like fourth grade, so 10, 9, he's nine. And he was having a really he was really far behind in his math goal. And again, we don't use grades or anything like that. So it's like you're just be we we collaborated, we set a goal, a shared goal, and that we all committed to to getting done. And he was like falling off pace of that goal, which he didn't sit well with himself. I wasn't like bringing a lot of like shame or like you gotta get this goal done, right? It's he's like, I'm behind. And I'm like, okay, like reflect on this situation. What is it that gets in your way when you're like trying to choose like if you're gonna do math or if you're gonna go do something else? Like talk me through that moment. He's like, I math makes me feel stupid. And so I want to avoid that. And so I'll do anything else besides math, right? Like, I'm just kind of in this like avoidance pattern. Um we can't, I was like, hey, make yourself a deal. Like, I'll support you in a deal. And the deal was if I get this done, if I'm caught up by a certain date, the end of the month or something, you'll drive me to the dollar store and I will I will spend a dollar of my own at the dollar store. And I'm like, okay, I will fully support that, right? Like, I'm not saying like I'll give you a dollar if you get on track in math, right? Which I could do because I love him and I do want him to stay on track in math. But just giving having that conversation and allowing him to make that deal just shows that he can be trusted to make good decisions, that his intentions are good, that he is a hardworking, diligent individual that wants to like live up to the goal that he set. He wants to be a person that's full of integrity and like do what he said he was going to do. Like all of these good things come when we allow them to like make a deal with themselves and support them instead of just like wave the stick or the carrot, right?

SPEAKER_02 51:25

That's a very, very cool, powerful framing. I haven't heard it framed that way. We we've talked about it, you know, honoring the learner's goals that they have for themselves. But the fact that I don't know, something about having them making a deal with themselves, um, it's like them talking to themselves in a way that's kind of beautiful. That's awesome.

Who Kindled Tyler And Where To Learn

SPEAKER_01 51:42

And then like bringing it back to like integrity too, like some sort of characteristic. It's like I set out to do this and like I want to like make good on my commitments because I'm a person that can be relied on. All of that also like in parallel builds like not only like do I want to like go to med school to like help relieve suffering in the world and like be a doctor or whatever, but it's like I want to be a person who can be trusted and relied on. There are lots of different, yeah, motivational framings that I think can really and we're all we should work them all. Like there's no bad. I think sometimes, and I'm I'm totally at fault for like, you know, really being down on extrinsic motivation, but like there are good ways to do it. You just have to frame it differently. But we're past time, we should wrap up. My last question to you and to all of our guests is always who is someone in your life who has kindled your motivation, your love of learning, um, your passion?

SPEAKER_02 52:28

I would say my mom, Joan Helmy Figpen, Joan Glenda Helmy Figpen. She was a lifelong educator. She has always loved me and my sister with unconditionally and had unconditional positive regard. And she's loved my kids, and she uh sacrificed a ton, and she made many moments of uh childhood very, very joyful and memorable and safe and secure and is still connected. Uh, she's actually the reading specialist at our school right now and uh helped us launch Forest, which is amazing. And I'm so lucky to be you know so close to her and to be her son.

SPEAKER_01 53:07

That's beautiful. I love that. How can people learn more about your work?

SPEAKER_02 53:10

Visit us at selfdirect.school and theforest.school, and that's the place to learn.

SPEAKER_01 53:16

I love it. And can we yeah, what are your socials?

SPEAKER_02 53:20

So we have on Instagram, it's we are forest school and Facebook as well. Um, and that's they're both connected, so that's probably the best way to do it.

SPEAKER_01 53:28

I love it. Well, this has been such a cool conversation. I feel like I've been so like uplifted, and I just always like leave these conversations just remotivated to like interact with kids in a more productive, like responsive way. And so I just want to thank you for your example and for all the work that you do in the world. And thank you for coming on the Kindled Podcast.

Sponsor Message And Closing

SPEAKER_02 53:47

You're welcome. Thank you for the kind words, but also the chance. I really appreciate your thoughts uh, too, and the work that you're doing.

SPEAKER_01 53:53

The Kindled Podcast is brought to you by Prenda. Prenda makes it easy to start and run an amazing microschool based on all the ideas we talk about here on the Kindled Podcast. Don't forget to follow us on social media at Prenda Learn. And if you'd like more information about starting a micro school, just go to Prenda.com. Thanks for listening and remember to keep Kindling.