We are pleased to announce that Dr. Peter Gray, research psychologist and Sudbury Valley School board member, has published a book that collects many of the insights and posts from his Psychology Today Blog, Freedom To Learn. Throughout the book, Dr. Gray champions that most essential human learning activity: play. He captures what Fairhaven School…
Three adolescent boys enter the back door and head into the Shop. They are talking a mile a minute, and they are on a mission to build or repair something, maybe a shield for their swordplay game. Their presence is loud, physical, and energetic. Here at Fairhaven School, the moment is insignificant; however, in the…
After Theatre Corp’s recent production of Hamlet, some of the younger students began forming their own play in the Kid Nook. On Monday those students put on their adaptation of Cinderella. I have to admit while watching them I could not help but think of how proud I am of all of them. They…
On October 26th, Fairhaven School hosted its second alumni panel. Ben Umstead (’01), Geoffrey Craighead (’01), and Brett Smith (’04) spoke of their experiences at Fairhaven School and their time after school. Here is what Geoffrey posted on his Facebook: “This is an alumni panel which I participated in for Fairhaven, the Sudbury school that…
As a teaching artist for the past 21 years, it has been both my pleasure and my passion to share my art with students. This year’s challenge of Shakespeare’s Hamlet has proven equally fulfilling. It is my personal belief that one can learn everything through the theatre. Over the past 7 years, I have had…
Fairhaven School Halloween, 2012. Enjoy!
Fairhaven School recently held its first 24 Hour Film Challenge, where students were able to stay at school over the weekend to produce their short films. Two supervisors/instructors tasked the students with creating a silent film which must use specific props by 5pm the next day. Even with only ten students present, the school was…
(We received this post and photo from alumna Alice Yoe after the school invited her to join the upcoming alumni panel.) Were it possible, I would love to drop in and be on the panel, but that might be a little bit tricky, considering that I’m a little… in Japan. I’m living in Fuji, Shizuoka–3…
“Education is a process of expansion—expanding strategies as writers, expanding knowledge as scholars, expanding concerns as citizens. Every class should be a community in which students safely and certainly expand their worlds.” -Cole Swenson, poet and scholar Although this quotation speaks to education in the narrower frame of traditional schooling and writing, if one substitutes…
On Friday, September 21st, Fairhaven School lost a cherished member of its community. Tim Craighead, 24, was a student at Fairhaven from 2000-2004. When I heard the news on Sunday I immediately knew that I wanted to return to the school grounds with those I call my “Fairhaven family”. Many others felt the same, so…
Sudbury schools exist worldwide, with groups advocating liberty and responsibility for young people in Germany, Japan, Israel, the United Kingdom, Canada, Belgium, the Netherlands, and across the United States. New schools seem always to be starting, as traditional schools continue business as usual. Every single school that exists is a testament to hard work, trust,…
My schedule this year at school includes two days opening the school, and these always afford a different Fairhaven School experience, these first hours before the hurlyburly to come. Empty rooms invite. It is difficult not to think of the notion of tabula rasa: each day brings a clean slate, both for the school and…
