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By Wayne Ellsworth


Tekos School is a novel student-centred institution in Russia. It is based on the principle that every child is born a genius, emphasises co-creation, harmony, oneness, beauty, nature, serving others, martial arts, love of motherland and more! This article is about our recent visit to the school near Pshada village, about 20 km north of the Black Sea.

I had received a gift of US$2,000. The very next day my friend said to me: “We have got to go visit Tekos School. It may be the real future of education – and Japanese schools are failing, and in other countries too!” My father was an educator so that really caught my attention!

So Shizue Inagaki, Hiroko Oriyama and I boarded an Aeroflot flight. The next night we landed at Krasnodar, a few hours away from where the Winter Olympics had been held. By the time we got to Pshada village it was 3am! I managed to get only four hours of sleep.

There was no electric power in the village and the roads were blocked. But the Tekos School administrative assistant Anna managed to come to where we were staying by some mysterious path.

We learnt that she had graduated from Tekos School at age 13, went to college, and then came back to work in the school. We went there the following day. The school had been built by the students themselves! Every room was painted with great imagination – themes from nature, historical figures, integrated curriculum and on and on. It felt like an art gallery.

“Who did this painting?” someone asked. “Oh, the students did it themselves,” was the answer. “They change many each year!” The paintings looked so professional, I could not believe my eyes!

“How do the students learn?” I asked. “Oh, they learn sitting around tables of five or six learners. The older ones re-wrote the text to make it easier to learn, and everybody teaches as well as learns.

“You see, this is a place of love, they feel totally safe here, they study one or two subject until they learn five or six years of knowledge. There are no bells telling them when to stop, no homework, they just love learning. They help each other, all the time. Learning and then teaching.

“Maybe the same day they learn another subject of their choice. And after lunch, they have free time, then art, singing, and making costumes for the dramas they perform.”

The students at Tekos have to sit for standard tests when they finish their studies. They pass with outstanding marks. After graduation, they get admitted to college but stay at Tekos and return to take their exams.

We toured several classrooms – the students were pleasant and engaged in their studies. They study math, chemistry, physics and astrology as an integrated subject, said Anna.

“That must be very difficult!” I said.

“No, it is much easier, and they learn the inter-relations and how these relate to the cosmos!”

We went outdoors and visited their fiveor six-bed homes. These were beautifully painted, the beds were neat and everything was well ordered. “Some discipline,” I exclaimed. “How do they get them to be so orderly?”

“The environment is so attractive, they automatically just do well!”

“Oh, right,” I said, but I couldn’t believe there were no behaviour problems among the 300 students.

It was getting near suppertime. We were treated to some traditional Russian food – great fish and vegetables from the school garden. The meals had been prepared by the children.

I was amazed! This was a hundred times more than what I came to see, a lifechanging experience. The three of usagreed to integrate as much of this as possible in our next project.

The school was set up in 1933 by eight educational experts following official concern about the quality of education in Russia. Professor Mikhail Petrovich Shchetinin was chosen to head the school.

Tekos has 250 to 300 regular students from various countries and cultures. They joined after visiting the school to experience its style and approach to education and learning about what it offers. Their expenses, including boarding, are paid for by the Russian government.

The school’s philosophy is that young people are natural geniuses but conventional education with its focus on imparting knowledge, know-how and habits sets them back. The aim at Tekos is to raise learners to live harmoniously with society and perceive the world as a united whole.

If we were to model schools on Tekos, we would need to think about the purpose and contents of education in a new way. We would have to view ourselves as facilitators of genius children. We do away with age limits, conventional teachers and classrooms, and create a student-centred living environment.

Wayne Ellsworth is a member of ICA Japan.
For more information contact Wayne Ellsworth, wayne@icajapan.org,
Shizue Inagaki, beaskypal3@gmail.com or
Hiroko Oriyama, oceangirl423@gmail.com,
or visit: http://www.icajapan.org/abundance/learning/


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