About Us
When Brent Cameron, founder and Executive Director of the Wondertree Foundation, and his six-year old daughter, Ilana, began the 'Wondertree' experiment in 1983, he didn't know that his work would lead to a total shift in how we think about learning and how learning is supported and accomplished. Over the past 25 years, the Wondertree Foundation has nurtured over 5,000 children to become compassionate, self-aware, self-directed young adults who, in this time of great change, are focused on making their communities and the world a better place. Where the conventional school system fails our children and families, SelfDesign offers breakthroughs in self-awareness and world-and-community-awareness.
The focus of SelfDesign is the self-creation of one’s integral self as an optimum human being. A child's right to control her own mind and thought process is a guiding principle of SelfDesign.
SelfDesign moves from a teacher-centric system to a learner-centric system that places the talents, gifts, and interests of learners at the center. The SelfDesign learning process is a naturally iterative one that involves goal setting, planning, action, reflection, and goal adjustments.
Our learning system includes the powerful Observing for Learning process, SelfDesign Learning Plans, Learning Outcomes Tracking, Personal Learning Portfolios, and subject expert mentors. SelfDesign mind-maps and learning plans act as snap-shots of the learner's interests and abilities that, over time, become a rich artifact of individual development. SelfDesign learners observe the process of learning at a deep level and are empowered to learn how to learn.
