The first day of nursery school for Laura Queen-Malcolm’s son, Leon, ended his career in public education for good.
Leon, who is autistic and was non-verbal at the time, walked into the classroom that first day and felt a growing anxiety, his mom says. “He just didn’t like the environment at all,” she told The Epoch Times, speaking of the rigid layout of the desks and general air of conformity. “I knew that wasn’t right for my child.”
After pulling Leon from class, Malcolm spent the next half-decade “worldschooling” her son. Worldschooling is like homeschooling, only the world becomes the classroom and learning is merged with life experiences—as well as travel. School isn’t just limited to academics like biology, physics, and math.
“Life’s learning,” Malcolm says, explaining her philosophy. “He loves being out and about, going on adventures.”
In this milieu, Leon, now 8, is thriving in his studies.
Last year, the family toured the English countryside in a camper van as part of their curriculum. They visited a medieval village, camped on a yacht, kayaked, and attended a music festival. Malcolm took Leon to meet other homeschool families to forage along rivers and cook food over an open fire. They learned about biology and survival.
Malcolm, 43, recently sold her home in Scotland and moved to the United States with Leon to live with her new husband. Her former husband died of cancer in 2020, and she remarried through their church. They now plan to embark on a nomadic family quest across the globe just as soon as their home in Ohio sells. They'll truly uproot and start a full-on worldschooling shift in their lives. Their travels have already transformed Leon from being non-verbal to being able to “express what he enjoys.”
“We’re looking at all being in Georgia together,” she said. “When I say Georgia, I mean Georgia the country.”
She’s made connections with worldschooling hubs across Europe through the internet to arrange trips from Portugal and Spain to Turkey and Georgia, where they will settle for “at least a year” to partake in the local hub’s educational facilities. Then they'll trek on again. Language won’t be a problem, she says, since the programs are mostly in English.
“I think [Leon would] benefit now from the more academic side of things,” she said.
The family has been following the “play-led” model used in Sweden where children aren’t taught academic subjects until age 7. Early school life is reserved for exploration through play.
“It’s very much independent, more childlike,” Malcolm says, adding that Leon has been enthusiastically talking about riding the cable cars through Tbilisi, Georgia’s capital, forming his own interests.
Since starting worldschooling, Leon has progressed in “leaps and bounds” from being non-verbal at 2 years old, his mom says. Despite being on the spectrum, he'll sit and have a conversation with someone if they ask him about things he’s interested in and give him a chance to warm up to them.
Through their journeys, he is finding out that he loves working with animals. Malcolm once owned threes horses in Scotland that were therapeutic for her after the loss of her first husband. Her involvement with equine training gave Leon opportunities to feed and touch the horses and sparked his passion for animals.
“It was John D. Rockefeller who set the system in place, and it was a very systematic way that he wanted it to be so we'd be prepared to work for him and for the industry,” she says. “That’s what the governments are preparing for our children and are setting in place.”
Although she says public schools aren’t inspiring kids to become entrepreneurs or to dream, some kids thrive in that kind of framework. “It works for some,” she said. “I just don’t think it would have worked for [Leon], to be honest.”
Those other children aren’t travelling the world and gathering the same rich experiences as Leon. “They’re not getting to think outside of that box,” Malcolm said. “You go to university and get a master’s before you even decide your life.”
Now in Grade 3, Leon is already showing he has a natural aptitude that might point to a future career. “He loves [to wonder about] how things work,” she said, adding that he’s fascinated by pipes and how water flows.
“I have to imagine him doing something practical, a skill like plumbing or electrician.”
Just show Leon how to take something apart and he'll put it right back together, Malcolm said. She thinks he might make a good mechanic one day.
“I think that would be more suited for him.”
