FAQ's
Please use any of the forms on my About page to share additional questions with me that you don’t find answers to here.
What is Iterative Autonomy?
Iterative practices grow & change as they repeat over time.
Autonomy is freely choosing your own thoughts & actions.
Iterative Autonomy (IA) is a practice of growing your self-awareness into greater ownership of your thoughts & actions.
It’s an educator’s answer to the question: What can we do to set ALL people up to succeed?
And trust me I DO know it's a mouthful, but it's also a way to define both the entire human experience AND how to live life to the fullest in just two words. This is why I feel so strongly about their value and potential to effect positive change.
Without iteration, we are denying the truth of change, the one thing that we can depend on to happen in this world. Without autonomy, we aren't really a world of individuals, we are a finite collection of echo chambers.
IA Practices are uniquely personal, fitting your needs as they grow & change with time.
So YOUR Iterative Autonomy is your own journey of self-discovery and ownership of your thoughts & actions.
TLDR: A Way to Be More You.
What is the Autonomy Adventurers Pre-Membership Club?
Autonomy Adventurers is a Pre-Membership Club for explorative & playful family teams who want to get to know themselves & each other on a deeper level.
Each quarter, members will receive a special quest for the whole family to adventure on together.
There will also be space in my posts on the platform for member families to talk about how their missions are going, ask questions, share advice and connect with other families practicing self-discovery as a family team.
And those are just the basic membership offers.
Those who’d like to upgrade, can also get access to:
Collections of add-on materials to create a better fit for your unique team.
Expansions to take each quest in new directions for those with extra bandwidth & greater interest.
And a few top tier members will be able to make personalized requests.
In addition to all of this, possibly one of the greatest benefits of joining the Autonomy Adventurers at this very early stage is the power your family will have to shape future offers.
I envision a community of families sharing their experiences (both things that went well & not so well) for other families to build off of and learn from.
I can see conversations that ripple out into new ideas, understandings & experiments both for other family teams on the platform and myself as I develop new offers and resources.
And, though different members will have different levels of access to make requests of me directly, I will always be eager to hear everyone’s opinions & feedback on any aspect of the experience that may be improved.
So to recap: former classroom teacher, very enthusiastic to create quality experiences for your family, open to ideas for improvement along the way and ready to start dropping 2+ decades worth of experience into activities to bring your family closer together.
The first cohort of Autonomy Adventurers will embark on their Spring Quarterly Quest in March. Join the waitlist today!
Where do your ideas come from?
Well first & foremost, I went to public school, have a degree in early childhood education and, for a time, I was a 2nd grade classroom teacher and small tutoring business owner. I can draw the squiggly line from playing school with my siblings as a kid, my favorite teachers & mentors, time with my elementary students & designing my own tutoring program in Arizona through volunteering with creative educators in Oregon, years of research on anything remotely related to my growing ideas for improving the education system & ultimately to my evolving framework for a practice of growing your self-awareness into greater ownership of your thoughts & actions.
The concept of Iterative Autonomy (IA), at it's core, comes from my study of iterative design, most commonly discussed in tech circles, and Edward Deci and Richard Ryan's self-determination theory. I've also sprinkled in my understanding of mindset, introduced to me by author and researcher Carol Dweck, endless takeaways from Brene Brown’s qualitative grounded theory research and this experiential learning model (experience > reflection > transference of learning to the next experience), taught to me by my friend Iggy Perillo, a trusted source on leadership & experiential human development.
My apologies if those last two sentences just put you to sleep. I totally understand how quickly academic concepts can make things feel bigger and more intimidating than they really are. As my website & resources grow, you'll find several links to content that expands upon these ideas, so you can dive as deep as you like into the research, but just know that I am always striving to make these concepts more approachable & easy to apply. I’m also well aware I did not come up with my ideas in a vacuum, so I’m always open to feedback on where they can be improved including nuanced changes to language & quality resources.
Do I need to do everything just as you say it on your site to be successful?
Oh heck no.
But really you already knew the answer to that if you believe me to have even an ounce of integrity. Honestly, there is nothing worse than someone saying you should be autonomous and focus on being who you are by doing exactly what they tell you to do. This is a subconscious message of many educational models and I have no tolerance for it.
I'm intentionally crafting an initial space to kick start your iterative autonomy journey and I want you to do with it just what I want you to do with everything on my website (and everywhere else really):
Take what you like. Leave what you don't.
You will be giving me the greatest compliment by taking what I've come up with and making it your own. That's why I try not to reinvent anyone else's amazing wheel. My plan is to open up doors for your family all over the place and my only wish is that you only walk through the ones you see as a fit at the time. And only dive as deep as you need, sending all that you interact with through your own personal filter. I will always be seeking to craft my own iterative autonomy while encouraging others to craft theirs.
What should I do if I have more questions?
My practice of autonomy allyship & advocacy is an iterative one as well. I welcome constructive feedback from those who have knowledge, experiences, perspectives and ideas to offer that are different from my own whether they align with my viewpoints or not. I want to get this right and the only way to do that is to always stay open to better ideas and deeper understanding.
You can use the search bar at the bottom of each page or check out my blog here to see if I’ve already got what you’re looking for. Otherwise, my About page has several forms for sharing questions or ideas with me 1-1 and/or anonymously. Thank you for helping me to grow!