Cindy Ross - The World Is Our Classroom: How One Family Used Nature and Travel to Shape an Extraordinary Education

Praise for

THE WORLD IS OUR CLASSROOM

A love of the natural world and an understanding of our place in it are vital for humanity and all other life. Knowing we are part of nature and not outside it is vital for the future. The importance of this comes across strongly in The World Is Our Classroom . Ross taught it by doing rather than telling. Experience rather than theory. This is a book that shows just what is possible, a book that gives hope for the future.

C HRIS T OWNSEND , award-winning author of Out There: A Voice from The Wild

School teachers are largely bound by classroom walls and the Internet; parents have no such constraints. As Cindy Ross reveals in The World Is Our Classroom, the unbounded opportunities in nature should inspire every parent to create memories and powerful experiential learning opportunities. Significant emotional encounters can be transformative. When children are allowed to explore, and use their curiosity to discover the seemingly magical things in nature, it changes them as no passive learning can. In this rapidly changing world, we must foster a love of nature in every child as they must soon confront profound ecological disruption and play a vital role in restoring, replenishing and relocating elements of biodiversity to retain some aspect of system integrity upon which all life depends.

L ARRY S CHWEIGER , author of Last Chance: Preserving Life on Earth

Navigating the best educational options for your children can feel like you are lost amid a dense wilderness. The World Is Our Classroom cuts a path through that wilderness and gives the reader a map of how to teach their children the resilience, compassion, and problem solving that is part of adventure-based learning.

J ENNIFER P HARR D AVIS , author and National Geographic Adventurer of the Year

Cindy Ross is one of todays most eloquent and thoughtful writers on the connection between humans and the natural world. The World Is Our Classroom s hows how all of us invite humility and wonder into our lives, not only through great adventures, but through everyday communion with the rest of nature.

R ICHARD L OUV , author of Vitamin N, The Nature Principle, and Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder

We are encouraged to treat our children as if one tumble from the monkey bars or spiteful remark from a friend can cause a lifetime of pain. How exciting it is to see two parents put the world in front of their kids from such a young age, believing their kids will rise to the occasion. This book, The World Is Our Classroom, will explode some disabling myths about how fragile our kids are!

L ENORE S KENAZY , founder of the book, blog, and movement Free-Range Kids

In a culture increasingly alienated from nature and dependent on technology, Ms. Rosss book shows how our love for the world can be reanimated.

A UDREY P ETERMAN , president and co-founder of Earthwise Productions, Inc.

Someone once said of Ginger Rogers: She does everything Fred Astaire does, but backwards and in high heels. For me, thats what its like watching Cindy Ross. She and I have both walked across countries, traveled all over the world, maintained freelance careers, and authored books. But in addition, Cindy and her husband, Todd, built their own log home with their own hands, and raised and schooled two children. Cindys kids grew up with the world as their classroom. Want to live a big life? The World Is Our Classroom takes you on the journey of how one family did it, and it doesnt get any bigger, wilder, and better.

K AREN B ERGER , author of Great Hiking Trails of the World and the New York Times -bestselling Americas Great Hiking Trails

Cindy and her husband Todd have succeeded in accomplishing one of lifes noblest goalsto make ones avocation, ones vocation, as our two eyes see as one. They have exhibited the courage, fortitude, and just plain old hard work, to create a life they fervently believe in and then effectively sharing it with their two children. The message in this book carries the truth born from actual experience. Read it, think about it, feel it, and then get on with making, rather than earning, a life for yourself and your loved ones.

W ARREN D OYLE , PhD, 36,000-miler and founder of the Appalachian Long Distance Hikers Association & the Appalachian Folk School

Whether tightrope-walking a fogged-in Knifes Edge, ascending through the mist of Half Dome, or traversing slopes in grizzly country, Cindy and Todd present their children with breathtaking experiences that instill a sense of wonder, creativity, resilience, and self-confidence. The mental health benefits and lifelong lessons that come from extended time in nature resound through the book. Read this book before your children get sucked into the video-game vortex.

L EO W ALKER , president and co-founder of HIKE for Mental Health

The World Is Our Classroom is an enthralling education in itself for anyone eager to intimately experience the mysteries of the natural world. Cindy Ross has given us a treasure of environmental consciousness, empathy, and gratitude for the life we share on this Earth.

G AIL D. S TOREY , author of I Promise Not to Suffer: A Fool for Love Hikes the Pacific Crest Trail, winner of the National Outdoor Book Award

Cindy raised her family with a real consciousness of the value of being in nature and adventure. Cindy and her husband Todd have shown that getting kids outside early makes them better people in the long run and it makes us better parents. The World Is Our Classroom is not about completely flipping your life upside down but making the time to take you and your children outdoors. Its a lot easier to hand your child an iPad instead of going on a hike but it is ultimately much more fulfilling.

C OREY R ICH , film director and adventure photographer, author of My Favorite PlacesGreat Athletes in the Great Outdoors

The World Is Our Classroom is a fascinating discourse on creativity and learning. This book will help parents find ways to nurture creativity in their childrenparticularly by taking them into stimulating nature and giving them the freedom to explore and wonder. In these pages, parents will come to understand how necessary it is to spend lots of quality time with their children. Building a strong and effective hands-on relationship between parents and their children is the best way to minimize negative effects from challenges such as drug use.

M ICHAEL K ESSLER , acclaimed contemporary artist

Schooling, too often, is a world where teachers and schools are encouraged with drill and kill methods. This development of a new culture of schooling in America seems to mean that successful students must learn to operate their digital apparatuses and attach themselves to their computer screens, or else risk failure. The online computer-based testing begs the question about which priorities are most important; test taking on a computer screen or true learning from experience and adventure as advocated for by Cindy Rosss book, The World Is Our Classroom ? Cindys belief in experiential education for her children, in teaching children to have sense of place, belief in The Nature Principle, and having great adventures is well worth contemplating.

M ONTY T HORNBURG , PhD, educator and president of the John Muir Geotourism Center