At Carbon's school, which is a Sudbury school, there are "corporations" that "own" and care for different areas of the school. For instance, there is an "Art Corporation", a "Music Corporation", a "Kitchen Corporation", etc. The corporation sets rules for who can use the materials and what they have to do to show capability, through a process called "getting certified". In this system, Carbon still hasn't managed to get certified to use the microwave at school, because he gets mixed up about what button does what.
After our trip to Legoland, Carbon was very excited by the idea of starting a Lego Corporation at school. He proposed it, and had a staff person help him write up a sort of charter. The school meeting voted and approved it. He was joined by two adults and a handful of other kids who also like legos a lot. He took more rubbermaid tubs to school and has been leading the charge to ask for donations of legos and funding from the school coffers to buy legos that the corporation will agree they want the most.
They set a date for a field trip to Toys R Us to look at legos and make a list of what they want to buy. But, unfortunately, Carbon ended up being the only kid who went on the field trip, which bummed him out a bit. Hopefully the lego corporation will regain a bit of its enthusiasm, but if not, it's already been a good process for Carbon.
What impresses me about this system is that it takes an interest - in Carbon's case his main interest is legos - and it gives it a real-world setting that is great practice and education for later life.
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