New Experiential Learning Program for Homeschoolers on Long Island

Long Island homeschool families have a new option for hands-on enrichment designed to connect practical skills, science, creativity, leadership, and real-world problem-solving.

Synchronicity Coaching and Forgotten Skillz are introducing Praxis, an experiential learning program built around a simple idea: there is a difference between knowing something and knowing what to do with it.

Praxis programs give young people opportunities to work with their hands, ask questions, experiment, solve problems, collaborate with others, and gradually take greater ownership of what they are learning. The goal is broader than mastering any one skill or subject. Praxis is designed to help participants develop capability—the confidence, judgment, adaptability, curiosity, communication skills, and practical competence needed to meet challenges in the real world.

The first active programs are being developed in partnership with Long Island’s homeschool community, with separate experiences for ages 7–11 and 11–14.

SkillCraft Explorers: Ages 7–11

For younger participants, SkillCraft Explorers provides a developmentally appropriate introduction to hands-on learning through Forgotten Skillz.

Explorers may work with nature, traditional skills, tools, natural materials, crafts, outdoor learning, observation, creative problem-solving, and other practical experiences. Sessions are designed to encourage children to ask questions, try things for themselves, make mistakes, work with others, and gradually become more confident in their own abilities.

At this age, the different elements of Praxis are intentionally blended together rather than divided into separate subjects. A single experience might combine nature observation, simple engineering, practical skill-building, teamwork, creativity, and problem-solving without stopping to label each one.

That interdisciplinary approach is especially well suited to homeschool learning, where families often value experiences that connect multiple areas of study through meaningful activity.

Learn more about SkillCraft Explorers for ages 7–11:
https://forgottenskillz.com/skillcraft-explorers-for-kids-ages-7-11/

Praxis: Pathfinders: Ages 11–14

For ages 11–14, the program becomes more deliberately interdisciplinary through Praxis: Pathfinders.

Pathfinders begin connecting practical skills with science and engineering, leadership, communication, entrepreneurship, personal development, and increasingly complex team challenges.

Their experiences are organized around four recurring areas:

SkillCraft Lab develops practical and traditional skills through hands-on work with materials, tools, nature, crafts, outdoor skills, historical technologies, and other useful forms of knowledge.

Discovery Lab brings in STEAM—science, technology, engineering, art, and mathematics—through experimentation, investigation, design, and problem-solving. Participants are encouraged to test ideas, evaluate results, and refine their thinking rather than simply being given an answer.

Success Lab focuses on the human side of capability, including communication, teamwork, mindset, leadership, entrepreneurship, decision-making, relationships, and other skills that help people work effectively with themselves and others.

Challenge Lab gives students opportunities to combine what they have learned through practical missions, team challenges, projects, field experiences, and other situations that require knowledge to become action.

The Labs can work independently, but the larger value comes from the connections between them. A practical skill may lead into a science or engineering investigation. A leadership session may prepare students to organize a team. A later challenge can then require them to draw on several forms of learning at once.

Learn more about Praxis: Pathfinders for ages 11–14:
https://forgottenskillz.com/praxis-pathfinders-for-ages-11-14/

Why Praxis Fits Homeschool Learning

Praxis was not created exclusively for homeschoolers, but the model has found a natural early home within Long Island’s homeschool community.

Many homeschool families are already accustomed to learning that moves across traditional subject boundaries. Building something may involve mathematics, physics, history, design, communication, and creativity. Exploring a natural space may lead into biology, ecology, cultural history, stewardship, and practical skills. Organizing a team project can involve leadership, budgeting, entrepreneurship, writing, and problem-solving.

Praxis is designed around those connections.

For students, that means opportunities to move beyond worksheets and lectures and actually use what they are learning. They can work with their hands, experiment, spend time outdoors, collaborate with peers, make decisions, take healthy risks, and encounter problems that may have several possible solutions.

For homeschool families, the program can complement academic work while also providing something that can be difficult to reproduce at home: a group of peers working together through shared challenges and real-world experiences.

Programs can be offered as individual workshops, connected multi-part experiences, or ongoing homeschool clubs.

Growing With the Student

Praxis is being developed as a broader developmental pathway rather than a single age-specific class.

The next stage currently in development is Seekers, designed roughly for ages 4–7. At that level, the emphasis will be on play, movement, sensory experience, imagination, observation, curiosity, and age-appropriate independence.

As participants grow, the experiences can become progressively more complex and more independent. SkillCraft Explorers begin building confidence through exploration and practical learning. Praxis: Pathfinders begin making deliberate connections among skills, science, leadership, and action.

The common thread is capability.

A capable young person does not need to know everything. They need to become increasingly comfortable learning something new, asking useful questions, trying a solution, recognizing when it is not working, adapting, communicating with others, and continuing forward.

Learning That Leads Somewhere

One of the longer-term goals of Praxis is to create opportunities for students to use what they learn in ways that matter beyond the class itself.

A group might eventually identify a need, investigate possible solutions, learn the skills required to address it, test ideas through science and engineering, organize people and resources, and work together to create something useful for their community.

The finished project could take many forms. The deeper outcome is the development that happens along the way.

Praxis is ultimately about helping young people turn knowledge into action—and allowing that process to shape them into more capable, thoughtful, confident people.

The first Praxis programs are currently being developed with Long Island homeschool families, with additional opportunities for schools, libraries, clubs, camps, youth organizations, and community groups also possible.

Learn more about Praxis and current programs:
https://forgottenskillz.com/praxis-programs/