Trust Children now available on Amazon.com

7/26/2024
I recently attended the monthly session of BAIPA, the independent Publishing Association that helped me edit and produce "Trust Children".  I learned that the best way to boost sales is to boost reviews on Amazon. The speaker suggested aiming for 100 reviews!  I don't know about 100, but if you have looked over my new edition and enjoyed it, I would appreciate a review. It does not have to be long.  I just received the first review from my former student, Genevieve Malkin. I am deeply grateful to her. You don't have to compete!  Here it is:
"Trust Children" made me remember. It made me remember being a child and all the ways I loved to explore, connect, play, feel, celebrate, question, dance, act, and create. It made me remember the magic that exists in a single story and the importance of coming to your own conclusions in a supportive environment about why things matter, rather than just hearing from others that they matter and it's expected that you memorize and fall in line.

As a Waldorf student myself, these memories flooded back to me and wrapped me in grief, hope, and excitement. Grief in that it is deeply harrowing that our educational system has moved so far away from what is so simple and pure. Hope in that this style of learning is innate and accessible to more people through Anne's book. Excitement that there may be more educators around the world who share Anne's passion for her students, curiosity for the natural world, and courage to embark on the self-discovery required to share in the learning alongside her students. May they find this book and feel inspired to use this as a guide to create the learning environment that sets children's curiosity ablaze, not just while they're in formal education, but forever throughout their lives.

"Trust Children" brought tears to my eyes and a deep knowing in my heart that it is essential we adopt the techniques Anne Cummings Jacopetti sets out to describe in her lovely book. Natural learning is just that—natural. We all mustn't forget the power of cultivating a relationship with learning as children that will create adults inspired to cultivate deep relationships with the earth, each other, and themselves.

7/13/2024  
Where does the time go?  I have been gifting books to friends and former students who helped significantly in the writing of Trust Children.  I will be sharing excerpts from the book with you to tempt you to purchase and read this new edition.  I am also encouraging readers to write reviews on the Amazon website.  There is no end of the learning curve and marketing is a big one for me.  I would also appreciate your comments that I will post on this blog.  Do sign up for my newsletter that will share new posts if you are new to this website.
     Today's excerpt is the Foreword to my book, written by Bill Ayres, long-time activist and author and Education professor emeritus:
I just finished reading “What Are We Going to Learn Today? How All Children Can Become Enthusiastic Lifelong Learners” by Anne Cummings Jacopetti. Get a copy; read it; pass it on to teachers, parents, students, community members, and anyone interested in what schools and classrooms could be (and should be) at their best, as well as the challenges we face as we continue the struggle to create meaningful educational experiences for all children and youth.
“What Are We Going to Learn Today?” is an illuminating read, filled with hard-won wisdom from a lifetime of teaching. Jacopetti writes beautifully, and her stories are packed with wisdom about the power of dialogue and questioning, curiosity and first-hand experiences in teaching and authentic learning. She urges us to release our wildest imaginations as we nurture a tolerance for improvisation, confusion, experimentation, perpetual uncertainty, reciprocity, spontaneity, uniqueness, and flux.
And she helps us understand the terms of resistance: education for free people is powered, after all, by a particularly precious and fragile ideal: every human being is of infinite and incalculable value, each a work in progress and a force in motion, each a unique intellectual, emotional, physical, spiritual, moral, and creative force, each born equal in dignity and rights, each endowed with reason and conscience and agency, each deserving recognition and respect, and a dedicated place in a community of solidarity. We resist anything that dehumanizes or thingifies human beings, all the mechanisms to indoctrinate, inspect, rank, appraise, censure, order about, register, sort, admonish, and sermonize. And we recognize, further, that the fullest development of each individual—given the tremendous range of ability and the delicious stew of race, ethnicity, points of origin, and background—is the necessary condition for the full development of the entire community, and, conversely, that the fullest development of all is essential for the full development of each.
Jacopetti gets it: learning is an entirely natural human pursuit, and we are learning all the time. Curiosity is inherent, living in a wildly complex and diverse human community is all the motivation we need to keep growing and learning.
Wherever and whenever questioning, researching, reimagining, rebuilding, pursuing authentic questions and interests and experiences, and undertaking active work in the community is the order of the day, a spirit of open communication, interchange, and analysis becomes commonplace as an expression of love. In these places there is a certain natural disorder, some anarchy and chaos, as there is in any busy workshop. But there is also a sense of joy, and a deeper discipline at work, the discipline of getting things done and learning with one another and through life. We see clearly in these cases that education at its best is always generative, for teachers and students alike.
 

Dear Friends and Family,
Trust Children is now available through KDP, Amazon.  A Kindle version will soon follow.  I am so pleased with the final result and grateful for the help of Ruth Schwartz, the Wonderlady, and Lorna Johnson for her lovely cover design.  Now it's time to get the word out - a task that is a bit daunting, given advancing age and my relationship to a new computer that keeps outwitting me.  The importance of the message, however, keeps me going. I heard from a former student, Jack Policar, as I was taking a morning walk. It has been a number of years since we have connected and it was wonderful to talk and hear about his child, his wife and his climate recovery work.  The group of children that taught me so much on our journey through the grades are still a community - many of them are lifelong friends who celebrate, travel and enjoy life together.  Yes!  It is possible.
I will be publishing some excerpts from the book, including a wonderful foreword by Bill Ayres, in the weeks ahead.  Please let me know what you think if you purchase this new edition and I will share your thoughts on this blog. 
I hope you all are well ,
Anne