The New Model*
“You don’t change the old by resisting it but by making it obsolete through superior methodology, not by talking about it but through building artifacts.” ~ Buckminster Fuller


Here, then, is our new methodology --
A brand new artifact, our prototype model:
Your potential is within your own grasp


This invention proposes spontaneous education for all ages driven by choice and discovery. The object is to open the knowledge and wisdom of civilization to participants in a way such that basic skills and tools can be accessed, understood and mastered.

It will be as touchable, accessible, sequential, and self-correcting as it is possible to make it within a truly aesthetically pleasing environment, kept extremely orderly by two simple rules and kept pristinely beautiful by cleanliness and attention to detail.

The goal is to bring human mental potential to full flower in an atmosphere of empathy, respect, helpfulness and collaboration so that the creative results will not only bring positive benefits to individuals but to mankind as well.

Although it will be a “bricks and mortar” place, a wholly new type of search engine will offer virtual reality, “you are there” Internet access to all people on Earth.

It is a place for all ages, all social classes and entire families, who will come to it when they desire to learn: as much or as little as they wish. It will be a community of people who have a thirst for lifelong learning, and it will facilitate deep and permanent understandings they will remember forever, born out of their own interests and concerns.

After the prototype has been built, used, tested, refined and “de-kinked,” it can be modified in size, configuration and content, then spread worldwide by franchise and economies of scale.

It is based on:

  1. Freedom, and the ability of each learner to move about, explore, discover, notice and choose.
  2. The fact that children have an enormous drive to demonstrate competence and are interested in coordinating total information, total stimulation.
  3. A design to interest children in activities so profoundly that they will give ALL of their potential to them.
  4. The big picture of all knowledge: a fascinating array of hands-on content that is rich, deep, broad, accurate and restrained - only the best of the best.
  5. An atmosphere of trust, respect, safety, sincerity, zest, and joy.
Your potential is within your own grasp

This figure depicts a typical loggia design with the four main learning places in each: The Curiosity Center, the Project Center, the Hands-on Center and the Mastery Center. The loggias are three-sided with a waist–high fence in front (for easy viewing) and a turnstile gate at the entrance. Some loggias are quite large and even multi-leveled. Others are quite small and very compact. At the gate is a large “Invitation Symbol” (a flag, banner, object or hologram) which depicts the main theme within.

The Curiosity Center

Designed to welcome curious learners with a beautiful compelling and immersive experience, this area is highly interactive, sensory and engaging. Around the perimeter (starting on the left and going clockwise) are six fascinating “Discovery Walls”: 1. The “Map Alive,” 2.The “Wonder Wall,” 3.The “Mystery Wall,” 4.The “Timeline,” 5.The “Personality Wall” and 6. The “Generalized Principles.” The Map Alive shows world needs, places of major breakthroughs, hot spots of activity, and possibilities for game-changing projects. The “Wonder Wall” engenders total amazement. The “Mystery Wall” presents all sorts of unexplained, strange phenomena. The “Time Line” and “Personality Wall” convey the history and most important people of the subject. The “Generalized Principles” wall presents the major facts pertaining to the subject, which are true without exception.

A “Please Touch Pyramid” and a number of display shelves and counters will be loaded with all sorts of tools, artifacts, specimens, and relics, associated with the subject. Breakable things will be on high shelves for mature learners and sturdy things will be on lower shelves for younger learners. Computer stations provide access to varieties of Internet learning, discovery, research of facts, access to documentaries, YouTube clips, and DVDs. A “Walk In Book” is like a huge hanging rack in an Oriental rug store, in that one may “turn” the big pages. Here one may explore beautiful, amazing, and very detailed photographs related to the subject. Many small “learning stations” show in a simple form such things as the vocabulary of the subject, career options, world needs and pen pals.

The Project Center

The Project Center invites learners to become involved with self-chosen projects and contains:
  1. One or more project tables with chairs.
  2. Ample storage for supplies and equipment.
  3. Lockers in which to store on-going projects.
  4. Most of the tools, equipment and materials needed to carry out almost any project that pertains to that subject.
  5. A clean-up area.
Of course also present will be one or more mentors who will (when asked) gently guide, offer suggestions, demonstrate, explain and inspire.

The Hands-On Center

The Hands-On Center contains everything that teaches pertinent concepts by hands-on discovery through quiet, independent work with Montessori type objects and lessons, games, toys, puzzles, models, and simple machines. One or more mentors will be available to sensitively guide, encourage and insure order.

The Mastery Center

The most prominent feature is a large glass geodesic laboratory (a “Bubble Lab”) for the work being done by the masters so that learners can find out what a biologist (or a chemist or a geologist etc.) does all day. It is equipped with gas, electricity and running water as well as all tools and equipment needed to perform experiments or complete projects. Learners may stand and watch through the glass dome or qualify to become an apprentice to the master.

Magic Mastery MachineTM

Note: An individual Magic Mastery MachineTM is available only as part of an entire package of fixtures, furnishings, software, artifacts, materials, written programs and tools that comprise the totality of the Hamilton Learning Foundation learning center prototype model. If you are a philanthropist, non-profit foundation or a venture capital company and interested in getting information about our collaboration program and licensing procedures, please, contact us.

A number of these machines, (4’ and 5’ tall computers which look a bit like slot machines) have two functions: 1. As a game machine, programmed with hundreds of tutorials and games which break down concepts into tiny bits to be mastered by repetition and variety of presentation, and 2. As a record keeping device, to document every concept mastered by each learner who uses it. This information is not to be used as a “report card,” but is simply for the convenience of the learner and his/her parents. These machines reward learners with tickets or tokens which may be used to purchase field trips, food at the food center, items from “The Learning Store” in the Business Loggia and tickets to special events.

This fresh design to change the world by changing the way we learn is based on four decades of conceptualization, research, organization, design and refinement. It is now being unveiled to those who will be able to bring it into being.

Because it is to be built and run by free-enterprise, it has been protected by trademarks and patents, so that it can be fueled by the energy of capitalism yet carefully quality-controlled by the highest standards set in place by HAMILTON LEARNING FOUNDATION™.

*The design and other aspects of this facility are the subject of pending U. S. patent applications.

“A vision is not just a picture of what could be. It is an appeal to our better selves, a call to become something more.” ~ Rosabeth Moss Kanter