F.L.A.U.S.E. Elementary School

Help us foster a future-oriented education!

Children come into the world with a great love of learning and an inquisitive mind. This is how they learn to crawl, walk, and talk. We know from developmental psychology and neuroscience that children are born as highly competent. They are socially competent, able to relate to their peers from the first day after birth, and capable of bonding with multiple caregivers. This social competence is the prerequisite for learning: children who feel secure with other people can learn and develop in a healthy way. Healthy relationships are therefore the basis for growing up emotionally, physically, and psychologically healthy. Based on this knowledge of the child, questions arise for educators for which we need creative answers.

Furthermore, given the state of our increasingly globalized world, it is critical that our educational programs prepare students for the world they are inheriting.We must train a new generation of innovative problem-solvers who are capable of tackling the crisis of climate change and other pressing global issues.

The F.L.A.U.S.E. Elementary School was founded in the 2022-2023 school year with 18 children who learn from and with each other in an open concept across classes and ages. The non-profit “Lernfreude & Potenzialentfaltung gemeinnützige GmbH” is the responsible authority of the F.L.A.U.S.E. Elementary School, situated in Hochheim am Main/Germany, a thirty-minute drive from Frankfurt, Germany. For years, this nonprofit has been working to address the following questions, culminating in the founding of F.L.A.U.S.E.:

  • How can we awaken and sustain children’s motivation and curiosity, which comes from within, as part of the learning and educational process?
  • How can we promote openness, enthusiasm and creativity?
  • What does it take in a learning environment for children to learn to be able to solve complex problems in innovative ways?
From the point of view of the F.L.A.U.S.E. Elementary School, competent answers to these questions are a central component of transformative change for our society. Young people are thereby encouraged to create their future living and working environment in a new and more sustainable way. In this way, we at the F.L.A.U.S.E. Elementary School prepare our students for a society of tomorrow in which they are empowered to solve future challenges as best they can and to meaningfully recognize what is really important, for themselves and their (working) world. They become creative problem solvers who learn to think in a networked way and take responsibility for their actions. These skills are of great importance for our future (working) world, which is also becoming increasingly global.

F.L.A.U.S.E. stands for the German abbreviation „Frei, Lebendig, Abenteuerlich, Und in Sicherheit die welt Entdecken“ (Free, Lively, Adventurous and Discover the World in Safety). The F.L.A.U.S.E. team is multidisciplinary. The staff members have a wide variety of professions and backgrounds in order to be able to cover all areas and not „overlook“ any child’s potential. The pedagogical director is an experienced elementary school teacher who brings with her a great deal of practical experience in open, free learning settings. A high school teacher and trained musician supports the children from the first school year musically and in the English language in a playful loving way that awakens and intensifies their joy in making music and also in their foreign language development. Whether with a scientific background identifying the  importance of the academic subjects, or with a traumatherapeutic background recognizing which factors and influencing variables affect the children and their environment, F.L.A.U.S.E. combines the purely pedagogical support of the children with various domains of expertise under one roof. Our goal is to support the holistic development of the children and their families and thus accompany them into a future world that enables a sustainable and transformative change in our society.


The German state does not subsidize non-profit private schools in the first three 
years of a school’s founding, and thereafter only part of the amount that regular public schools also receive. Thus, there is a large funding gap in the first three years and a smaller but permanent funding gap in subsequent years. This gap must be closed by parental contributions and by a loan taken out for the school.

Would you like to learn more about F.L.A.U.S.E.? Please contact us directly via sekretariat@freie-schule-hochheim.de. We look forward to connecting with you.

And/or do you want to make a
donation? With your donation to FLAUSE Elementary School, you are supporting an education which fosters environmental sustainability, celebrates diversity, and empowers youth to create a better future for our world. Your support really makes a difference, a big thank you!

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