About Explocationers

Hi, I’m Els. Was a teacher, now a traveling mom.

Explocationers started on the road. As a teacher, I had a general sense of what young children are working on developmentally, but in those first traveling months my attention was elsewhere: where will we sleep tonight, which route should we take, what do we want to see? I wanted to keep following my daughter’s development, and I missed a tool I could turn to quickly, something clear and concise, woven into daily life. A guide with the developmental themes for this age, and how to recognize them in behavior, in what a child says, in how they play.

That guide didn’t exist in the form I was looking for. So I made it.

How I got here

I taught for twelve years, in classrooms that couldn’t have been more different. Multi-grade elementary classes at a village school. Later, special education in the city, working with preschoolers with speech and language needs.

During my studies, I interned in South Africa. Between two jobs, I spent a year and a half traveling alone through Australia and Asia, and taught in the outback. A few years later, my husband and I took a camper trip from Norway to Greece and back. After my last teaching job, we finally took the plunge: quit our jobs, sold the house, and went traveling with our daughter. She was one.

We hit the road in August 2024: first from Norway down to Morocco, then we shipped the camper to North America and drove through Canada, up to Alaska, and back through the U.S. By now she’s lived in a camper longer than in a house. We’re back in Europe now, traveling more slowly, so there’s more room for learning and discovery.

What the guide is and isn’t

An observation tool for you as a parent. Not a checklist, not a test, not worksheets for your child. It shows what a child of this age may begin to discover, no minimum, no standard. Grounded in early childhood education frameworks, with developmental theory in the background. For each area of development, you’ll find observation prompts with key indicators, and playful, non-prescriptive ideas to use along the way.

You take an observer’s role, not an assessor’s.

At the back, you’ll find a readiness portfolio: a look back at the development your child has gone through. Useful for spotting which next goals your child is ready for, or to share with school if your child is returning after extended travel.

For whom

For parents who see their child growing up outside the school system, or who want to support their child alongside school: worldschool families, homeschoolers, traveling families, and anyone who wants guidance without slipping into pressure or comparison.

The name Explocationers blends explore, location, education, and learners. The children are the Explocationers, learning and discovering wherever they happen to be.

Feel free to look around → our development guides