My interest in human spirit, which has existed within me for as long as I can remember, led me, among other things, to study history. I believed that knowing it would give me insight into the human spirit. I was not wrong. Yet this knowledge was not comprehensive enough to 'quench my thirst' for knowledge of man. So, after successfully completing my studies in Ljubljana, I went to the Netherlands to study religion at the University of Amsterdam. Learning about the religious experiences of man added another pebble to the mosaic of the picturesque image of the human spirit. After living in the Netherlands for a few years, I started a family in Slovenia with my Dutch husband. We have three children, and we have been home educating them from the very beginning. This motivated me to do in-depth research on topics such as educational theory, pedagogy and different pedagogical approaches, learning styles, developmental psychology, attachment theory, sociology and the history of education. All this knowledge has repeatedly awakened and nurtured in me the realisation that the quality of upbringing and education is one of the two decisive factors - the other being the child's inner nature - that mark the child's whole life. I was one of the main initiators of the slovenian home education website. Together with my sister, up until the corona crisis, we also organised various activities for home-schooling parents and their children, of course with the help of some other dedicated mothers who also home-schooled their children. During this time, I wrote articles on education for the catholic portal Iskreni.net website for many years. I have also written three scientific papers. The first one, entitled Home Education in Slovenia, was published in the scientific journal Contemporary Pedagogy. The second one is entitled Home education in Europe, past and present, with a focus on the 18th and 19th centuries. I presented the research at the 38th Assembly of the Historical Societies of Slovenia in Ravne na Koroškem, October 2016. The third one is entitled Homeschooling: between Croatian Aspirations and Slovenian Reality, which was produced in collaboration with Katarina Krešič Dadič and Rona Bušljeta. It was published in the scientific journal Educational Process: International Journal. I presented it at the GHEX (Global Home Education Exchabge) in Russia in 2018. I was again a speaker at the GHEX conference in July 2024, in Manchester, UK, where I presented the legal situation of home education in Slovenia, my work in this field over the last 15 years, and the topic of socialisation in relation to home education. In February 2018, I published my book entitled 'Where do you go to school?', in which I describe my experience with home education, as well as presenting the experiences of other parents who home-school their children and the knowledge needed to understand child's learning process. In October 2019, I published a handbook for parents who home-school their children, 'Mum, shall we go gem digging? (or A Handbook for Primary 1). In the same year, 2019, the ŠND Institute was created, within which my collegues and I have been spreading knowledge about home education and related topics. Our paths have parted, the ŠND Institute has ceased its activities and I am now working independently. In the course of teaching my children at home, I created the MagicTree teaching method. In the past, I have made many media appearances, trying to bring home education closer to readers, viewers and listeners. I am the administrator of the Learning Without Barriers FB group. I am a member of the European Homeschooling Network and occasionally work with the Slovenian Lada Centre. In 2018, Mateja co-founded an institute for the development of home education, and also published a book titled “Where do you go to School?”. Shortly thereafter she produced a handbook for parents about to home educate so that they will reach learning goals and academic standards prescribed by the state. During the process of home educating her own children, Mateja has developed a teaching method she calls “Magic Tree” – through the heart into the hands and the head. Currently, Mateja regularly gives online lectures on home education and other related themes, such as socialisation, developmental psychology, different pedagogical approaches, history of home education etc, to the parents and teachers that are interested in these topics. At the request of Slovene media, she has also had the opportunity to share about home education to the Slovene public many times during the past 13 years.