A major pitfall I find amongst schools that want to shift their learning practices is a mis-alignment of resources to a new organizational vision. Where schools get this right, innovative change is systemic and sustainable; where they fail, change is isolated, episodic, and often ephemeral. Sonoma Country Day School is a 35-year old K-8 independent school [...]
If your school is not accessing the FREE products and services of CK-12 Foundation, you are throwing away precious dollars and leaving leading-edge learning tools on the shelf. I gave a brief overview of CK-12 in #EdJourney after an interview with founder Neeru Khosla. Here is a quick video overview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbN-fPQnBeQ In addition to fully [...]
What is the difference between a "great" school and a "leading" school? Which would you like to be? Where would you choose to send your own child? How might a school be both? I spent several hours with Kim Diorio, second year principal at Palo Alto High School yesterday. Paly High is as close to being a private school [...]
"Principal learner" at the Trinity School in Montgomery, Alabama Michael Zavada, has written a wonderful "first review" of my new book, #EdJourney. He says it is a first review because he is biting off the book in smallish chunks and thinking as he goes. What a great "novel" strategy for good learning! Here are a [...]
In my metaphor of educator-leader as "farmer", the principal/superintendent/head of school farmer's job is to nurture and grow a strong learning organization. The teacher farmer's job is to nurture and grow strong students. This interview with Roger Martin, Dean of the Business School at the University of Toronto is a great nine minutes. Translate his [...]
Six boxes showed up at my door late yesterday, 50 copies of my new book, #EdJourney. In 90,000 words I do my best to tell YOUR story of how schools are overcoming the enormous challenge of innovating to meet the needs of a rapidly changing world. If you have followed my blog, hopefully you have [...]
Innovation in schools occurs when "regular, like-able people" can engage the process in a trusting, supportive environment. In her review on Amazon of #EdJourney, 4th grade teacher Lisa Goochee, now teaching in Brazil after global experiences from Philly to China, finds those common elements of successful innovation that are available to every educator-leader: ...showcases how regular, [...]
"What does a transformed learning space look like? How can I show my teachers what student-owned learning entails? Where can I send them?" These are questions I hear from nearly every school CEO I visit who is seriously trying to evolve the system away from the traditional assembly line model of teacher/subject/routine-centric education. Here is [...]
Thoughtful leaders. There is a mouthful: thoughtful, leader, thought leader; those who are all three are rare, not because we lack "thought-lead DNA", but often because we are consumed by busy lives and day jobs. I have frequently pointed Twitter followers to Mark Crotty, head of school at St. John's Episcopal in Dallas who takes the [...]
Design thinking is grabbing hold as a mainstream process for problem solving and building value in K-12 schools. A few school groups are taking it to another level: using regional or district-wide design challenges to deeply embed the skills and outcomes of long-term, sustainable design thinking into their culture and norms. Design thinking is born [...]