Three deeply intertwined strands of thought blew in through the blogosphere and Twitter feed in rapid succession yesterday. Any or all of these would make rich fodder for a faculty workshop or administration team reading. I received the links because earlier in the week I wrote a blog post “Join the Flamethrowers”, arguing that incipient [...]
On Saturday I return to the Philippines for an annual trip with high school students. Fresh out of grad school I taught there for year in 1981-82, an experience where I formed some of my first ideas about transformational education. Two stories from that time are embedded in my book, The Falconer, and I [...]
I just got back from a dinner with Jeff McCalla, high school math teacher at St. Mary’s Episcopal in Memphis. Jeff is a past winner of the prestigious Presidential Award of Excellence for Science & Mathematics Teaching. He also does instruction for Texas Instruments and was introduced to me by both Jill Gough from Trinity [...]
I was pleased to lead a two-hour workshop yesterday for about 50 business officers from the Southwest region of independent schools. Rather than the normal “sit and get” that conferences usually provide, I asked for this extended block of time to create an active learning session. Many walked into the room more than a bit [...]
The only resources that schools have are money, time, people, space, and knowledge. Schools are constructed around the units of time, subject, age, and achievement. It is critical to understand that the one common element of what we need to function and how we are organized is time. This post is about a lot of [...]
Warning: synthesis ahead. I am going to give the punch line both here at the beginning and then at the end: as we all try to meet the challenges of a rapidly changing world, we must remember to give equal priority to that which does not change in our world. The garden at St. [...]
What is the nature of learning, as opposed to the nature of education? Holly Chesser, with SAIS, posted a story yesterday about a high school math student who, two weeks into the semester had already pretty much given up any future in math. She just was not grasping some foundational construct, and in math, you [...]
A year ago I trialed a method of project-based learning that incorporates a number of skills that we associate with critical collaboration, networking, and group communication skills. It strengthens student ownership of the process and the product and ensures that the students are working on problems that are meaningful to them, not just to the [...]
I just realized we have been missing a "P". For years we have referred to the three key organizational elements at our school as the Three P's: people, program, and place. I imagine many others see their school in these same terms, as well as folks in other organizations. They reflect the main characteristics of [...]
There are two kinds of people in the world and they solve problems very differently. Some people look forward to solve the problem; others look backward to understand the problem. Both have a role to play, but for darn sure we should know not only our own natural approach, but also that of others on [...]