Revolutionary “Window Teams” Bust Silos at The Miami Valley School
June 21, 2014What if faculty and staff viewed their individual and collective affinities through the lenses of learning and pedagogy rather than the silos of class, department, division, or office? What if faculty, staff, students, parents, and trustees engaged in strategic-level thinking together, on a frequent basis, collaboratively and transparently aligning school resources directly in support of…
Design Thinking, Like Yoga, Is Mindset, Not Product
June 17, 2014Design thinking is not a product, a deliverable, or a stand alone process. Used to maximum advantage it is a mindset, an approach, a system of practice. An analogy comes to mind: some see yoga as stretching or working out in a hot gym. Those who embrace the mindset of yogic practice reap greater rewards than…
First Round of Generous Endorsements for #EdJourney: A Roadmap to the Future of Education
June 16, 2014Yep, I am going to crow a bit over the wonderfully generous comments I have received on my new book from some of our true educational thought leaders! Yong Zhao…author, researcher, visionary…who many of us follow closely (and if you don’t, you should), has written extensively on the sharp dissonance between test-focused learning and what we…
New Book #EdJourney: A Roadmap to the Future of Education Now Available for Pre-order!
June 16, 2014I am SO excited to announce that my new book, #EdJourney: A Roadmap to the Future of Education, is now available for pre-order…and with a nice pre-order discount on Amazon. I just had a call with a head of school who is ordering 150 copies for his faculty and staff! Delivery is in early September.…
What If Our School Plans Fail to Reflect What We Really Want?
June 15, 2014What would schools look like if educators could challenge, change, or discard something significant at their school? As many of you know I have challenged a wide variety of educators to contributed to a crowd-sourced knowledge base by asking “What if…?” questions that reflect this kind of expansive thinking. Over the last 15 months I…
Quick Summary of Martin Institute Summer Conference 2014
June 12, 2014In just 12 months, The Martin Institute, operating out of one small office in a modest-sized boy’s school in Memphis, arguably one of the most economically challenged mid-sized cities in America, has hosted three major educational learning events for a total of 2,000+ educators from all over the country. For some, these have been the first…
Zero-based Strategic Thinking Underway at The Miami Valley School
June 12, 2014Here is a great interview article with Jay Scheurle, head of The Miami Valley School, on the work we are doing at the school. I think it is a leading edge approach to defining a unique vision; creating a system-wide implementation plan in support of that vision; and building long-term institutional capacity for change and innovation.…
Balancing Academic Freedom and All-School Vision
June 9, 2014What is the balance between academic freedom for teachers to choose their own pathways in their own classrooms, and ensuring a strong collective all-school vision? How does the effective leader find this balance? Many (most?) teachers are extremely protective of how they choose to carry out their role in the classroom. In both public and…
What Is the Secret to Collective Greatness?
June 6, 2014I write almost exclusively about education, but woke up this morning reminded of the 70th anniversary of D-Day, and once again wonder at the acceleration of time and what it does to the global human consciousness. Can it really be just 70 years ago, a mere flicker in the movie reel of human, let alone…
Important Read for School Leaders: “Reinventing Organizations” by Frederic LaLoux
June 4, 2014What would we think if our school leader stood up and admitted, “We have always said we really trust all of our faculty and staff, but the fact is that we don’t”? What if our schools are fundamentally organized in ways that conflict with our most basic wishes and aspirations? What if we knew that…
Hello world!
June 2, 2014Welcome to WordPress. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!
Warren Berger’s “A More Beautiful Question” (Thx to Alyssa Gallagher)
May 29, 2014For the first couple of chapters of Warren Berger’s wonderful book A More Beautiful Question, I was selfishly angry and jealous. So much of his writing seemed straight out of my own mind and thought process, starting nearly three decades ago; why had I not written this book myself? Why did I not have the…
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