Fabulous story on This American Life – “Back to School.” Economic reasoning meets social psychology meets instructional/parent coaching as Ira Glass unpacks and integrates interviews that merge cognitive development with non-cognitive domains (character, personality traits, social skills, etc.)
I’m just playing with strands of ideas here…imagining one possible weave or braid.
Strand 1: 10,000 Hours
In Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers, as well as in earlier work by Howard Gardner, the 10,000-hour rule is posited. Essentially, to become expert, or deeply disciplined and proficient, one typically must commit to at least 10,000 hours of dedicated practice. Hold that thought for a minute…like you’re holding one strand between your fingers.
Strand 2: Tracking Time
Not too long ago, I wrote about tracking my time at Unboundary, and I imagined what a similar practice of tracking time might be like in schools. Now, hold this second strand between another set of mental fingers.
Strand 3: The 7 C’s
In Trilling and Fadel’s 21st Century Skills: Learning for Life in Our Times, the authors advocate for the traditional 3 R’s (reading, writing, and arithmetic), as well as 7 C’s:
Now, we can braid and weave.
Do we know how much time our students – the individual students – spend engaged in these seven activities? If a parent asked me, “Bo, I’ve been reading and listening about 21st C education. Can you tell me how much time your students spend in the 7 C’s? Can you explain some examples of how they might engage in the 7 C’s?”
I think I could knock the second question out of the park. I would totally strike out on the first question.
What if we had some sort of “dashboard” that could show us how much time our students are spending in these various C’s? Yes, you know…like the dashboards in our cars.
In our cars, the dashboards give us real-time feedback on speed, oil pressure, engine temperature, fuel remaining, battery voltage, etc. In 2012, couldn’t we have some sort of tech-enabled dashboard for how much time students are actually getting to immerse themselves in and practice the 7 C’s? It’s so easy now for me to examine how I spend my time at work by using the time tracker. I can see what projects I am working on, I can review what and how I am researching, and I can understand where I might need to rebalance my time allotments.
Wouldn’t it be insightful and informative to know, even if just for one day or one week or one month, how much time a student…
By looking at the dashboard, I could see how close my son PJ is getting to 10,000 hours in “Creativity and innovation.” I could review how much time he is getting to engage in “Communications, information, and media literacy.” We could make some great, informed adjustments with this information. Just like we know when to stop for gas, when to adjust our speed, when to add oil to our car.
As a school we could examine aggregates and grouped data. We could look at departments to see if one department contributes more to certain C’s and another department contributes more to a different sub-set of C’s. We could see our bright spots and our areas for growth.
There could even be an app for that!
Driving without those gauges and instrument panels on the dashboard could cause a disaster! Using our dashboard makes us a better driver…and helps us get to where we are trying to go with greater success.
Developing and utilizing such tools could really help a school trying to create its finely tuned pedagogical master plan!
Today, I had reason and opportunity to dig deeper into GPEE – the Georgia Partnership for Excellence in Education. As I was digging, I took time to explore Dr. Jason B. Huett’s keynote at GPEE’s recent August 2012 event. Dr. Huett is the Associate Dean of Online Development at University of West Georgia.
During Dr. Huett’s presentation, he highlights five themes in educational change and ten catalysts for these shifts.
5 Themes in Educational Change from Dr. Jason B. Huett
10 Catalysts for Educational Change from Dr. Jason B. Huett
Dr. Huett’s talk is very much worth the listen. He puts very interesting flesh on the 15 interconnected bones listed above. In the embedded video below, his speech begins at 18:05.
Are You Learning as Fast as the World Is Changing? – Bill Taylor – Harvard Business Review
Why Good Design Is Finally Affecting The Bottom Line | Co.Design: business + innovation + design
1. Provide equal access to quality education of an international standard.
2. Ensure every child is proficient in Bahasa Malaysia and English language.
3. Develop values-driven Malaysians.
4. Transform teaching into the profession of choice.
5. Ensure high-performing school leaders in every school.
6. Empower State Education Departments, District Education Offices and schools to customise solutions based on need.
7. Leverage information and communication technology to scale up quality learning across Malaysia.
8. Transform ministry delivery capabilities and capacity.
9. Partner with parents, community and private sector at scale.
10. Maximise student outcomes for every ringgit.
11. Increase transparency for direct public accountability.
Education Week: Graduating All Students Innovation-Ready
Our students want to become innovators. Our economy needs them to become innovators. The question is: As educators, do we have the courage to disrupt conventional wisdom and pursue the innovations that matter most?
Third, to push educational innovation, districts need to partner with one another, businesses, and nonprofits to establish true R&D labs—schools of choice that are developing 21st-century approaches to learning.
Day 3: Innovation in Action at Colorado Academy « The Learning Pond
John Dewey’s Vision of Learning as Freedom – NYTimes.com
Dewey: “The world in which most of us live is a world in which everyone has a calling and occupation, something to do,” he wrote. “Some are managers and others are subordinates. But the great thing for one as for the other is that each shall have had the education which enables him to see within his daily work all there is in it of large and human significance.”
Is Every Single Subject Taught in High School a Mistake? – Education – GOOD
Campus master plans are beautiful, elegant solutions. They make visible entire systems of complex thinking. Is there any comparable practice in schools when it comes to “pedagogical master planning” or “instructional systems thinking?” I don’t think strategic planning is even remotely comparable given the manner in which it is most commonly done. Isn’t that fascinating? We spend enormous time, energy, and resources on physical-space planning, yet we don’t really do such with the core of what really exists at the center of learning in schools.
Can you show a visitor your “pedagogical master plan” if she asked to see it…like you could a campus master plan? Could you point to the system of blueprints, engineering details, and relational diagrams?
On the University of Buffalo’s “Building_UB Photostream” on Flickr, you can see in their campus master plan the thoughtful planning that undergirds all of the eventual blueprinting, engineering, and constructing. You can see sets of plans that provide intentional detail about how buildings will relate to one another by function and geography. You can see green-space drawings and bubble diagrams that reveal why various operations are grouped and coordinated in particular ways. You can see the whole…and all of the virtually countless parts.
by Building_UB, Flickr, Creative Commons License
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Building_UB’s photostream |
Of course, after such thorough master planning is completed, the “real work” is only just beginning. Renovation schedules must be developed and articulated. Architectural blueprints and renderings must be created. Engineering schema must be decided – water, electrical, gas, flooring, lighting, etc. FF&E (furniture, fixtures, and equipment) must be selected. And, if done well, ALL of those countless decisions radiate from the uber planning – the campus master plans. It just has that “this-makes-sense” kind of feeling.
Do schools have anything comparable in terms of planning and implementation for the overall system of instruction and pedagogy that should exist at the heart of any and all educational organizations?
Schools seem to be making countless decisions…
Are we developing master plans that make visible the links, connections, relationships, influences, and impacts that each of these “buildings” has on the other “buildings” on campus? Are we designing the architectural blueprints and engineering blow-ups that show each and every one of these categorical constructs working and existing in harmonious symphony with the other interrelated elements?
Can you show me such plans? Can you show me how a decision to implement PBL – just one pedagogical methodology – impacts the ripple-decisions of technology, professional development, assessment, learning spaces, etc.?
The system is a whole. It reminds me of the song about the ankle bone connected to the shin bone, the shin bone connected to the knee bone, the knee bone connected to the thigh bone,….
I wonder what would happen on a school campus if a small group of builders just squatted on a section of property and began building. What if this “rogue” group sawed, hammered, and nailed their creation without much coordination with the campus master plan. Not from spite or rebellion. Just from lack of clarity and collective connectedness.
Such happens every day in the pedagogical and instructional system of a school. Lots of independent contractors not having the level of master plans to which they have contributed and from which they can coordinate.
[out of writing time for now.]
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