How active should learning be? How relevant? And what is required of adults if they are serious about expecting that kids will have a different experience — and a different feeling — in that thing we call ‘school’? In a new four-part series from 180 Studio, we witness one community’s efforts to answer those questions. […]
Read More »Blog
Diverse by Design: Episode 1 (The First Day of School)
How do you reimagine something that has looked the same for generations? And what does a diverse society require — and need — in order to support a shared commitment to the common good?
In a new six-part series from 180 Studio, we witness one community’s efforts to answer both questions.
Read More »Seeds for a Better World
I’m knee-deep in an audaciously large new collaborative project, and I’m wondering who else would like to join us in the fun.
If you’re game, here’s your challenge:
Read More »Green Book Is Not Our Story
It has been more than fifty years since James Baldwin first named the knotted pathology that has ensnared both White and Black America in an intimate dance of mutual self-destruction for, well, ever. “The failure to look reality in the face diminishes a nation as it diminishes a person,” he wrote. America has failed, he said, because it has come to believe its own myths:
The Dream. Equal Justice. The Melting Pot.
Read More »What (& Where) Are the World’s Most Transformational Schools?
OK, people, let’s get specific: Out of all the schools in the world, which ones are the most transformational when it comes to imagining a new way to think about teaching and learning in the 21st century? There are a lot of inspiring schools out there, so I want to repeat: which are the most […]
Read More »The Art of Jazz
Imagine a country: imperfect, divided, diverse, contradictory, inchoate, in search of a more perfect union.
Now give that country a sound, a feeling, and a form.
Read More »The Science of the Human Brain
It is the most complex living system in the known universe, built of hundreds of billions of cells, each as complicated as a city.
It is the primary author of the deeply personal story we tell ourselves about who we are and why we are here.
And it never, ever, shows us the world as it truly is — only as we need it to be.
This is the conundrum of the human brain, which is why understanding its peculiar science is a prerequisite towards our ability to imagine, and then build, a better world.
Read More »2019: The Year of Living Emergently?
We’re doing it again.
2019 is barely a week old, yet everyone seems to be searching for the singular person, policy or program that can restore order and usher in the better world we seek. From the excitement over the looming presidential race (and the promise of a return to normalcy) to the anticipation of the pending Mueller report (and the vision of a president in handcuffs), we are hardwired to hope for the sweeping solution, the quick fix, the reset button.
In reality, life works differently. What if we started to work in closer accordance with life?
What if we made 2019 the year of living “emergently?”
Read More »The Most Famous Nursery Schools in the World — And What They Can Teach Us
Reggio Emilia, a mid-sized city that sits roughly halfway between Milan and Bologna, is not your grandmother’s Italy.
For starters, it’s more hardscrabble than picturesque — heavily graffitied, with streets and buildings that feel weathered and worn from everyday use. And although you’ll still find the charming clock tower, the cobblestone streets and the Renaissance-era churches in the city center, you’ll also find a city in which one out of five residents is not from Italy itself, but places as far-flung as Ghana and Nigeria, Morocco and Albania, Yemen and Syria.
It is, in short, a microcosm of the changing face of Italy, and of the wider world: nascent, uprooted, and precariously perched between worlds and worldviews.
Why, then, is it also the home to the finest nursery schools in the world?
Read More »This is what culturally-responsive education looks like (& requires)
I’m so excited to share these powerful short films of teachers and of culturally-responsive education (along with a whole se6t of resources you can access at https://crestories.org/watch). They’re about race, and identity, and about the challenges of doing our best work. So I hope you’ll watch and share. This is the future of learning. This is […]
Read More »
Recent Comments