Design. Learn. Solve.

Beauty and Curiosity

I found these two videos today. They are interviews of Richard Feynman, the acclaimed physicist, and both really resonated with me.

As educators, we are expected to assist our students as they grow and define themselves. These two videos highlight a few principles that, in my mind, are some of the most important lessons we could ever teach our students.

be “madly” curious

explore the little things

beauty surrounds us in all things

it’s ok not to know the answer

Hopefully these videos will inspire you as much as they did for me.

Beauty
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRmbwczTC6E[/youtube]

Curiosity
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmTmGLzPVyM&feature=related[/youtube]

Photo and Video Credit: damewse

We Are All Designers

“We are all designers.”

Some may balk at this statement. Some may say that they don’t even actually know what that means.

I don’t make that statement lightly.  I taught history, am  a “techie”,  and  can’t draw very well (i’m trying though). In the past, I did not consider myself as the creative type.

With that in mind, design is not about making logos, building websites, or creating an inexpensive incubator for countries in the third world. Design is a mindset. It is an approach that addresses how we collaborate, how and what  we create.

Design is about creating interactions. Design is about understanding our users. Design is about developing something that will make a difference. As educators, we do this ALL the time. We create lessons and experiences that support our students’ learning. Design is at the core of what we do.

This past weekend at Next Chapter in Atlanta, GA, we heard this over and over again: “ design is a verb not a noun.” I know some people may say, “What does that even mean?” but it is at the core of how we can improve how we teach and learn. Design is about how we interact and create.

To understand and embrace this concept of design takes time. I’ll be the first to admit, seeing ourselves as designers does not come easily. You are not the expert. For some, this may be antithetical to how they were trained, how they have operated, how they have built their career. The outcomes, while undefined, may not be what they suggested or had in mind. It may not come easily. We were taught to have structure and a clearly defined outcome or argument.

Despite that, I ask you to try to let go. Try to embrace the uncertainty of the process. Many of our colleagues cry out for empowering our students, to create curriculum that is authentic. We talk about teacher as “facilitator” or as “guide on the side”. If we are truly to embrace the concept of authentic and student-centered learning, we must be open to letting go: to embrace a process that is messy and does not have a pre-defined outcome.

I am not suggesting that you upend your life to embrace the design process. Rather, find small ways that you can incorporate  the process into your life. Start by  addressing  a small challenge that your colleagues, students, or family is facing. For example:

1. Use the process with students and teachers to define how to recreate a space in the  library to best suit the needs of the community.


2. Build it into a unit for a class you teach.


3. Brainstorm exercise with a few of your colleagues during a faculty or department meeting.


4. With your family, reconsider how you use your backyard.

Give yourself the time and space to explore the process in a way that suits your personality and needs. Do not try to copy an approach. Think about who you are and what you need.

If you  need guidance, find someone who would be willing to explore this challenge with you. Do you need to research before you begin? See below for some resources. Find an approach that speaks to you and adapt it to suit your particular need.

The idea of design and design thinking is not to uproot  our core values but to heighten  our ability to create experiences that will extend how we teach and learn. It will empower our students and colleagues. It will create experiences and outcomes that we could never have imagined.

Release. Play. Make. Celebrate.

Resources

• IDEO - “Design Thinking for Educators”


• Stanford - “k12 Lab Wiki”


• Prototype - Design Thinking Resources

Photo credit: Hugh MacLeod

How Space And Time Can Transform A School

I ran across two sites today.

One was about the phenomenon of co-working spaces:

”Office Party? Let’s Tweet It”

In an era where more and more people are taking the entrepreneurial spirit and working in coffee shops or in their homes, the idea of a co-working space is something that is quite intriguing from an educational standpoint.

What if schools created spaces and opportunities that centered on the same principles mentioned in the article?

“the group lunches, the whiteboard brainstorming sessions, the Friday beer parties — that puts Studiomates at the forefront of an innovative new model for doing business.”

What if our students were given the opportunity to learn in spaces like these? Ok, sans the beer, but still. What defines the success of co-working spaces, like Studiomates or the General Assembly, is the intersection, of play+creativity+productivity+community+inspiration.

We must be more thoughtful about how students worked together and create spaces and opportunities that lead to interactions and ideas like Creative Mornings, which in my opinion offer exactly what students need: a 20 minute break from the day and access to ideas that will broaden their horizons.

When we create spaces and opportunities that allow creativity and play to flow freely, you’d not only be surprised at the quality of what is produced but how much of it.

The other site I found was:

72 Hour Challenge by The Better Block

The team at The Better Block created a website that is

“a demonstration tool that acts as a living charrette so that communities can actively engage in the buildout process and provide feedback in real time”

In other words, they are working to improve city blocks around the country.

Their 72 Hour Challenge asks groups to create a new vision for a street block in 3 days and nights. This same challenge could be applied in schools.

Why can’t we give our students a challenge, a deadline, and asked to “make” something? We could ask them questions like:

How could our students revise a playground?
How could you reconstruct a communal space to be more collaborative and fun?

These are challenges that our students would thrive on, it would create a culture of play, and help re-think the idea of school space from our users’ point of view. If we can embrace challenges like these, we will breathe a breath of fresh air into our schools and you’d be surprised how much our students are learning.

What does this mean?

If we look at these ideas, they offer people to opportunity to connect, share, learn, play, and make a difference. These are all things that schools are meant to represent as well. While I am not advocating that schools need to be co-working spaces or have all learning happen through 72 hour challenges, I do believe the core ideas behind these initiatives can help improve our schools.

Photo credit: duncan

Rives and the iPad

Rives is a man of many talents, he is a spoken word poet, emcee, pop-up book writer, and conversationalist. As one of the hosts of TEDxSMU this past October, he was given the chance to show off some of his skills and gave a powerful storytelling performance using an iPad.

His four minute “talk”, seen below, is an example of the potential of the iPad, or any tablet for that matter. Far too often we see computers as a means to check email, write papers, or watch videos. In an age of, as Clay Shirky puts it, “cognitive surplus”, we have the opportunity to use that technology and our time towards “doing something” and being “creative”, two things that we must ensure our students embrace. The tools at our disposal, including the iPad, are extremely powerful, so let’s make sure that our students are using the technology to do more than write five paragraph essays or create PowerPoints. Let’s make sure they truly create.

In the end, as Rives points out, no matter the medium, it is about telling a “story”. We need to let our students embrace the mediums that work for them (iPads/cellphones/whatever) and allow them to create stories that they care about. By giving them a voice, we will not only empower our students but allow them to develop their creative spirit all while maximizing that “cognitive surplus”.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNhdRvBfg7A&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]

Learning from Google’s Creative Lab

Google’s Creative Lab has been around for a few years but the concept has been a transformative one for the company and a model that schools should consider.

The Creative Lab

Google, which had been known more for their search than their advertising, has made a large impact in the digital media scene over the past few years. Their multi-disciplinary team in the Creative Lab has been responsible for some very critically acclaimed work including, their “Google Chrome Speed Tests”, “Wilderness Downtown”, and “Parisian Love”.

Projects like these have transformed Google’s image. The Creative Lab has been an opportunity to infuse creative talent into an Internet company while also training the “creatives” on the power of Google. Those who work in the Creative Lab stay for a year or two before being sent back into their respective industries. By following such a model, Google has been able not only train up and coming designers and writers on the power of Google but reap the benefits of their talent.

Bringing the Creative Lab to schools

The power of the Creative Lab has been in the fact that it has helped transform Google into a force in the digital media world.

Why can’t the same be done in schools?

It could be a “Teach For America” for creatives. Innovators and designers will spend two years working within a school to help bring innovation and an understanding of design thinking into schools while in turn they are trained as educators. The schools benefit by having access to amazing creatives who can help transform the experience of learning in an academic institution while the creatives benefit by being trained as educators. After a stint in a school, the creatives return to their professional worlds with an understanding of education that many dedicated to helping lack.

Far too often I meet very creative people who want to make a difference in the world of education but do not understand schools. By developing a program like this, a school will give those passionate creatives an opportunity to make a difference the world of education and in turn become a much more informed public. This type of work would provide an opportunity to solve two problems:

1. The need for schools to truly embrace a different way of thinking when it comes to learning


2. Create more informed social entrepreneurs, innovators, and designers

The Google Creative Lab has transformed Google into a powerful player in the advertising and media space. Schools can benefit from the same approach. Design and innovation are becoming more important in our schools and this is a great opportunity to create more “teachers” while benefiting from the power of creativity and innovation.

If anyone is interested in such an idea, let me know and lets dream this up together.

Next Generation of Makers

This cartoon by @howtoons exemplifies the kind of curiosity and desire to create that can empower students and make them the “life-long learners” we always hear about. When students take ownership of their learning, the game changes. They become passionate about learning.

The image also speaks to the idea that students are learning more on YouTube and elsewhere than inside a classroom. As Diana Laufenberg mentions in her TED Talk, content we used to passs on to students can be obtained elsewhere. We must be curators and guides as we empower our students to create and use their knowledge to be solve problems that matter to them and their community.

If we provide our students the opportunity to be curious and create, we are giving them the best education they could ever receive from us.

P.S. If you’re interested in buying a print of the cartoon, you can find it here.

Photo credit: Howtoons

What Matters Now

Seth Godin just published a book called What Matters Now. In his new e-book, which is really more of a pamphlet, Godin and a number of other thinkers examine some important ideas that every educator must ponder and attempt to incorporate into his or her teaching.  These are concepts that will cross every industry and will prove to be invaluable for our students as we move into the second decade in the 21st century.

Download the free PDF here or read the book below.

Joe’s Non-Netbook vs. The Internet

Today I was reading Jeff Richardson’s blog entry, Textbooks… Are they old-school?, and it touched on a point that has been brought up in several recent conversations.

Should we move away from textbooks?

Jeff posted the following video made by Joe, a student at Science Leadership Academy in Philadelphia, PA, which highlights this issue.



While the video takes an amusing look at textbooks, Joe’s Non-Netbook ties into deeper questions about the direction schools should be taking.

Inquiry And Textbooks

No matter how you slice it, a textbook cannot provide the same richness, depth, and perspective as the Internet.  A textbook limits a student, it prevents inquiry and further investigation.  As educators, if we are attempting to develop critical thinkers and challenge our students to ask thoughtful questions, they need to have access to multiple points of view and should be able to investigate on their own.  A textbook cannot provide that, the Internet does.

The Cost Of Textbooks

The argument is presented, but it would cost too much to put a computer in every students hands.  If you compare the cost of bound textbooks over four years (at least one textbook per class) to the cost of a having all texts housed on the Internet through an online course management software (CMS) and a top of the line HP netbook ($499), it’s not even close.  You would save hundreds of dollars.

The Environmental And Economic Impact

Whether a school is trying to cut budgets, support efforts for environmental sustainability, or both, it is a good call to invest in online texts.  The amount of paper that is printed can be cut substantially when using online texts and laptops.  If a school invests in high speed scanners and all paper resources are made digital and posted online, a school is able to cut down on not only the amount of paper used but the number of copiers and printers needed on campus.

Conclusion

Joe’s video may of taken a satirical look at bound textbooks but it definitely hits a nerve.  When we look at transforming our schools and truly preparing our students we must reconsider what we use to teach.  In a world where our students are constantly connected online and have access to the world, are we really going to turn that off and give them a book with no hyperlinks or alternatives and expect them to really learn?

New Media Literacies

As of late, new media and social media have been the focus in education. Applications Facebook, Twitter, and You Tube have become an integral part of our teaching practices. Project New Media Literacies, created by MIT, has been examining where New Media is going and how it can apply in education. Check out their new video.

Voting, Creativity, and Students

As I have mentioned in the last few posts, creativity and student engagement are at the core of true learning. This video captures those ideas. If we are to get our students to really learn, they must take on the learning themselves and not be passive participants. If creativity and thinking are the skills companies are looking for in their future employees, this video about the election is a prime example of what kids need to be doing in school.



Head nod to C. Del Tatto.