Reinventing Education

We talk about education, but where do we find education? In this episode we use the quadrants to help identify where you go to find education.

Education is defined as the giving or receiving of systematic instruction, especially at school. In this episode we explore how the giving or receiving of systematic instruction can be found in the:

• activities & resources used for systematic instruction  
• environment where & the systems through which systematic instruction is given
• culture and communities of people connected to the systematic instruction
• reactions and beliefs of the individuals involved

How each of these is carried out is impacted by the 4 values influencing what education looks like. These values are the belief that the systematic instruction should be organized in one of the following ways. Either with an adherence to security, achievement, inclusion or integration.

In order to find how to get to where we want to go we need to know where we are. In this episode we begin to construct our map to navigate the reinvention of education.

We clarify:
- the difference between reinventing and improving education
- what the 3 aims of school are
- what the 4 values influencing education at this time

Some of this is a recap of our earlier episodes but is a necessary synthesis to build up our thesis on healthy schools which we will explore over the next handful of episodes.

A school hallway is transformed into a space that encourages physical activity.

This supports student’s physical health, stress management and ability to focus. How could someone criticize this?

Well, we play devil’s advocate to raise concerns and praise that would come from the 4 different values that inform what education looks like.

We also address the perceived relationship between mind and body from each of the 4 values. What role do the mind and body play in one’s education?

Article:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/physical-activity-guidelines-children-1.4932070

Youtube clip:

https://youtu.be/P4q8dNwsR3E

How should colleges go about filtering who gets in and who doesn’t?
At what point does a competitive advantage for an applicant become cheating?

We discuss the current college admissions scandal in the US through the 4 values that inform what education looks like.

Standardized tests which have been of great value seem to be losing favour due to the numerous ways students and parents can gamify or cheat the system. In this case, parents were paying for students scores to be enhanced and even paying for other people to go write the tests for their kids.

Will a scandal like this or others in the future lead to us abandoning standardized test scores as entrance criteria or will they simply compliment other criteria deemed worthy?

https://edition.cnn.com/2019/03/13/us/what-we-know-college-admissions-cheating-scandal/index.html

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/14/us/sat-act-cheating-college-admissions.html?fbclid=IwAR1eOMmp_ZZ6hjiiS_NrJfupriPPL5GolQ50JseUQqImrGpfoZmzfYn6Htc

Facial recognition AI used to track your child’s attentiveness and mood in school.

On what grounds would you be OK with it?

Is it supporting teachers or putting fear into students? Or both?

Would you feel comfortable having AI mark your child’s work?

China is piloting practices like these in over 60 000 schools. Will this lead to innovation in education or a doubling down on more traditional pedagogy with the help of new technology?

In this episode we explore how compliance, ambition, sensitivity and development driven schools might try to bring AI into the classroom.

Article:

https://newatlas.com/china-ai-education-schools-facial-recognition/54786/

It’s easy for others to understand us incorrectly.

At times this is because we’re speaking from different quadrants or perspectives.

In this episode we introduce Ken Wilber’s quadrants as an analytical tool to help us specify which particular aspects of school we are addressing in our discussions. Simply put it helps us navigate whether we are addressing a topic from a 1st person 2nd person or 3rd person perspective.

Distinguishing which topics must be addressed in each quadrant will help us distinguish nuance from noise in future episodes.

In this episode we make distinctions between discussing school in terms of the:

upper left quadrants: Response & Beliefs

lower left quadrants: Culture & Communities

upper right quadrants: Resources & Activities

lower right quadrants: Environment & Systems

New features on our show. We take stories about education from the news.

We look at the issues from the perspective of the 4 different values at play in education.

We tease apart how compliance, ambition, sensitivity and development focused schools might respond to the story. 

Today we begin with the current student climate protests.  

Should everyone be taught in the same way? How should we measure progress in learning?

How much of their “real” self should teachers bring into the classroom?

Recently we’ve interviewed 6 leaders on the cutting edge of education.

In the last episode of this season we complete our exploration of the shared themes in these discussions and the patterns they revealed in the roles of students, teachers and parents in development-focused schools.

We discuss: Philosophies on differentiation; Assessment and valid measurements of progress in learning & Teachers as authentic people.

How the role of the teacher is beginning to encompass elements of the mentor, coach & facilitator.

Creating meaningful connections between school, home and the wider community.

What should be taught in school? If you sat down and made a list of 10 things, what would be on it? Recently we’ve interviewed 6 leaders on the cutting edge of education.

In this episode, we attempt to connect the dots between the discussions to reveal patterns in how development-focused schools view learners and what should be taught in their schools.

We discuss: 
-Beliefs about learners
-How different values prioritize certain things over others in curriculum
-How to balance the school’s requirements with student agency and autonomy
-How self-organizing leadership fosters a community capable of inquiry and self-direction

What does leadership look like in a developmental school?

According to our interviews with leading-edge educators, in terms of leadership, it...
-dissolves the traditional hierarchy pyramid of a school 
-brings students into the structure in an authentic way
- is built off a sense of purpose and self-organization
-must reflect the adaptive characteristics required to navigate the VUCA world