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Can We Just Stop With The Homework Already?
“There’s never a break. Never.” It “takes me away from everything I used to do,” says one. (High School student comments on a Stanford study about homework) I look forward to the day when the homework debate is no longer a debate. Ask any high school student or parent about homework and I’m sure you’ll
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Defeat is Always Momentary
Defeat is always momentary. So get up. Dust yourself off. Learn from it. Embrace the opportunity for growth. And help others do the same. P.S. And while you’re here reading this, check out my daughter’s blog post on a similar topic: Failure is Not the Finish Line Show her some love – her blog is
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The People You’ll Meet….
Before I arrived at the SXSW EDU conference, I spent time looking through the conference app, marking sessions that correlated with goals I have for my department. Little did I realize just how much I was going to learn at this conference, and the bulk of it did not happen in those sessions. It happened
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Bashing into Walls to Change the World
In the book Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World, Adam Grant writes, “When we become curious about the dissatisfying defaults in our world, we begin to recognize that most of them have social origins: Rules and systems were created by people. And that awareness gives us the courage to contemplate how we can change them.”
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I Believe in 28 out of 36 of You
World renowned psychologist and Stanford professor Albert Bandura has shown through his body of research that “our belief systems affect our actions, goals, and perception. Individuals who come to believe that they can effect change are more likely to accomplish what they set out to do… People with self-efficacy set their sights higher, try harder,
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From Prototype to Advocacy
I’ve been mulling this question/idea around in my head for about a week now. Hoping my braintrust crew can help me out… As we provide design thinking opportunities out to students, I’m wondering how we capitalize on the empathy when the prototyping and feedback cycle ends. For example, the plight of the homeless has been
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Crafting a New Story of Learning
This was a fascinating read the other night… From: Making the World a Better Place Starts with a Really Good Story Kathleen: One of the things I saw in the organizations that I interviewed is that they prioritize storytelling, not only at the executive director or CEO level, but at every single level of the organization.
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Ideas are Cheap, but Prototypes Cost: Learning Business Skills in a Makerspace
“Ideas are cheap. Execution is everything.” — Chris Sacca (on Shark Tank) Makerspaces are fun. I love seeing students discover new ideas, and new ways to represent those ideas, within a makerspace. There’s just something magical about turning twine, an egg carton, and a plastic spoon into a prototype for a prosthetic arm. But today I
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Creating Young Innovators through Play, Passion, and Purpose
In 2012, Tony Wagner wrote a book called Creating Innovators: The Making of Young People Who Will Change the World. After interviewing over 150 innovative changemakers, Wagner seeks to find the shared experiences that result in innovative mindsets. Sadly, but not shocking, it typically was not school that provided that spark. It was parents, or an
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Stupid Normal Distribution Curve
“Life is all about getting A’s. Not some stupid normal distribution curve.” – Ken Blanchard, author of over 50 books on leadership Ken Blanchard has studied, and written books on, servant leadership. Servant leadership consists of two elements: The visionary role, which is the leadership element of servant leadership; and the implementation role, which is the servant element of
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What Do I Think I Know and What Do I Have to Learn?
You never know what you will learn when you step outside your bubble. The other day on LinkedIn I saw an event posted by Garry Ridge, CEO of WD-40. It was the Annual Breakfast for the MS in Executive Leadership program at University of San Diego, followed by a panel about servant leadership, creating a
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Personalization Isn’t a Fancy Computer Program
Laura presented the idea of “personalization of learning,” meaning more in how does the teacher understand the student, build on their interests, and create learning opportunities for the student. I can get behind this idea. The personalization of learning creates the opportunity for more depth and authenticity, whereas “personalized learning” seems to be more about knowing the “stuff”.
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Laura K Spencer, Ed.D. 