Fly a plane to the future

Launch your ideas into the future. This is the Million Futures site where you see a blue sky, fluffy clouds and circling paper planes. Each plane contains an answer to one of the questions representing people’s views on the future of education and the skills that will matter. Read a few, launch your own

It is part of a joint project conducted by the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) (UK) and Futurelab. It’s a novel way of consulting the public, getting people thinking and identifying ideas about the challenges ahead.

Here’s a screenshot of the six questions circling the central question:

What of today’s education do you want to see in 2025?

Click on a question and you have the chance to toss your thoughts into the air. Click a plane and you can read someone else’s answer. The nature of the web means that the UK will be getting answers globally.

As a way of gathering and aggregating ideas from everywhere this idea is innovative, playful and fun. You can also learn how to make a real (paper) plane.

What a clever idea. What a great way  to consult the public on vital matters of planning and policy. The responses wll be published on the Beyond Current Horizons website and used to inform long term planning for education in the UK. i can imagine all kinds of uses such a tool. How long before we can put this to work in the PDS community as a way of testing ideas, gathering opinions, identifying challenges, exploring differences and finding common ground?

What’s your favorite word?

What’s your favorite word and is it in this dictionary yet?  If not, then consider making a personal contribution. Meanwhile – take a look, see and listen to the contributions so far in Wordia

And don’t worry – there are lots more words to go. The Second Edition of the Oxford English Dictionary contains full entries for 171,476 words in current use, and 47,156 obsolete words. To this may be added around 9,500 derivative words included as subentries.

“That’s my philosophy….

…you gotta have fun and you’ve got to love the kids.”

Giving thanks

So many things to be thankful for.

PDS gave traditional Thanksgiving thanks at the all-school celebration on Tuesday. Groups gathered to eat, hear a story and re-connect. Older students from the high school led the way – served the food, read the story and then brought everyone together in the JEJ theater a for a poem by Langston Hughes and a moment of silent thankfulness.

This was also the end point of this phase of the ongoing food drive in support of the Queens Galley and food pantry in Kingston. Emma one of the organizers from the high school – helped everyone understand the purpose for this specific food drive.

Ken McGloin and Sidereal led us in the traditional PDS Thanksgiving song. It was written by students for an original musical some years ago – a most meaningful expression of all there is to be thankful for. Students sat in their mixed grade groups and we were joined by alumni who came back to say hello and be a part of it.

Teen time online: An interesting study

A high school parent writes:

I think we knew this already (“study shows teens’ use of digital media show that America’s youth are developing important social and technical skills online – often in ways adults do not understand or value”) but it’s nice (especially as a parent) to be reassured.

The study in question  can be found here in versions of varying lengths but the gist of it is summed up in the header:

New Study Shows Time Spent Online Important for Teen Development.

It might surprise parents to learn that it is not a waste of time for their teens to hang out online. There are myths about kids spending time online – that it is dangerous or making them lazy. But we found that spending time online is essential for young people to pick up the social and technical skills they need to be competent citizens in the digital age. – Mizuko Ito, University of California, Irvine researcher and the report’s lead author.

It’s helpful to begin to get some solid research on the ways in which people, and especially young people, are using digital technologies and the impact they are having on all of our lives. It’s not always what we think. What’s really interesting is their finding that so much online learning is self-directed. Young people learn from each other how to create and navigate new forms of expression and establish new rules and conventions for social behavior. It’s behavior that is interactive, regulated, social and collaborative.

Schools sometimes try to impose standardised benchmarks to measure such technical and media literacies. An impossible task where the learning is peer driven, the pace of change so furious and so fluid. When it comes to online learning we need more of a learning partnership – not the sage on the stage model for learning but rather the guide at the side. And sometimes that guide will be, must be, the student

Advice from Jules Feiffer

Work hard at what you are passionate about.

Read lots of books.

There was more, but that was how Mr. Feiffer opened his talk last Thursday. What a treat to hear him talk about his creative process and answer questions – mostly from children- about his life and work.

How did he get started? Well – by telling bedtime stories to a daughter who was not satisfied with repeats and who wanted something new every night. So – he started to make them up Scheherazada style. And we are all grateful that he did.

Jules Feiffer was at the PDS Book fair last week signing books and dispensing genial wit and wisdom. Thank-you Mr. Feiffer, the art department and the PA for the food, the wise owls and for all the books.

Mr. Feiffer’s latest book is Explainers- the complete Village Voice cartoon strips from 1956-66. Here’s one from March 4th, 1965 – one of many with wry commentary on the world of children, learning and schools. (Click the cartoon to enlarge.)

Leadersheep are real

I’ve posted about leadersheep before and now I have heard from an Icelandic shepherd with more information. “Flannelberry” – who started a blog Flannelberry Farm (Small-scale farming, self sufficiency and all things considered…) – writes:

I am a shepherd with an Icelandic flock and came across your blog while googling “leadersheep”.

There are indeed leadersheep – a specific line within the more generic “Icelandic Sheep”. They’re lovely brilliant things, bred for brains rather than meat or fibre. They look a little different – narrower in most respects and more primitive somehow – but you would not want to have a flock without one.

More about them here –
Icelandic Leader Sheep

Civics literacy – a test

With a new president and a new administration in the offing, time to take the Civics Literacy test.
Civics, government, some economics, and politics. I scored just over 90% but some of that was the luck of multiple choice.

Learning in a world of plasma

A parent sent me a link to this clip from Ulrike Reinhard‘s blog and specifically her story “Intrinsic motivation will play a major role…”

Thank you for introducing me to the ideas and work of Chief of Confusion: Richard Seely Brown. Brown is a visiting scholar at USC and the independent co-chairman of the Deloitte Center for Edge Innovation. Formerly he was Chief Scientist at Xerox.There are two other videos on his site on creativity and social learning as well as other resources and ideas.

Creativity and Play

Creativity, trust and play – there are (shock! surprise!) links between them. Thinking with your hands. At the 2008 Serious Play conference, designer Tim Brown talks about the powerful relationship between creative thinking and play — with many examples you can try at home (and one that maybe you shouldn’t.) Exploration, building and role play – they are all important.
Take a look. Click the pic to get the link. What do you think?