Worth Reading.....

1. Why the Problem with Learning is Unlearning (Bonchek)- the biggest challenge is not learning something new, but unlearning what old ways of thinking.

Unlearning is not about forgetting. It’s about the ability to choose an alternative mental model or paradigm. When we learn, we add new skills or knowledge to what we already know. When we unlearn, we step outside the mental model in order to choose a different one.

2. Meaningful Making: Projects and Inspiration for Fab Labs and Makerspaces (Blikstein, Martinez and Pang)- A compilation of articles about making and fabrication as well as ideas for projects, assessment strategies and public exhibitions.

3. Terms We Need to Rethink in Education (Couros)- an attempt for clarity around educational buzzwords

Risk Taking

What a lot of people hear – Doing something crazy or dangerous with kids!

What I hope it means – Moving from something “known”, to an “unknown” in pursuit of doing something better for and with students.

4. The Key to Learner Agency is Ownership (Ferriter)- the difference between learning and schooling and how they are not the same thing.  Learning is about agency, and the individual owning the inquiry process.

When we strip away ownership over every learning experience and create highly scripted spaces where kids are never given the chance to set their own direction or examine their own interests or answer their own questions, we create passive students who are dependent on others for direction instead of active learners who are developing the skills and dispositions necessary to be the change agents that our world needs them to be.

5. From Deficiency to Strength: Shifting the Mindset about Education Inequity (Zhao)- discusses the failed model of remediating gaps through teaching around a student's deficiency as opposed to focusing on what kids do well.

Thus to shift the paradigm, we must start with rethinking about human differences and adopt the mindset that differences are not a deficit. Instead, education needs to assume that every child comes to school with strength, although their strength may not be aligned with prescribed standards and expectations. It is the school’s responsibility to help children discover and cultivate children’s strengths instead of fixing their deficits.

Worth Reading

Vacation edition of worth reading post.  If you run out of materials on the beach or have a few quiet minutes at home take a look through some of these articles and videos.


1. Truly Questioning Everything (Truss)- forces the reader to examine and evaluate traditional school structures.

The learning curve has been huge. I’ve had to question a lot of my own assumptions and have even found barriers in my own beliefs about what school ‘should’ or ‘needs to’ look like. It has been humbling, challenging, fascinating and engaging. The interesting thing is that much of what I’ve been learning can happen in most every school, and I find that very exciting.

2. In Search of Agency (@budtheteacher)- how do we help students and teachers realize and embrace their ability to bring about change.

The essential question at the bottom is, I think, the big piece – “How do I approach a system to determine where my agency lies?”  If you’re able to play, you can see the constraints.  To see them, you’ve got to know how and where to look.  Hacking, making and playing seem to be useful ways to answer that question.

3. Flipped Learning: a response to five common criticisms (November and Mull)- define and defends a Flipped classroom.

If they have provided students with an array of rich resources and have set up opportunities for students to think deeply and question what they have learned at home before coming to class, these teachers are going to see that there are a wide array of new questions that arise that might never have come up during a standard class period. In these cases, teachers are really going to need to know their stuff, and they are going to need to be able to individualize on the fly—quite possibly five, 10, or even 20 times in a class period.

4. Classroom on the Water: The Urban Assembly New York Harbor School- Classroom on the Water: The Urban Assembly New York Harbor School, chronicles the achievements of the Harbor School and its journey to its new home on Governors Island.

5. Emily Philloton: Teaching design for change- Designer Emily Pilloton moved to rural Bertie County, in North Carolina, to engage in a bold experiment of design-led community transformation. She's teaching a design-build class called Studio H that engages high schoolers' minds and bodies while bringing smart design and new opportunities to the poorest county in the state.