The Call to Unite

Earlier this week I joined the Call to Unite - a 24 hour global live stream event where I shared my thoughts on how we can seize the opportunity to transform how we educate our children, and how we approach our relationship with the world we live in.

You can learn more at www.unite.us. #AnswerTheCall

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QU4Q17t4muY

 


NEW Podcast/Video Series: Learning from Home

Millions of parents and carers have suddenly found themselves responsible for overseeing their children’s education from home.

If you’re one of them, you may be finding this a daunting challenge to be facing on top of all of the other stresses of our current global situation. I am launching a podcast special to help bring you and your family resources and insight from around the world, and to give you the opportunity to share what is happening with your own family so that others can benefit from your experiences. No matter how isolated you may be feeling, the support you need is out there and my hope is that this podcast will connect you to it.

Please watch the video above to learn more, and then I invite you to be in touch with your stories, questions, concerns or insights by emailing LFH@nevergrey.org. With your permission some of these may be featured in the series and I may be in touch to arrange an interview so that we can share and exchange ideas.


Dear Teacher

The first day of school is a big day for your child and for you. I hope you enjoy my reading of this lovely poem by Emma Robinson, beautifully animated (as always) by We are Cognitive.


Wired Magazine: Standardisation broke education. Here's how we can fix our schools

I was delighted to write this short piece for Wired UK, and hope you find it useful

 

Standardisation broke education. Here's how we can fix our schools

"The movement towards personalisation is already advancing in medicine. We must move quickly in that direction in education, too"

We are all born with fathomless capacities, but what we make of them has everything to do with education. One role of education is to help people develop their natural talents and abilities; the other is to help them make their way in the world around them. Too often, education falls short on both counts. As we face an increasingly febrile future, it’s vital to do better. For that to happen, education has to be urgently transformed. We have the resources and the expertise, but now we need the vision and commitment.

In my book, You, Your Child and School, I make a distinction between learning, education and school. Learning is acquiring new skills and understanding; education is an organised system of learning; a school is a community of learners. All children love to learn, but many have a hard time with education and some have big problems with school.

Usually, the problem is not the learners – it’s the inherent bias of education and the enforced culture of schools. For generations, formal education has been systematically biased towards narrow forms of academic ability. The result is that it largely disregards the marvellous diversity of human talents and interests.

For the past generation especially, politicians have been smothering schools in a depressing culture of standardisation. As a result, they have been marginalising the very capabilities our children need to create a more equitable and sustainable world – by which I mean creativity, compassion citizenship and collaboration...

 

Please continue to read the full article on the Wired UK website.


Podcast: Wisdom On The Intersection Of Education, Leadership, And The Environment

The two climate crises. I enjoyed this conversation with on Education, Leadership and the Environment. Hope you do.

Please listen to the interview here

 

"As a professor of leadership, host of this podcast, and constant student of acting by my environmental values, I live and work in the intersection of leadership, education, and the environment.

Ken Robinson does too, but with a big difference: he's been here for decades longer, actively practicing in each. This episode approaches each of education, leadership, and the environment from several perspectives.

I can't say anything better than his voice carries the wisdom and vitality of someone who has worked here for longer and with greater passion than maybe anyone I've met and I'm in this world.

I'll keep this writing brief. Let's listen to Ken Robinson.

One last caveat: our schedules meant recording by phone, meaning the audio quality isn't like being in a studio, but I believe you'll find Ken's message transcends the medium and hope you listen for what he says, not the equipment.

Show Notes :

Here is the Robert Ardrey quote from the 1961 book African Genesis that Ken said at the end:

But we were born of risen apes, not fallen angels, and the apes were armed killers besides. And so what shall we wonder at? Our murders and massacres and missiles, and our irreconcilable regiments? Or our treaties whatever they may be worth; our symphonies however seldom they may be played; our peaceful acres, however frequently they may be converted into battlefields; our dreams however rarely they may be accomplished. The miracle of man is not how far he has sunk but how magnificently he has risen. We are known among the stars by our poems, not our corpses."