the skinny

What is normal?

Lucas wrote a brilliant paper about it.
Instead of embracing the diversity of the human mind we have
stigmatized
the very differences
that are so
characteristic of humans.
The DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) declared war on the introverts, and the educationally challenged among others and has attempted to
define what a normal human should be,
an extroverted individual who works well with people, progresses well in conventional schooling, and will succeed in a conventional job.
Lucas, student, Stigmatizing the Human Mind
looking to measure creativity.

Yaacov Hecht has a great visual and explanation of how we define it in school,
in his book Democratic Education. (education cities)

click to go to live doc

look at all the info we cover now
click for more of your school design it
Let’s assume we trust the
capabilities of tech to help us
differentiate like this for students.
Most of us might buy into it as long as we’re still owning student learning.
Because…

…many of us
are so conditioned, inclined, intoxicated if you will,
to believing there is a normal.
In good intention, we seek what’s best for our students, our children, for us,
…yet,
we fear
the risk
of that
perceived ______________

The crazy notion that each kid could essentially have their own self-made plan, allowed us to envision the entire community as one school.
This
… morphed into the idea of the
highschool buildings becoming
the hubs, or the resource centers,
for the entire town. The town as
one big school. Like a uni campus.
Resources,
lectures halls,
science labs,
art hall,
engineering hall,
everything/everyone is available – per choice.

Community as a school:
In the US, when you say real life people tend to define it as: outside of school.
- Michael Wesch, K-State,
What if school involved everyone, the entire town?
Wouldn’t we all be better off?
Health - people being known by people
Budget – the more we know each other, the more we share
Environmental – the more we share, the less we need
What if community as school became so normal,
we didn’t even call it school anymore…

to story deck

key
Over the next year…
the Lab:
Imagination & Play
Pre K-5: vast exposure through games, logic, programming, … dabbling with mentors other than parents
6-8 focus: ongoing exposure, solidifying mentors, working on small personal network
Design/prototypes:
i&p , be you web, and Patchwork
9-12 – quasi college –
Design/prototypes:
the Met, detox, and your school
design it, , Yaacov Hecht,
Education Cities
12+ - quasi career
Design/prototypes:
Cathy Davidson, John Hope Franklin
Humanities Institute at Duke, Yaacov Hecht, The Educational-Social Entrepreneuring Incubator
Teachers– google 20% as learners, Teacherpreneurs, Yaacov’s incubator, & Your pd design it
Create a space to house our best resources for the arts.
Create a space to house our best resources for engineering.
Currently imagining the Lab could roam around the city in diff spaces creating mesh. Rented to them at low cost or free of charge. In return, their time in it is spent designing the space for creativity/allure, one that is alive, a future investment for the owner(s).

over the next year.
This is a rough sketch of the buildings in our town, the colored ones part of our vision...

Existing buildings morph into resource centers, meeting spaces, with specialty buildings shared by the community..
over the next 3 years.

What wakes kids up?
What would wake the community up?

John Dewey, How We Think

click for live doc.

What a boost to global net happiness it would be if we could positively activate the minds and bodies of hundreds of millions of people by offering them
better hard work.
-Jane McGonigal, Reality is Broken

Doing what has been considered standard
doesn’t equate with success anymore.
We need to be freeing kids up to
be themselves. Giving them space
to fail. Showing them we trust
learning. That it is that fascinating
and alluring.
Lucas with a CSU student talking about space and permission to be.

Getting to the heart of the matter begs a …
to deck for culture of trust

What about the basics….
One of the best answers we’ve seen from the Brooklyn Free School:
How does the school ensure that students learn the "basics?"What is meant by the "basics?"
A certain segment of society has sought, and succeeded, in imposing their view of what is important for all students in America, and indeed in much of the world, to learn in school.
The world is a fluid, fast-changing, and increasingly open society where individuals need to be first and foremost confident, flexible and independent thinkers and learners.
What a student learns is determined by each individual's own unique set of talents, skills, and interests which they pursue in their own good time.

What about the tests…
what about math even….
We think this question is huge, because even if we give lip service to getting away from standardization and teaching to the test,
a raised eyebrow can affect attitudes and mindsets.
A bit about standardized tests and math here.
Great insight from Dewey’s How We Think.

So what exactly are we facilitating?
Self-directed ownership of learning what matters most – to an
individual/community/culture.
And how do we facilitate that?
By redefining NCLB as a means to offer free/safe spaces of permission.

We’re thinking the glue is:
Some process for learning how to learn, such as detox.
A mechanism, per se, overarching any topic per choice. Ongoing iterations of this process becomes second nature. Drive, and hence, authentic intellectual learning, comes from self-owned curiosity/curriculum within each learner.
Some means to facilitate the craziness of differentiating to infinity.
Declaration of interdependence with 1-1 mentors per passion, local and beyond. Your school design it connecting learner to school/prof/project per choice with a type of rateyourprof local match ups.

via The Lab in Loveland, CO
because of the space, permission and trust given to us by
Thompson School District
SPACE
to experiment on the edge.Connected adjacency
with the district.

It’s more about a mindset than anything…
High recommends for this
slideshare’s ideas:
Lisa Gansky, The Mesh
(how to find resources in unlikely places)
Yaacov Hecht, Democratic Education
(stories of success/failure that are us, as we offer space for kids to find their gift/own their learning, education cities, embrace perpetual unknowing)
Dennis Littky’s, The Big Picture, Ed is Everyone’s Business
(modeling the 1-1 mentor, the transcript/expository/portfolio at end of yr, city as floorplan)
Clark Aldrich’s, Unschooling Rules,
(rethinking school means not thinking school)
So many others.. Reality is Broken, The Element, DIY U, Rework, Linchpin, Talent Code, Mindset, Cognitive Surplus, Secrets of a Buccaneer Scholar, The Power of Pull, A New Culture of Learning, The Design of Business, The War of Art, Do the Work, What Technology Wants, Tribes, Blogs Wikis Podcasts, The New Brain, The Human Project, The Blue Sweater, Drive, Greater Than Yourself, Wounded by School, Teaching Unmasked, ….
Great insight from Dewey’s How We Think
and Krishnamurti’s Education & the Significance of Life

previously slides are one story deck of the narrative deck:
The entire narrative deck can be accessed here..
Or you can go to the next slide to access another story deck…

4-39: mindset - the skinny
40-79: redefining success: school as a business … community as a school
43-49: the dandelion effect
50-53: is respect for every voice a part of your soul
54-63: we don’t need more resources, we just need to be more resourceful
: on health & wealth
64-72: Joi Ito as an exemplar – nothing is for everyone
73-79: declaration of interdependence - as glue
80-89: findings in failings
: history (deliberately not teaching, homeless analogy)
: detox (process/what, unpacking/why, doing/how)
90-95: vision/floorplan
96-97: connected adjacency
98: suggested book reads
99: faq
100-111: mindset
Suggestion per parents, if you were only going to look at 2 things:
slide 20 and detox.
as story
just out:
awakening indispensable people via videos
warning – poor quality – ieslidedeck with voice

What is normal…
click to play

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the skinny

by monika hardy

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