Big question: – Can we "equip" our children with the knowledge and skills they will need to succeed in the 21st century? Digging it more: – Are we successfully preparing our students for the increasing 21st century demands of life and career? – Are our educators successfully addressing the unique and diverse needs of the 21st century children? – How can we improve even further the quality of our Education offer?

1. Agile-based
Active Learning
A gentle introduction, by Nuno Rafael Gomes
Agile Portugal 2017 Conference
June 2-3, 2017

2. About me
Twitter: @nrgomes
Linkedin: linkedin.com/in/nrgomes
Blog: medium.com/@nrgomes
#lean #leanthinking #leanstartup #agile
#scrum #eduscrum #kaizen #kata
#lego #seriousplay #seriouslearning
#coaching #learning #education
#activelearning #agileschools
Lean Agile Coach
Agile Connect® Founder
Serious LearningTM
Founder

3. Agenda
➔ The world in April, 2015.
➔ Some powerful questions.
➔ The world we live in…
➔ Making sense of the world…
➔ The skills we need in the 21st
century…
➔ To learn or to know?
➔ Active Learning.
➔ Agile Mindset.
➔ Scrum.
➔ Agile in Education.
➔ Agile Classrooms
➔ eduScrum®.
➔ The 1st eduScrum® Portuguese
School.
➔ Takeaways.
➔ Q&A.
➔ Thank You!

4. The world in
April, 2015

5. Some powerful
questions

6. How can we make the
classroom as dynamic as
the world around us?

7. What do you value most?
Learn content or
learn how to learn?

8. What do you value most?
Learning or knowledge?

9. The world we
live in...

11. A VUCA world
Volatile
Uncertain
Complex
Ambiguous

12. A VUCA world
The US Military started using this term in late 90s to
describe the post-Cold War multilateral, fast-paced,
increasingly unstable and rapidly changing world.

13. A VUCA world
Currently used in emerging ideas in strategic leadership
that apply in a wide range of organizations, including
everything from for-profit corporations to education.

14. Volatility
The nature and dynamics of change,
and the nature and speed of change forces
and change catalysts.

15. Uncertainty
The lack of predictability,
the prospects for surprise,
and the sense of awareness
and understanding of issues and events.

16. Complexity
The multiplex of forces,
the confounding of issues,
no cause-and-effect chain
and confusion that surround an organization.

17. Ambiguity
The haziness of reality,
the potential for misreads,
and the mixed meanings of conditions;
cause-and-effect confusion.

18. A VUCA world
The new normal?

19. Making sense of
the world...

21. "Different contexts require
different ways of navigation."
Nuno Rafael Gomes

22. Cynefin Framework
A "sense-making device", that is, the data precedes the
framework, the patterns, used worldwide to help
managers, executives and policy-makers reach decisions,
accordingly to 5 decision-making contexts or “domains”:
Obvious, complicated, complex, chaotic and disorder.

23. Complex
The realm of “unknown unknowns”
Stable state, with enabling constraints
Cause and effect are only obvious in
hindsight, with unpredictable, emergent
outcomes.
Complicated
The realm of “known unknowns”
Stable state, with governing constraints
Cause and effect relationships exist,
but are not self evident, and therefore
require expertise.
Chaotic
The realm of “unknowables”
Transient state, absence of constraints
No cause and effect relationships
can be determined.
Obvious
The realm of “known knowns”
Stable state, with rigid constraints
Cause and effect relationships exist,
are predictable and are repeatable.
Disorder

24. Complex
Probe - Sense - Respond
Emergent Practices
Pattern management, stories, heuristics,
sensemaking, coherence monitoring,
conduct safe-fail experiments,
dynamic flow management.
Complicated
Sense - Analyse - Respond
Good Practices
Predictive planning, expert analysis, data
provides options but only experts can
interpret it on most of the cases.
Chaotic
Act - Sense - Respond
Novel Practices
Crisis management, experience
informs decisions, act as fast as
possible to bring stability (if accident),
drive innovation quickly (if intentional)
Obvious
Sense - Categorise - Respond
Best Practices
Standard operating procedures (SOPs).
automation, fact-based management,
data provides answers and anyone can
interpret it.
Disorder

25. Complex
The realm of “unknown unknowns”
Stable state, with enabling constraints
Probe - Sense - Respond
Emergent Practices
Complicated
The realm of “known unknowns”
Stable state, with governing constraints
Sense - Analyse - Respond
Good Practices
Chaotic
The realm of “unknowables”
Transient state, absence of constraints
Act - Sense - Respond
Novel Practices
Obvious
The realm of “known knowns”
Stable state, with rigid constraints
Sense - Categorise - Respond
Best Practices
Disorder

26. Complex Complicated
Expert Education
Almost all University degrees!
Chaotic
Special Training:
Firefighters, Special Ops,
Emergency Medical Staff...
Obvious
Basic Training
Core K-9 Education
Disorder

27. Complex
Active Learning Education
What we need today!
Complicated
Expert Education
Almost all University degrees!
Chaotic
Special Training:
Firefighters, Special Ops,
Emergency Medical Staff...
Obvious
Basic Training
Core K-9 Education
Disorder

28. The skills we
need in the 21st
century...

29. “As escolas são as pessoas,
e não os lugares.
Onde houver gente, há escola.”
José Francisco Pacheco

30. “The schools are the people, and
not the places. Where there are
people, there is a school.”
José Francisco Pacheco

31. P21 Framework for 21st Century

34. Communication
Sharing thoughts, questions, ideas and solutions.
The ability to share information while expressing thoughts
and opinions clearly to to others. It also requires strong
listen and evaluation skills in order to aid collaboration.

35. Collaboration
Working together to reach a goal;
putting talent, expertise, and smarts to work.
The ability to work with others to accomplish a goal,
while being flexible and sharing group responsibility.

36. Critical Thinking
Looking at problems in a new way,
linking learning across subjects and disciplines.
The ability to analyse, interpret, evaluate,
make decisions and solve problems.

37. Creativity
Trying new approaches to get things done
equals innovation and invention.
The ability to brainstorm, refine ideas, be responsive to
ideas from others, and make ideas tangible and useful.

38. To learn or
to know?

40. Active Learning

41. "Every time we teach a child
something, we keep him from
inventing it himself."
Jean Piaget

42. Active Learning
A model of instruction that focuses
the responsibility of learning on learners.
A method of learning in which students are actively or
experientially involved in the learning process,
and where there are different levels of active learning,
depending on student involvement.

43. Active Learning Principles
Purpose
Reflection
Negotiation
Critical Thinking
Complexity
Situation-driven
Engagement

44. Learning pyramid (Edgar Dale)
Retention Rate Passive Learning
Active Learning
———
+++

45. Some Active Learning strategies
Class game
Class discussion
Think-pair-share
Jigsaw
Learning by collaborating
Learning by teaching
Reciprocal teaching
...

46. “I hear and I forget.
I see and I remember.
I do and I understand.”
Confucius

47. Active Learning
Passive Learning
Thinking &
Complexity
Level
Bloom’s Taxonomy
———
+++

48. Agile Mindset

49. “Agile is a mindset driven by 4
Values and 12 Principles."
Nuno Rafael and many others :-)

51. Agile Manifesto
We are uncovering better ways of developing
software by doing it and helping others do it.
Through this work we have come to value:

52. Agile Values
Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
Working software over comprehensive documentation
Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
Responding to change over following a plan
That is, while there is value in the items on the right,
we value the items on the left more.

54. Collaboration
Culture
Individuals & interactions
Customer collaboration
Control
Culture
Cultivation
Culture
Responding to change
Competence
Culture
Working software
People Organization
Reality
Possibility

55. Agile Principles
Satisfy the customer
Welcome change
Deliver frequently
Work together
Trust & support everyone
Face-to-face interactions
Working products
Sustainable pace
Technical excellence
Simplicity
Emergent design
Reflect & adjust regularly

56. Collaboration
Culture
Deliver frequently
Work together
Face-to-face interactions
Emergent design
Reflect & adjust regularly
Control
Culture
Cultivation
Culture
Satisfy the customer
Welcome change
Trust & support everyone
Sustainable pace
Simplicity
Competence
Culture
Working products
Technical excellence
Reality
People Organization
Possibility

57. Agile Practices
Scrum, eduScrum, Extreme Programming (XP), Crystal Clear
methods, Kanban, Dynamic systems development method
(DSDM), Disciplined Agile Delivery (DAD), Adaptive software
development (ASD), Xtreme Decoupled Engineering (XDE),
LeSS, Nexus, Scrum @ Scale, ...

58. Agile as Culture?
Agile is all about putting People First!
Agile aligns well with Collaboration & Cultivation cultures!
Validated in 2010 by Michael Spayd!

59. Scrum

60. From Scrum Guide
Scrum is a framework for developing
and sustaining complex products.
Scrum is a framework within which people can address
complex adaptive problems, while productively and
creatively delivering products of the highest possible value.
Scrum is also a “way of getting things done”, thus, Culture.

61. Scrum Values
Commitment
Focus
Openness
Respect
Courage

62. Collaboration
Culture
Focus
Openness
Control
Culture
Cultivation
Culture
Commitment
Respect
Courage
Competence
Culture
People
Reality
Organization
Possibility

63. Scrum as Culture?
Scrum is all about putting People First!
Scrum aligns well with Collaboration & Cultivation cultures!

64. Agile in
Education

66. Your Journey from...
Prescriptive → Iterative
Content → Culture
Evaluation → Visible Feedback & Reflection
Control → Trust
Competition → Collaboration

67. Agile
Classrooms

68. Build an Agile Classroom

69. eduScrum®

70. Collaboration that gives you wings

71. “O professor deve ser um
mediador do conhecimento.”
José Francisco Pacheco

72. “The teacher should be
a mediator of knowledge.”
José Francisco Pacheco

73. From eduScrum Guide
eduScrum is a framework within which
students can tackle complex adaptive problems,
while productively and creatively achieving learning goals
and personal growth of the highest possible value.

74. eduScrum Principles
Trust
Freedom
Ownership
Focus
Commitment
Autonomy
Authenticity
Personal Growth

75. Collaboration
Culture
Autonomy
Ownership
Focus
Control
Culture
Cultivation
Culture
Trust
Commitment
Personal Growth
Authenticity
Freedom
Competence
Culture
People
Reality
Organization
Possibility

76. eduScrum as Culture?
eduScrum is all about putting People First!
Scrum aligns well with Collaboration & Cultivation cultures!

77. eduScrum vs Scrum in a nutshell
A slightly different set of Values (previous slides).
Development Teams are self-organized Students’ Teams.
1 Product Owner (Teacher) for all Teams in the classroom.
Every Student Team has its own eduScrum Master.
Product Backlog is known in advance (classroom context).

78. eduScrum vs Scrum in a nutshell
A Sprint Goal is a set of Learning Goals.
Acceptance criteria are mandatory.
Sprint Planning includes Team Formation.
All students’ work is managed through the FLIP (an artifact).
A Definition of Fun (an artifact) must be set by each Team.
Sprints cannot be canceled!

79. eduScrum Teams start with Trust...

83. The 1st
eduScrum®
Portuguese
School

84. “Our greatest glory
is not in never falling,
but in rising every time we fall.”
Confucius

86. The School
One of the top 10 best Portuguese educational institutions
that aims to form citizens who are critical, supportive,
ecologically conscious and capable of lifelong learning.

88. “The important thing is
not to stop questioning.”
Albert Einstein

89. An initial question...
Are we successfully preparing our students for the
increasing 21st century demands of life and career?

90. A possible answer?
Are you shifting the responsibility of learning
from the teacher where it has traditionally been,
to the learners where it belongs?

91. Another question...
Are our educators successfully addressing the
unique and diverse needs of the 21st century children?

92. A possible answer?
Are you using the education content to build and nurture
the learning and innovation skills of the 21st century?

93. And another question...
How can we improve even further
the quality of our Education offer?

94. A possible answer?
Use Active Learning and eduScrum as its main strategy?

95. Main challenges (constraints)
We need some (eduScrum) templates to support:
➔ The School, for compliance reasons.
➔ The Teachers, for confidence and scaling reasons.

96. Main challenges (constraints)
Teachers are very busy persons:
➔ We have few opportunities to give them training.
➔ It’s critical to give them all support they need to start.

98. Ignite our “pollinating bees”
Start with 11 Teachers, from Sciences, Technology,
Languages, Humanities and Socio Economic studies.
One 2-days introductory workshop about
Scrum and Science of Teams.
One 2-days introductory workshop about
Active Learning and eduScrum.

99. … and build knowledge together :-)
Co-creation of Active Learning eduScrum templates
to support eduScrum classes, the Teachers and the School.
Regular Coaching Circle sessions for Teachers to
share experiences, learn and improve with each other.
A few short eduScrum intros given in classrooms,
requested by some Teachers at the beginning.

107. Sharing some results...
5 Teachers gave Active Learning classes with eduScrum :-)
2 Teachers run an interdisciplinary project with eduScrum!
All students improved their grades on eduScrum
“facilitated” subjects, and “enjoyed the freedom” of
“controlling their own destiny”.

108. Teachers’ preliminary conclusions
Significant test score increase just after one sprint/project.
Students’ interest on contents achievement grew a lot.
More effectiveness on achieving interdisciplinary goals.
Trust and confidence improvements in cooperative work.
eduScrum is a great classroom interaction facilitator.
eduScrum classes are more dynamic and appealing.

109. Next steps :-)
eduScrum adoption should be expanded, that is, more
teachers, classes, subjects, projects and sprints next year,
in order to validate these results on a wider scale.
Since eduScrum classes require more time to prepare &
master (it’s a new way of thinking & doing), Teachers
should have quality time to invest in it every week
and the coaching circle sessions should last the all year.

111. Students’ own words :-)
“Teachers didn’t orient us as much, we were autonomous.”
“We understood the contents much better.”
“We worked better, and more, as a Team.”
“We learned and worked together.”
“We took more responsibility.”
“It made us think & reflect more about our own learning.”
“Classes were more interesting, dynamic and appealing.”

112. Takeaways

113. Just one :-)
Inspired to help improve our Education?

114. Q&A

115. Thank You!
Please, tweet:
@nrgomes #agilept #activelearning #education
@agilept @eduscrum @agileschools @agileinedu

116. Some references
Standing on the shoulders of giants:
- eduScrum (Willy Wijnands, Arno Delhij, Claudia Struijlaart & Maarten Bruns)
- Agile Classrooms (John Miller)
- Agile in Education (Manifesto)
- Framework for 21st Century Learning (US coalition)
- Education transforms lives (UNESCO)
- Rethinking Education, Towards a global common goal? (UNESCO)
- A Leader’s Framework for Decision Making (David Snowden & Mary Boone)
- The Reengineering Alternative (William Schneider)

117. Special thanks
Special thanks for the amazing images from:
➔ Karsten Würth
➔ Megan Soule
➔ Michael Sahota
➔ Ahmed Sidky