This document outlines Chris Lehmann's vision for creating modern schools that engage students through inquiry-driven, project-based learning. It advocates for schools that ask open-ended questions, are student-centered, community-based, and help students develop skills like collaboration, critical thinking, and learning how to learn. Rather than focusing on standardized tests and recall, schools should emphasize understanding, integration across subjects, and using new technologies to support student-driven learning. The goal is to transform schools into caring institutions that empower students and help them develop the skills they will need in the information age.

1. Building School 2.0:
Creating the Schools
We Need
Chris Lehmann
Science Leadership Academy
Philadelphia, PA
@chrislehmann

2. Why This Matters

3. My Bias:
Old Ideas and New Tools

4. More Bias:
Citizenry, Not Workforce

5. One Last Bias:
Public Education = Democracy

6. School Stinks

7. Do What You’re Told
Over and over and over again...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dystopos/195707530/

8. Stuff You Might Never Need
... or care about.

9. “Why Do I Need
to Know This?”

10. It will be on the test...
You’re going to need it some day...
It’ll help you get a job...
It looks good on a college resume...
It’s a required class...
(because someone told me I had to learn it / teach it.)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/benrussell/1477899923/

11. Is School Relevant?
(are we relevant?)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/library_of_congress/4176254887

12. The Modern School

13. http://www.flickr.com/photos/edublogger/
838786841/
Photo by Ewan McIntosh
If you want creative workers, give them
enough time to play.
- John Cleese

14. School Can Teach Us
How To Learn.

15. What Will You
Unlearn?

16. http://www.flickr.com/photos/mwichary/2225299236/
The illiterate of the 21st century will
not be those who cannot read and
write, but those who cannot learn,
unlearn and relearn.
-- Alvin Toffler

17. Tell A Better Story:
We Must Have Vision
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lnx/6257130/

18. Caring Institutions
We Teach Kids, Not Subjects

19. Inquiry Driven
Ask Questions We Don’t
Know The Answers To

20. Student Centered
It’s Not About Us.

21. Teacher-Mentored
Kids Need Adults

22. Community-Based
We can learn from many

23. Collaborative
Synthesis Works

24. Passionate
School Is Real Life

25. Integrated
The day has to make sense

26. Meta-Cognitive
Think about thinking.

27. Understanding-Driven
and Project-Based

28. Common Language of
Teaching and Learning

29. Common Inputs

30. Common Process

31. Common Outputs

32. Tests
Homework
Projects
Class Participation
Traditional
Classrooms:
Recall-Based

33. Projects
Homework
Class Participation
Tests & Quizzes
The Schools
We Need:
Understanding-
Driven

34. Neil Postman:
Certain Technologies Are
Not Additive, They Are
Transformative

35. Technology Like Oxygen
Ubiquitous, Necessary and Invisible

36. Dream Bigger
This isn’t personalized.

37. Thoughtful, Wise,
Passionate and Kind

38. How Do We
Change the
World?

39. Be Humbled By
The Task
And Be Skeptical of Those Who Aren’t

40. Inquiry is for
all of us.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/kjarrett/12143612396
And Don’t Settle For Easy Answers

41. What Do You Think?
The link between inquiry and care

42. Organize
The Time Is Now
http://www.flickr.com/photos/library_of_congress/2163922974/

43. Ideas Must Live In Practice
Build Systems and Structures that Reflect Shared Vision

44. Problematize
Everything
What is the worst consequence of your best idea?

45. Empower
the Kids
It is their education, and it will be their world

46. Be One School
Be What You Are For Everyone

47. Have Fun
We get to teach!

48. Be Willing to Be
Transformed
We Have So Much Left to Learn

49. What do we teach
in the Information Age?

50. Wisdom.

51. Join us:
chris@practicaltheory.org
http://www.practicaltheory.org
Twitter: @chrislehmann
Science Leadership Academy
http://www.scienceleadership.org
EduCon 2019 -- Jan. 25-27, 2019
http://educon.org