Pow! Straight to the Moon!

The unique challenges we face at our school are paradigmatic.  We are "the best" American School in the World.  We get kids into the Ivy League.   We offer lots of AP courses which our kids take and ace. We support top notch staff development and attract leaders in education.  Etc. Etc.

It is 1965 and we are dreaming of space exploration.

Telescopes and theory tell us it's possible to get there.

Enter Sputnik, et al

Like the space programs of the sixties, our greatest challenge in education today is overcoming gravity.   The gravity on our campus is tradition and, ironically, our past success as an institution. Furthermore, our administration is just now starting to fund and support  "NASA" on campus.

We are the astronauts, the ground control and the engineers building the "rocket to the moon".  We have the "Sputniks" (Khan Academy, Stanford's and M.I.T.'s Free online classes) driving our efforts.

Google, Cisco and Apple are the Lockheeds, Northrups and Hughes Aircraft of today.  It was the Space Race then showing us the future.  Today, it is the future of education that defines our thinking.

Information is free and unlimited.

The telegraph became the telephone

Air travel became space travel

The Industrial Age has become the Knowledge Age: 

"Post-Industrial – or Knowledge – Age (21st century) people also need ‘know what’ kinds of knowledge. However they need more than this. They need to be able to do things with this knowledge, to use it to create new knowledge. The ‘know-what’ kind of knowledge is still important, but not as an end in itself. Rather, it is a resource, something to learn (or think) with. In the Knowledge Age, change, not stability, is a given."

It has been posited that our favorite songs are those we listened to in the era of our first sexual exploits...

<pause for contemplation>

...While this may be nothing more than drunken logic, it helps me make this connection:

My pedagogical "teeth" were cut in the first few years of my teaching career.  Those experiences and learnings are at the core of my teaching today.  As such check out the following videos from 1999, my fourth year as a teacher and when I first watched  this ABC news report.  Keep your eye on the big red ball:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JkHOxyafGpE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVZ8pmkg1do

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nyugyrCQTuw

"We're not actually experts at any given area.  We're experts at the process of how you design..."

-Dave Kelley of IDEO

Experts in the process.  

Professional Learning Communities are the latest way our school is going to improve our students' learning.  In this work we have a golden opportunity (moral obligation?) to identify the processes for which learning takes place on our campus.

Instantaneous access to infinite amounts of information + guided/purposeful  practices + clear and timely feedback from authentic audiences = Rockets to Mars

Here's one of my colleagues putting on her space suit and getting ready to launch:

10, 9, 8, 7, 6...

http://www.fastcodesign.com/1664735/what-schools-can-learn-from-google-ideo-and-pixar

This article was in one of our documents. In case you didn't see it buried in there, here it is. It's great! I think our admin should read it. The examples are fantastic. This is what we are trying to do. This kind of physical space along with our leadership tying it to curriculum combined is very exciting!!

As always, thanks for the good conversation.