Reinvent public schools with proven, innovative practices
Our homes, communities, and the world itself need the natural assets our children bring with them as learners, and which they often lose over time on the assembly line that pervades most of the public education system today. We see no actions as more important in school than developing, supporting, and reinforcing children's sense of agency, the value of their voices, and their potential to influence their own communities.
In Timeless Learning, an award-winning team of leaders, Chief Technology Officer Ira Socol, Superintendent Pam Moran, and Lab Schools Principal Chad Ratliff demonstrate how you can implement innovative practices that have shown remarkable success. The authors use progressive design principles to inform pathways to disrupt traditions of education today and show you how to make innovations real that will have a timeless and meaningful impact on students, keeping alive the natural curiosity and passion for learning with which children enter school.
- Discover the power of project-based and student-designed learning
- Find out what "maker learning" entails
- Launch connected and interactive digital learning
- Benefit from the authors' "opening up learning" space and time
Using examples from their own successful district as well as others around the country, the authors create a deep map of the processes necessary to move from schools in which content-driven, adult-determined teaching has been the traditional norm to new learning spaces and communities in which context-driven, child-determined learning is the progressive norm.
Children are enthusiastic, natural learners. They yearn to actively participate in learning experiences fueled by their questions, curiosities, and interests in and out of school. However, the cookie-cutter assembly line that pervades much of the public education system drains the passion for learning from our students. As the authors of Timeless Learning explain, there are no actions more important in school than developing, supporting, and reinforcing children's sense of agency, the value of their voices, and their potential to influence their own communities.
Timeless Learning's award-winning team of leaders (Chief Technology and Innovation Officer Ira Socol, Superintendent Pam Moran, and Lab Schools Principal Chad Ratliff) clearly shows how to put in place the innovative practices that have proven to be remarkably successful. The authors present the processes needed to move from schools in which content-driven, adult-determined teaching was the old norm to new learning spaces and communities in which context-driven, child-determined learning is the new standard.
The book is filled with illustrations from the authors' own successful school district and others from around the country. For example, Timeless Learning reveals the transformative power of a diverse leadership team to successfully introduce processes such as project-based and student-centered learning, computing, a maker curriculum, and opening up learning space and time in her large, diverse public school district.
Timeless Learning offers a guide for becoming an exemplary leader who educates young people for life, not school. Or a teacher who is interested in helping children take joy in learning with them as they navigate through life rather than ensuring students pass other people's standardized tests.
