Shift to the Future

The more I read about history, the more in awe I become of the numbers and types of transformational changes that have occurred.  I read (audio book) Niall Ferguson’s Civilization: The West and the Rest this past year.  Empires as we know, rise and fall but their stories are impressive.  A rise and a fall are both transformational events.  We humans experience transformational events personally and on larger scales, all the time.  Being born is a pretty transformational event don’t you think.  Something seems to happen to many of us along the way through life to reduce our tolerance of transformation, “a change or alteration, especially a radical one” ( free dictionary, Dec. 14, 2014 ). We become comfortable with the status quo and resistant to change.  Ruben Puentedura’s in his discussion of the SAMR model describes stages of change as Enhancement: Substitution to Augmentation and Transformation: Modification to Redefinition.  His context i...

It’s a short but profound little question, “why?”.  Why influences a persons motivation to choose one path or thing over another.  In the book “ Start with Why ” by Simon Sinek that I’m currently listening to on my commute between Vancouver and Maple Ridge, the author introduces the golden circle ( watch the TEDx video ).  So many companies and individuals are focused on what they do and how they do it but miss the mark of why they are doing it.  In his book, Simon uses an example of when MP3 players came out.  Manufacturers would talk about what these did or had such as how many gigabytes, how long the battery would last, etc.  When Apple produced the iPod, they focused on why you would want one.  They described a lifestyle, talked about why you would want 1000 songs in your pocket, etc.  Once you were hooked, you would ask about what such as how much memory.  Apple wanted to change your life as you experienced music, not just sell you a...

Back in 2001 when I moved from Nanaimo to work for the Coquitlam School District, I recall having to buy a “good” map book to find my way around the District and the lower mainland.  I would use online maps increasingly to figure out routes but would write the turns down or print them.  It wasn’t elegant but I managed to get by.  My recent change to join the Vancouver School Board takes me to many schools and other places in the city that I’ve never been to.  Thankfully, my iPhone with Google Maps exists!  I plug in an address and pick the best route, press Start, and off we go.  The GPS “person” is very patient with me even when I pick route elements I think are “better”, ‘she’ recalculates the route and gets me on track.  I also love how I can speak to my phone, ask SIRI to plot a route to a place, eg a business or restaurant location, and it does it.  What a difference a decade of change makes for maps. My son and I were talking the other nig...

I am the type of person who pursues big ideas, big problems, and adrenaline charged activities.  For many years I engaged in somewhat extreme (not according to today’s crazy riders but…) downhill mountain biking.  There’s something invigorating about facing down a laddered launch about 10-12 feet high 15 feet out over a gulf to the other side.  I loved the adrenaline rush caused by fear and accomplishment.  The key to success is total commitment, any hesitation and things can go horribly wrong as they did numerous times for me – broken bones, torn ligaments, and for quite some time afterward, apprehension and fear.  I still ride hard but have switched to all mountain / cross country – high speed and flowee but much safer (getting older and wiser). Last week Saturday two of my sons, one of their friends, and I went skydiving for the first time to celebrate my 50th birthday.  Wow!  What a rush that was.  I am afraid of heights so expected to be qu...

With all of the conversations, conference sessions, government initiatives, and books on the topic of 21st century learning, personalized learning, etc., one would think we’d have a clear sense already about the future of learning.  I’m not sure we do though.  We truly do need to be and produce lifelong learners – I heard that term for the first time in the early 90’s and only in the past decade has it really resonated for me given the acceleration of change we are experiencing.  I was at a traditional conference with 1200 others this past Thursday and Friday and an Edcamp on Saturday, doing my lifelong learning thing.  I have recently switched to taking notes live on Twitter and find myself immersed in a 3-dimensional learning experience.  It’s a bit disorientating and mind boggling to be honest.  It’s challenging to focus in the physical session, taking relevant notes (tweeting), while engaging with other tweeters in that room and in other sessions I’m no...

Well, I’ve had quite the week.  I quit a job and accepted a new one.  For those that may not know yet, I am leaving my current role Nov. 2nd as Manager of Information Services at Coquitlam School Board (SD43) to join the Vancouver School Board (VSB) Nov. 5th as their Director of Technology and Chief Information Office (CIO).  Interestingly, I wasn’t looking for a change but the opportunity to serve in this new role became rather compelling.  I’m very excited to make this change while simultaneously experiencing a sense of loss.  After the announcement went out in SD43 about this change, emails started pouring in with shock, sadness, and congratulations.  People shared very kind words with me about the difference I’ve made for them, their schools, and the District.  It is very humbling and honoring… Shortly afterward, VSB made their announcement and emails started flowing in from folks there welcoming me to VSB.  It was an emotional roller coaste...

Does anyone else in a formal leadership position feel a little overwhelmed these days by the torrents of communication / information, time wasting meetings, and increased uncertainty for decision making?  I certainly do.  It can be paralyzing if you don’t rise above it.  Technology was supposed to make life easier, wasn’t it?  Unfortunately, our tools which are designed to improve our work flow often have the opposite effect.  Take email for instance, it can replace a lot of paper-based writing like memos, reports, and letters, and help with giving direction, sharing information, etc.  But, so many people misuse or overuse it.  You have probably crafted elegant emails with say three or four questions and then find that people respond to only one or two, or worse none or completely different questions.  This probably happened (I can’t remember) in the old days of paper memos but the speed of communication then was in days or weeks, not seconds....

I’ve been thinking a lot about our complex world lately and how our education system does or doesn’t match what we need.  There’s a lot of buzz about the need to support 21st century or personalized learning.  Although there isn’t necessary consensus on what that means or entails, my impression is that most people recognize that our world is quite different today and is rapidly changing and our education system should adapt accordingly.  Education hasn’t necessarily evolved and transformed fast enough to fully match our world’s needs.  I’ve written before about complexity ( Education for an automated future or Complexity is Everywhere ) and I am in awe of our potential.  I’m reading a couple of excellent books right now that are quite fascinating.  One is Macrowikinomics by Don Tapscott and the other The Rational Optimist by Matt Ridley (thank-you @lisarink e for loaning this one to me).  I’m 39% through Macrowikinomics on my iPad and at p. 41 o...

I was having lunch with @gary_kern recently and we talked about the difference between innovation for and adoption of technology in education.  Innovation involves creating something new, a method, a model, a thing while adoption is the implementation or use of a method, model, or thing.  Gary and I talked about what to call an innovation involving the educational use of technology.  Is it a model, a program, a project, or something else?  The question is, “what will help us take an innovation to full adoption within schools?”  Does it matter what we call it?  Will calling it something like “a program” help people more easily connect with and adopt it? When talking about an innovation, we often talk about it being transformative or causing a transformation.  For example in our School District we often refer to laptops for students in a one laptop per student configuration (embedded use of technology) as transformative to their learning.  Anot...