We have the Technology!

Since writing my previous post on building a curriculum that empowers all children to live a life of self-transcendence, I have come across three very interesting initiatives which suggest we really could be seeing a movement towards real change in the ‘what and how’ we teach our children.

The first is the exciting work being carried out by Fernando Reimers at the Harvard Graduate School of Education: http://www.gse.harvard.edu/news/uk/17/05/curriculum-changing-world. Reimers and his co-authors have produced a K-12 curriculum they hope will change the world, built on the sustainable development goals, as referenced in my last post. The team is advocating an approach that personalizes learning, builds partnerships with parents and communities, and promotes leadership to support cultures of continuous improvement and learning. Furthermore, it makes explicit the obligation of every individual to make a positive difference – beyond the criticisms of Maslow’s self-actualisation being merely ‘healthy narcissism’. The hope is that this real world curriculum will produce a generation of students and educators who understand that personal achievement and success are not enough to be happy. We are all obligated to improve our world.

The second initiative is the International Positive Education Network (IPEN): http://www.ipositive-education.net/. Their tagline “Preparing young people for a flourishing life” is certainly in-keeping with the concept of sustained happiness over a fad-like add-on to the existing, generic curriculum of pain.  Led by Sir Anthony Seldon, the aim of IPEN is “to bring together teachers, parents, academics, students, schools, colleges, universities, charities, companies and governments to promote positive education. Our goals are to support collaboration, change education practice and reform government policy.”

The third exciting movement came in the form of The Mastery Transcript Consortium: http://www.mastery.org/, which brings together a significant number of high profile and influential private schools in the US. The aim is to move away from the traditional High School Transcript and replace this anachronism with a challenging, competency-based report that higher education institutions will accept. It is certainly a challenge.

The great Tony Wagner is quoted as saying of the MTC: “This new development is a game changer. You have provided extraordinarily important leadership for an effort that could well prove to be a tipping point in the transformation of education!” Let’s hope so.

I believe the key to moving from adding wellbeing lessons to an outdated and painful curriculum, to a curriculum that truly delivers the foundation of lifelong self-transcendence for all, is curriculum reform that:

•  Prioritises the science of happiness as a core component and thread running through all areas; and 
• Offers every student a truly personalized learning pathway, not just finding different ways for students to meet common curriculum standards, but to truly peronalise the curriculum itself for every student. Forgive me for repeating these quotes, but they do go to the heart of the sea change that is needed in curriculum reform:

“To find out what one is fitted to do, and to secure an opportunity to do it, is the key to happiness.” – John Dewey

“There is a major difference when we focus on the ‘learner’, instead of the ‘learning’.  A subtle shift that needs to be made in education.” – George Couros

“We must meet the real needs of every child – not just in core subjects, but in their real aptitudes, gifts and desires.” – Tom Friedman

There are two things that stand out for me from these developments and the work we are doing across the GEMS schools today.

Firstly, the prominence and influence of those involved in the work of exploring real, practical solutions, is unprecedented. Never before have we seen influencers such as Reimers, Seldon, Wagner and those leading the MTC schools, all pushing in the same direction and with such substance to support the theory. For the first time, we are moving beyond academics and TED talks, to powerful lobbying of policy-makers for achievable transformation.

Secondly, we have the technology to help make this happen. Here at GEMS, we have been working with the visionary providers of a groundbreaking technology called Kinteract. It is not VR, AR, MR or bio-engineering. It does not 3D-print schools, brains or bionic limbs, fly, or drive itself around California, land on Mars, cure cancer, extend life, eradicate poverty and war, or do anything else that gets pulses racing and makes the headlines in the world of innovation. But it does help to produce the people who will deliver these things, and that is why we are so excited about it. This is important. Only this week, Time.com reported on Karen Arnold’s research that suggests our top performers at school are not equipped to lead or change the world. It’s powerful stuff and worth reading. The accompanying video in the article encapsulates why the work of the MTC, supported by effective technology such as Kinteract, promises to transform the curriculum and save the world.

So what, exactly, does Kinteract do?

Kinteract is an AI-driven and interactive, portfolio, assessment and reporting tool for K-12.

What makes Kinteract different?

• ·         Sophisticated AI recommendation engine to promote student agency and accelerate learning.
• ·         Beautiful progress and achievement timeline feature.
• ·         Schools and users create hashtags to personalize the learning experience.
• ·         Students can share their profiles to find and collaborate with peers who share their passions.
• ·         Makes traditional reporting to parents obsolete.
• ·         Saves teachers up to four weeks’ a year and removes the well-known pain points when teachers are focused more on writing meaningless, out of date reports that have no impact on learning, than they are on actually teaching their children.
• ·         Engages parents and students in the assessment process, through an authentic partnership and a continuous learning conversation.
• ·         Allows ‘just-in-time’ formative assessment, personalized for every student.
• ·         Empowers students to pursue, record and have recognized, their passions, achievements and mastery beyond the school curriculum – answers the question, “So, you have top grades, what else do you have?”
• ·         Fully supports the work of the MTC in providing a revolutionary new transcript model, based on challenging and personalized competencies rather than reducing every student to meaningless grades in a limited number of subject areas – Kinteract can produce this transcript. In fact, it goes further in empowering the student to personalize the portfolio.
• ·         Provides big (and small!) data on the achievements and progress of students across any number of schools or even a whole nation.

What makes Kinteract different is that it supports the initiatives outlined above and promises to help redefine the very purpose and output of our schools. Not just producing students with top grades, but also students who will follow their passions and change the world.  This is something we are very, very excited about.

Learn more about Kinteract: https://www.kinteract.co.uk/