I believe that peer feedback is critical for students. Part of this is the nature of peer interactions. Peers are often able to share their thoughts in a more relatable way than teachers. Another part is simply the time limits that teachers have. Even with…
Initially, I cringed at the term marketing. I viewed myself as an artist who thought that my work would be discovered. I viewed marketing as trickery. However, over time, I realized that if the initial goal of the design thinking cycle involved solving a problem…
Over the last three years, I have realized that there were key things I want to learn more about. The first topic was business. Although I didn’t see it this way at first, I quickly realized that as we launched a blogging platform, we were…
I sit in front of the computer, staring at the screen. I have a general syllabus with little more than standards and goals. The university is giving me a crazy amount of freedom to design this online course. I shake my head, unsure of what…
Last April, I had the opportunity to deliver a TEDx Talk in Pennsylvania. Here’s the talk: There’s a deeply cultural idea that freedom and opportunity are the key ingredients to creativity. We use terms like “think outside the box” to describe the wild ones who…
Over the last few weeks, I’ve enjoyed experimenting with illustrated videos. Here are three of my examples: One of the questions people ask is, “How did you make these?” This is often followed up by a second question, “How long did it take?” That…
For the last eleven years, I asked my students to fill out a survey about how they use technology. Although I am now teaching university students, I think I’m going to do a similar survey. The questions are both about technology use (have you ever…
Subscribe to YouTube Channel Here’s the transcript of the video: It was about eight years ago when the alarm woke me up at 3 in the morning. Except, it wasn’t an alarm. It was a newborn baby and I couldn’t calm him down. I remember…
It’s easy to bust on standardized tests. They suck. They’re boring. They’re virtually meaningless. They kill instructional time. But what’s the alternative? If we’re not using multiple choice tests, what are we using? If we want a more creative classroom, what types of assessments exist…
I have noticed that students often hate the revision phase. In the design thinking cycle, they go from research to ideation and building a prototype. It seems cool. They’re excited about what they made. But then when we switch to testing and revising, they get…