I still remember the day. I was in my first year of teaching and I sat there holding my printed lesson plan. This was supposed to be my greatest lesson of the school year. I had planned it for hours, revising various aspects of it…
The LAUNCH Cycle: A K-12 Design Thinking Framework The term “design thinking” is often attached to maker spaces and STEM labs. However, design thinking is bigger than STEM. It begins with the premise of tapping into student curiosity and allowing them to create, test and…
Lorem amet elit libero sit ipsum hendrerit libero sit consectetur lorem lorem link The LAUNCH Cycle Visuals from the Blog Ridiculous Education Puns
When I go home, I’m no longer a dad. I transform into a sidekick to the world’s coolest superhero. I become a nurse to a stuffed animal surgeon. I get to help an architect and a builder in forts made from couch cushions. I become…
My goal is simple. I want to make something new each day. Sometimes, I make stuff. Sometimes, I make a difference. On a good day, I get to do both. I often use design thinking as a framework for my creative work. If you’re interested in any…
When I was a kid, my brother and I built a “roller coaster” in the backyard with a wagon, some scraps of wood, and tons of pipes. Was it safe? Probably not. Did it ever work properly? Not really. But it didn’t matter. We were…
Toward the end of the year, I remember feeling absolutely exhausted as a teacher. Once the testing is over and the pressure is gone, there’s this sense of relief. However, this was nothing compared to what my eighth graders experienced. You could see it in…
Note: I’m sure my thoughts on this topic have been heavily influenced by Dean Shareski. If you don’t read his blog, go check it out. For the last four days, I have been back at home with my family. We have had deep conversations….
“Hey dad, can I have a YouTube channel?” my son asked.”What kind of a channel would you create?” I asked.”Maybe a channel showing how to create things in Minecraft. But there’s already a lot out there. What if I had a channel showing kids how…
When I was a kid, I remember hearing that computers would replace teachers. I didn’t like this idea, unless they could guarantee that my teacher would be like Data on Star Trek: The Next Generation. However, technologists promised us that computers would radically transform our…
