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barriers to change
John Abbott Challenges Faulty Assumptions About Kids
Posted January 28th, 2008 by carrieannJohn Abbott speaks about the fact that children are innately inquisitive and insists that schools need to capitalize on this fact.
Featured in this video:
John Abbott is the President of the 21st Century Learning Initiative, an initiative to facilitate the emergence of new approaches to learning in the United Kingdom.
-Charles Ungerleider
Posted January 18th, 2008 by mlayChanges that occur within an institution are least likely to come form those who occupy the most powerful positions. In fact, most changes come from persons who are regarded as deviant or marginal, people who embody countercultural values.
why hasn't anything changed?
Changing large systems is difficult. When you grow up and succeed within the traditional system, it’s hard to see what’s wrong and it’s even harder to imagine that we can do it any other way. Perhaps we have also failed to recognize that what happens to our children affects us all.
Education is Inside Out, Upside Down: John Abbott Speaks
Posted December 19th, 2007 by carrieannJohn Abbott speaks about how schools have it wrong.
Featured in this video:
John Abbott is the President of the 21st Century Learning Initiative, an initiative to facilitate the emergence of new approaches to learning in the United Kingdom.
The changelearning website project emerged from the collaboration of John Abbott and Heather MacTaggart, the Executive Director of Classroom Connections, a Canadian non-profit educational organization dedicated to optimizing student learning.
The Need for Change
Over 40 billion dollars a year is spent in Canada getting our children from Kindergarten to Grade 12,[i], yet over 40% of our youth fail to meet expected performance levels for basic subjects[ii] and almost one quarter of our children fail to graduate with their peers.[iii]. Students are disengaging grade by grade[iv], a trend illustrated by their increasing dislike for school[v], declining academic achievement[vi] and rising rates of teenage depression[vii] and suicide[viii]. Contrary to Canada’s most fundamental democratic tenets, minority and low-income children are the hardest hit[ix].
what's the problem?
Problems in education can be seen in a variety of symptoms in our youth and in our society. How did we get here and why is it so hard to change?
