Wise Words:
Pam Moran6:17 AM
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"I think that the tension you describe in authority and initiative permeates professional organizations - how do we create a culture of exploration, ideation, invention AND keep the flow of work moving in a steady stream? How do people come to value gathering to think and learn together vs seeing that time as an interference to their own work? How do we accomplish "good of the order" biz w/o having it become the main thing we serve? Why should we think about these questions?
We humans are conditioned to sustain status quo in our lives. Schools have been the transmitters of order and compliance over the last century - the builders and suppliers of the factory workforce. I was in an elementary charrette yesterday where kids in multiage groups described what they wanted in their built environment - bluebird robots to welcome kids to school, tree houses on the playground for reading, a kids lounge, round tables in the cafeteria, fresh food, choices of where to play at recess, new colors in learning spaces, more time to run, picnic tables they can use, doors to the outdoors from their rooms, tables shaped like animals, sculpture in the halls, a castle with a dragon.
Kids dream together naturally when given the opportunity in school just as tribes have done forever. It's key to being human but we seem to have eradicated the flow of creating, designing, building, making from schools so that we can get everything punched in on a time clock. Yet, civilization advances from dream work - and I think schools would too if we reduced the authority work commitment and increased the initiative opportunity work commitment. Sometimes, it helps to see and hear kids work with no strings attached to their dreaming - it reminds me of what we adults have lost as we've learned to dance to the tune of the factory whistle." - Pam Moran
We humans are conditioned to sustain status quo in our lives. Schools have been the transmitters of order and compliance over the last century - the builders and suppliers of the factory workforce. I was in an elementary charrette yesterday where kids in multiage groups described what they wanted in their built environment - bluebird robots to welcome kids to school, tree houses on the playground for reading, a kids lounge, round tables in the cafeteria, fresh food, choices of where to play at recess, new colors in learning spaces, more time to run, picnic tables they can use, doors to the outdoors from their rooms, tables shaped like animals, sculpture in the halls, a castle with a dragon.
Kids dream together naturally when given the opportunity in school just as tribes have done forever. It's key to being human but we seem to have eradicated the flow of creating, designing, building, making from schools so that we can get everything punched in on a time clock. Yet, civilization advances from dream work - and I think schools would too if we reduced the authority work commitment and increased the initiative opportunity work commitment. Sometimes, it helps to see and hear kids work with no strings attached to their dreaming - it reminds me of what we adults have lost as we've learned to dance to the tune of the factory whistle." - Pam Moran
