After six years circling the world as THINK Global School's Head of School, Jamie Steckart intends to return to his native Wisconsin for the foreseeable future. He plans on spending that time with his wife Angie and their three children: Charlotte, Finn, and Piper. "My family has been living abroad for over eight years now, and it's been nine years for myself. In that time, I have made many new...
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Yep - checking in again from 12,000 metres above, well, where am I at the moment...above the North Pole, I believe. I just woke up from the most peaceful nap and while this may not be earth-shaking news to our blog readership, it was by far the best sleep I've had in the past month. When I woke up I was flooded with memories of this trip. As Johnny Cash...
Read MoreJust as the bridges of Stockholm link together the people of its 14 islands, so does technology represent the thread that connects all of us on this planet. When I was in high school, I hardly knew how to send an email and the only room in the school that had computers was the computer lab - a stuffy, dusty room in the basement filled with humming machines that were...
Read MoreI heard some expatriate kids the other day say that they should "bounce." I mention that I wasn't on US or Canadian soil as I'm not sure that "bounce" is a perfectly current term, though it very well may be. I don't seem to bounce terribly high or long in the world of contemporary teenage slang, refusing to lose the thread of the right term long past its expiry date....
Read MoreFor years I believed that we were all united by commonalities. That the fact the we all endeavoured to eat three times a day and have certain nice things and basic necessities were uniting factors (and that, as a consequence, we could latch on to these things and be brought together). But I soon realized that what drew me to people as I have traveled the world over the years...
Read MoreWhen you’re involved in a new venture of any kind, one of the most important elements of your work is to “spread the word”. Those of us closely involved in transforming THINK Global School from the vision of its founder, Joann McPike, to a fully-realized school have, therefore, been very diligent in sharing information about TGS in a variety of ways: website; meetings with educational, technological, and service organizations; newspaper...
Read MoreOne of my happiest reflections since we launched THINK Global School, is that both great schools and great ideas are fuelled by great coffee. I have been a fan of amazing coffee (and have stayed away from bad coffee) for as long as I can remember. I'm actually 6'9". It's only a thirty year love affair with coffee that has stunted my growth to a modest 5'10" and ended my...
Read MoreOne of the great points of intersection between education and entrepreneurship is that you sometimes don't know that you're looking for something until it's staring at you in the face. The really elusive solution may have been elusive because it didn't dawn on us to focus our view close up. We at THINK Global School were invited last week to take part in the @elemenous Future of Education Global Awareness Panel....
Read MoreI read a very good and well-received piece written by Leo Babahuta tonight. The argument really grabbed me - until the solution: "unschooling." I loved the assertion that creativity is alive in children. The concept of teachers as facilitators grabs me every time I read it and write about it myself. And the discussion of the workplace of tomorrow being so very different is something we've written about extensively here...
Read MoreIn designing the academic program for THINK Global School, I have been thinking a great deal about curriculum lately. Curriculum – the collection of courses studied at a school, or the collection of courses studied during one’s career as a student. Curriculum Development is the creation of such collections of courses. My job with Mosaic Curriculum Consulting is to create such course collections to express the mission and vision of...
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