Coconut Thinking

How is place an emergent, relational experience, rather than a fixed location?In this special episode, Charlotte and Benjamin speak alongside the sounds of Paris to create a conversation that includes the city. We come to Europe every couple of years to visit family, and this year we will also drop my son off to university. We recorded this episode in raw form, so we can be immersed in experience. We discuss: 🥥 How place creates the conditions for agency to emerge; 🥥 How learning experiences might be designed with emergence in mind, that is, with enabling constraints that nurture inquiry and the unexpected, without giving way to "anything goes;"🥥 Specific examples of learner projects that have contributed to life and led to deeper learning (and yes, outcomes).Come be part of this conversation that is alive with the city. When we listen to the stories around us, we appreciate that Nature is everywhere because we are Nature.

How might we commit to change in order to create conditions for deeper learning and put students first?In this episode, I speak with Kyle Wagner. Kyle is an education consultant and founder of Transform Educational Consulting (TEC). He specializes in empowering schools to create socially, emotionally, and globally aware citizens through project-based learning. With over 20 years of experience, Kyle has worked with numerous schools worldwide, helping design more than 500 learning experiences. He previously served as the coordinator for Futures Academy at the International School of Beijing and as a project-based learning leader at High Tech High. Kyle is the author of "The Power of Simple," which provides strategies for school transformation. We discuss:🥥 How changes in the physical environment can augment or constrain deeper learning; 🥥 How artifacts of learning are touch points in journeys of learning rather than ends in themselves;🥥 How no matter where you are, or think you are, you can make a shift toward more student-centered learning. Check us out www.coconut-thinking.comAnd look Kyle up on https://transformschool.com/

How might regenerative travel teach us about reciprocity, contributing to a different approach to education?In this episode I speak with David Leventhal and Ximena Rodrigues of Playa Viva.  Playa Viva is a B-Corp certified brand that leverages hospitality to bring capital to work to improve ecosystems, for people and planet, to create vibrant, resilient, healthy and profitable systems for all participants. It takes a "slow money" committed investment and runs entirely off-grid. Playa Viva works extensively with its local community to support health and education. David Leventhal is its Founder. He is a regenerative (social and environmental) impact entrepreneur and investor. Regeneration principles have guided much of his work including the founding of Regenerative Travel and Regenerative Resorts to support similar independent hotel owners around the world. Ximena Rodriguez is the ReSiMar Regenerative Education Coordinator. Sher works closely with the local community to develop citizenship through education, working alongside guests at Playa Viva. We discuss: 🥥 How travel is an exchange of discovery between peoples coming from two different places;🥥 How we are not the principle characters of the story, but rather participants here and in this moment;🥥 How travel is not reward for working, it is education for living... which has a parallel to schools.Check us out www.coconut-thinking.comAnd look up Playa Viva: www.playaviva.com

What if we decided to do things differently?I speak with Clover Hogan. Clover is a 24-year-old climate activist and the founding Executive Director of Force of Nature - the youth non-profit turning climate anxiety into action. She has worked alongside the world’s leading authorities on sustainability, consulted within the boardrooms of Fortune 50 companies, and counseled heads of state. Clover has spoken alongside Jane Goodall and Vandana Shiva, and interviewed the 14th Dalai Lama. Her TED talk, 'What to do when climate change feels unstoppable', has been viewed over 2 million times. At 22 she was recognized on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list, and has featured in countless media outlets. And she is a Green School Bali graduate! We discuss: 🥥 How the real problem isn't that youth is climate anxious, it's that people in power are not;🥥 How Departments of Defense might consider defending our rivers, mountains, forests, and air—where preserving the peace becomes about climate;🥥 How social justice and climate justice are the indissociable, and how transforming education has to take this into account.Check out our website: www.coconut-thinking.com

How might our stories be as unique as the place from which they unfold?In this episode, I speak with Jenny Andersson. Jenny is the founder of The Really Regenerative Centre. She works as a strategist, facilitator and educator, supporting organizations and communities to create visions for the future they want – together – and to find the energy, will and approaches to sustain long-term change. She also leads the cohort Power of Place, which is collective learning  journey in regenerative placemaking. The aim of the course is to provide a living systems and regenerative thinking approach to how we design our places so that they can become places in which humans can fulfill their potential and true roles and all life thrives in harmony – so that the places that are precious to us become Places For Life. We discuss:🥥 How place provides an entry point into understanding the enormous complexities of systems and the dynamic relationships within them;🥥 How understanding your bioregion is critical to education because it connects us to place, but also appreciates the uniqueness of every system and our place [within/as] it;🥥 The nestedness of all things, or rather, the rhizomatic relationships that we have with all aspects of society and life.Check us out www. coconut-thinking.com

How might we re-think higher education to be about our ability to discern the world and take action, not the diplomas we receive?I speak with Ronald Barnett. Ron has spent a lifetime in higher education as a scholar, institutional leader and manager, researcher, and writer. He is recognized as having introduced and developed the philosophy of higher education as a field in its own right (and he is the President of the recently established Philosophy and Theory of Higher Education Society, and co-editor of two major book series. Since 1990, he has been on the staff of the Education Faculty of University College London, where he is now an Emeritus Professor. Over the years, Ron has written and edited more than 35 books and over 150 papers has been cited in the literature over 25,000 times. There are about 3 million words of his in the public domain. He continues to act as a consultant to individual universities around the world on higher education matters, and also with his work in examining, reviewing, editing, and mentoring. We discuss:🥥 Higher education as a process, not an institution;🥥 The conspiracy that involves all stakeholders in grade inflation and the degradation of standards;🥥 Ethics as the platform from which the critical thinker seeks to make the world a better place.Check us out on www.coconut-thinking.com

Jennifer D. Klein, an expert in global education, and Jill Ackers-Clayton discuss rewilding learning spaces, trusting observations over grades, and embodying teaching practices. They emphasize the importance of flexible, collaborative environments that support project-based learning and cultural inclusivity.

How might we come together around a WHY rather than a HOW? Might the HOW sort itself out if we share purpose?In this episode, I speak with Kevin Bartlett. Kevin is the Founder of the Common Ground Collaborative. He has held leadership positions in the UK, Tanzania, Namibia, Austria, and Belgium, where he was most recently Director of the International School of Brussels from 2001-2015. Kevin has co-designed accreditation systems for the European Council of International Schools (ECIS), the Council of International Schools (CIS) and the New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC) and is currently engaged with a small team developing ACE, an innovative new accreditation protocol for NEASC. He is a writer and trainer in the field of curriculum design and leadership for learning for the Principals’ Training Center. As a curriculum designer, he was the initiator and early leader of the IB Primary Years Programme. We discuss:🥥 How we might challenge schools to describe what they're doing as a process, in order to avoid getting stuck in outcomes;🥥 How conceptual transfer opens up spaces for learning and action, how goes beyond the the here and now to make a difference in now and then.🥥 How feeling inspires action, not academics; feeling is what connects us, not cognitive understanding (though that can nourish feeling).Check us out: www.coconut-thinking.com

How might AI create both utopian and dystopian futures all at the same time? What does this mean for education and for learning?In this episode, I speak with Darren Coxon. Darren is Founder of CoxonAI, a worldwide strategic advisory specialising in K-12 AI implementation. An educator for 25 years, Darren has most recently managed the operation of schools’ groups, notably Brighton College’s international schools, Forfar Education, and Britus Education, Bahrain, where he was COO. Darren has been at the forefront of educational technology for many years, including leading the first 6th form college in the UK to move to an iPad 1:1 model. He is now a major thought leader on AI in education, has delivered training for COBIS and the National College, as well as more recently delivering keynotes and workshops for HMC, GESS Dubai, and the Cottesmore AI Festival. We discuss:🥥 How generative AI is only the beginning, yet there is nothing new in how we use technology to enhance ourselves, our learning, and our abilities;🥥 The connections between AI and our response to ecological breakdown... maybe this is also an opportunity to connect non-virtually;🥥 How we might prepare learners, no matter their age, to be useful, not in an extractive way, but rather one that helps all life thrive, and this is the re-purposing of schools.Check us out: www.coconut-thinking.com.

How might we free ourselves from the bondage of data to tell different stories of learning?In this episode, I speak with David Penberg, Ph.D. David is an urban and international educator, teacher and writer with 40 years of experience. His work is place-based and intergenerational. He supports communities seeking to become more vital, joyous and integrated places of learning. He has held leadership and teaching roles in non-profits, community-based organizations, independent, international and charter schools, and in higher education. His love for learning and interest in people are rooted in a belief in agency and democratic practices. We discuss:🥥 How intentionality can lead to greater well-being and deeper learning;🥥 How to amplify stories of care, ones that connect and inspire us;🥥 How schools can find their place within the community, as places of learning for all generations.Check us out www.coconut-thinking.com