Robert Kegan and Lisa Lahey

Robert Kegan is the William and Miriam Meehan Professor in Adult Learning and Professional Development at Harvard University. Additionally he is the Educational Chair for the Institute for Management and Leadership in Education and the Co-director for the Change Leadership Group. Kegan is a psychologist who teaches, researches, writes, and consults about adult development, adult learning, and professional development. His work explores the possibility and necessity of ongoing psychological transformation in adulthood. He is also interested in the fit between adult capacities and the hidden demands of modern life, and when there is a gap, how adults can best traverse that gap. In addition to his faculty appointment, Kegan serves as educational chair of the Institute for Management and Leadership in Education; as co-director of a joint program with the Harvard Medical School to bring principles of adult learning to the reform of medical education; and as co-director of the Change Leadership Group, a program for the training of change leadership coaches.

Lisa Lahey is associate director of the Change Leadership Group at the Graduate School of Education at Harvard and co-founder and do-director of Minds At Work. An expert in adult development and an experienced practicing psychologist and educator, she works with leaders and leadership teams in both for-profit and not-for-profit organizations. With a doctorate from Harvard in developmental psychology, she combines her expertise of individual development with a deep knowledge of organizational psychology and teamwork. Her work focuses on the interconnection between these two arenas of change, with the goal of helping teams and groups to support individuals’ development and for individuals to enable teams to perform optimally. She specializes in helping adults close the gap between their good intentions and intended results by focusing on expanding mindsets and behavior options.

Kegan and Lahey are the authors of:

Immunity to Change: How to Overcome it and Unlock Potential in Yourself and your Organization (2009)
Change Leadership: A Practical Guide to Transforming Our Schools” (2006)
How The Way We Talk Can Change the Way We Work (2001)

Immunity to Change

Immunity to Change:  How to Overcome It and Unlock the Potential in Yourself and Your Organization, published in January of 2009.


As adult learning experts, Kegan and Lahey are intrigued by why adults don't adapt to conditions that are necessary or even life enhancing. Situations that don't seems rational include the smoker who continues to smoke despite health issues, or the heart patient that refuses to change their lifestyle, or why people are so unsuccessful in changing their diet permanently?

The answer, they conclude, is that change is difficult, especially for adults who have invested many years in developing coping behaviors and underlying beliefs that actually compete with the new behavior that is needed.  In Immunity to Change Kegan and Lahey discuss the steps necessary for adults individual and teams in organizations to discover what hidden commitments keep them locked in their habitual ways of thinking and behaving, keeping them immune to change.

Successful adaptation or change for adults (individuals and whole teams) begins with discovering the hidden or competing commitments and the set of beliefs (mindset) that keeps those behaviors strongly locked in place.  Only by changing the mindset can individuals or teams make progress in adapting new behaviors.

This book is important to independent school audiences because it is a detailed and pragmatic companion work to Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol Dweck and because of the many, many schools seeking to achieve growth and adaptive change in their cultures.

Bloom's Taxonomy - Learning In Action

Benjamin S. Bloom (1913 – 1999) was an American education psychologist who is best known for his mastery learning theory. Bloom received his bachelor's and master's degrees from Penn State University and a Ph. D. in education from the University of Chicago. In addition to serving as professor at the University of Chicago, Bloom advised the ministeries of education in foreign nations like Israel and India.

His basic theory of mastery learning is that learning objectives could be organized according to their cognitive complexity. His interest was in providing teachers a tool not only for assessment but for creating successful learning sequences in their lessons.

Bloom published his taxonomy in the 50's and it has been revised many times over the years. It is interesting to note that Benjamin Bloom, never used a pyramid to illustrate his taxonomy.

Bloom's Pyramid

Now we see Bloom's in a more familiar representation, the pyramid. The idea behind learning taxonomies or classifications systems is that there is a hierarchical ladder of learning processes that one proceeds through. Higher order thinking would be those cognitive processes near the top of the pyramid which theoretically require base level knowledge and understanding. In Bloom's taxonomy, for example, skills involving analysis, evaluation and synthesis (creation of new knowledge) are thought to be of a higher order, requiring different learning and teaching methods, than the learning of facts and concepts.

Another Visual Bloom's

This is another visual representation of Bloom's found on the wikispace Edorigami. Andrew Churches is the organizer of this wiki and can tell you an amazing amount of information about Bloom's then and now. The advantage of looking at Bloom's in this way is the idea that learning can begin at any point and that knowledge, skills, and affectation (mindset) all work together. Don't let the more complicated and less controlled nature of this visual be off-putting.

Bloom's Taxonomy - Basic Review

This video provides a basic overview of Bloom's taxonomy and its laddered stages. The guy is Dave Knopp and he is director of assessment and evaluation somewhere.

Bloom's Taxonomy - Basic Review Part 2

Dave Knopp with Part 2 of Bloom's review. This video focuses on the words to use when creating assessments.

Bloom's Taxonomy - Basic Review Part 3

Dave again, with part 3 of basic review of Bloom's taxonomy. At this point, I would call this a thorough review! Thank you, Dave!

Bloom's Modified

And, then people started messing with Bloom's, updating it for the way we teach and the way we learn now. This is a pretty good video, make in the Commoncraft style. Interesting that this guy (an English teacher) just decided to make this video. He has had over 5300 views. Pretty good!

Bloom's modified Part 2

In this video, writing is the top and the guy shows how to use What, Why, How to teach paragraph writing.

Bloom's 1990's

During the 1990's, Lorin Anderson worked with David Krathwohl to reconsider Bloom's Taxonomy. They published the Revised Taxonomy (pictured above) in 2001.

As is easy to notice, the major revision, as simple as it may seem, is the use of verbs rather than nouns for each of the levels. The other huge difference is a new understanding of the sequence and work accomplished in the levels. Here is a comparison:

Original Bloom's Revised Bloom's (from lowest order to highest)
Knowledge Remembering
Comprehension Understanding
Application Applying
Analysis Analyzing
Synthesis Evaluating
Evaluation Creating

It is interesting to note that Creating became the highest order thinking domain in the revised Bloom's.

Activities with the Domains

There are many ways to learn and assess mastery in each of the Bloom's domains. What Bloom's (old and new) tries to capture is the learning process, creating understanding about how we learn.

Reasoning through the sequence, learning basically happens like this:

Before we can understand a concept, we have to remember it.

Before we can apply the concept, we must understand it.

Before we analyze a concept, we must be able to apply it.

Before we can evaluate its importance or impact, we must have shown proficiency in application.

Before we can create, making our own use of the concept, we must have remembered, understood, applied, analyzed, and evaluated the concept.

Creating is the highest order of thinking and learning mastery.

The process is one of basic knowledge acquisition, deepening understanding, new knowledge creation.

Student Voices

Bloom's 3.0

Obviously the reconsideration and redefinition of Bloom's that occurred in the 1990's did not include the huge advances in technology and the social revolution of collaboration that we have witnessed to date. Not to worry, Mike Fisher of DigiGogy has revisioned Bloom's once again.
DigiGogy is his blog about teaching with the new digital tools.

The question that this visual suggests is how are we using the free, digital tools at our disposal, to lead our students through knowledge acquisition, deepening understanding, and creating?

21st Century Pedagogy

Greg Whitby is an Austrailian educator and is one of the foremost voices of what challenges and opportunities the 21st century is presenting. He is the Executive Director of Schools in the Catholic Diocese of Parramatta, NSW.

In 2007, Whitby was named as the most innovative and creative educator in Australia by the Bulletin Magazine in its annual Smart 100 Awards. In the same year, he received a Presidential Citation from the Australian Council for Educational Leaders of which he has been a Fellow since 2002. Whitby was also made an Apple Distinguished Educator "for his contribution to the implementation of Learning Technologies in Education".

Classroom 2.0

Classroom 2.0 is a great, easy, free resource for teachers wanting to learn about integration of technology and collaboration into the classroom and curriculum. They have interested speakers and guest in their forums. There events are in the early evening and on Saturday mornings.

David Perkins Bio

David Perkins earned his Ph.D. in mathematics and artificial intelligence from MIT in 1970. He is currently a senior professor of education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. He is also senior co-director of of the educational research group, Project Zero.

Perkins researches and writes about teaching for thinking and meaningful learning. His books deal with learning for students in and out of the classroom, for teachers, and for institutions interesting in harnessing the power of their collective knowledge. One of Perkins' impact goals is to facilitate personal and organizational understanding and intelligence. His work reflects a theory of mind that emphasizes the interwoven relationship among thinking, learning, and understanding. The three are dependent upon one another. Meaningful learning leads to understanding and depends on thinking with and about what one is learning. In order words, thinking about what and how you are thinking is important to learning and understanding.

Perkins' titles include:

The Mind's Best Work (1981) a look at the psychology of creativity
The Teaching of Thinking (1985) with Raymond Nickerson and Edmond Smith
Knowledge as Design (1986) about meaningful instruction design
Teaching Thinking: Issue and Approaches (1989) a practicioner's guide
Block: Getting Out of Your Own Way (1990) the psychology of counterintuitive behavior
Smart Schools: From Training Memories to Educating Minds (1992) a new vision of schooling
Inventive Minds (1992) a collection of articles about inventiveness
The Intelligent Eye (1994) learning to think by looking at art
The Thinking Classroom (1995) developing a culture of thinking
Software Goes to School (1995) role of technology in education
Outsmarting IQ (1995) how to grow your intelligence
The Eureka Effect (2000) an investigation and guide to breakthrough thinking
King Arthur's Round Table (2003) how collaborative conversations create smarts
Learning at Work (2005) about leading learning in the workplace
Making Learning Whole (2009) teaching for understanding and engagement

Edutopia's Intro to Project-based Learning

This is a short and nice video that explains the difference between project-based learning and curriculum learning. This website has a lot of information and resources about project-based learning and experiential learning.

Making Learning Whole

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Using his memories and love of playing baseball as a kid, David Perkins, co-director of Harvard's Project Zero, describes how teaching all subjects at all levels can be made more effective through teaching the "whole game." Perkins presents the 7 principles of teaching the whole game. Here are the main ideas of the book:

1. "Play the Whole Game" explains how complete treatments of even more complex subjects can be presented in junior versions.
2. "Make the Game Worth Playing" understanding the whole game makes the game worth playing because students get the point of why they need to know what they're learning.
3. "Work on the Hard Parts" shows how teaching the whole game reveals gaps in knowledge that can then be addressed and focused on.
   
4. "Play Out of Town" challenges learners by taking them out of their comfort zones in a subject. Train them to be able to transfer their learning to related subjects.
5. "Find the Hidden Game" goes beyond the obvious to teach the rules, tricks, and strategies that are often hidden to students, but essential in the real world.
6. "Learn from the Team" encourages students to communicate and work with one another to improve learning, even in areas where collaboration is does not come naturally.
7. "Learn the Game of Learning" makes sure students are taught and given practice in how to learn. Help them become self-managed learners who will continue to learn even when you the teacher are gone.
   

The principles are universals of learning, applicable to any age from kindergarten through college.

Making Thinking Visible

One of the biggest evolutions in teaching and learning since we have found ourselves in the knowledge age where information is easily accessible with a click is that the goals for learning are more about thinking than knowing. Knowing content is essential. Each domain still has certain foundational knowledge from which all else flows, however knowing is not enough. Thinking, problem-solving, and working through problems collectively are critical learning goals.

Helping students develop rigorous thinking and analytical abilities as they learn domain knowledge is the goal of "Making Thinking Visible" and "Making Learning Whole." Much of these thinking routines can be accomplished in collaborative learning with teams and with project-based learning.

From Making Thinking Visible by Ron Ritchhart and David Perkins (February 2008) in Educational Leadership

Six key principles of Visible Thinking:

1. Learning is a consequence of thinking. Students understand and remember content better when they think through it. Teaming allows learners to build and share knowledge with each other.

2. Good thinking is part skill and part attitude. It is essential to develop and foster open-mindedness, curiosity, attention and observation skills, imagination, inventiveness, and growth mindsets.

3. The development of thinking is a social endeavor. We learn best from those around us and our engagement with them. Social interaction in classrooms should be all the time, not sporadic.

4. Fostering thinking requires making thinking visible. Externalizing and documenting our thoughts in various ways helps us become aware of our thinking and how to make it grow.

5. Classroom culture sets the tone for learning and shapes what is learned. Depending on their form, these forces can support or undermine the rhythm of thoughtful learning:

(1) classroom routines and structures for learning
(2) language and conversational patterns
(3) implicit and explicit expectations
(4) time allocation
(5) modeling by teachers and others
(6) the physical environment
(7) relationships and patterns of interaction
(8) the creation of opportunities.

6. Schools must be culture of thinking for teachers. Instruction can only improve as teachers learn and develop. Administrators need to value, create, and preserve time for teachers to discuss teaching and learning, grounded in observation of student work.

How do we fostering thinking about thinking in our work across the grades?
What would we like to explore to evolve our practice?
What might be the pros and cons of adopting more thinking routines in our teaching?

Why Teach with Project Learning?

reprinted from Edutopia

Why Teach with Project Learning?

Project learning, also known as project-based learning, is a dynamic approach to teaching in which students explore real-world problems and challenges, simultaneously developing cross-curriculum skills while working in small collaborative groups.

Because project learning is filled with active and engaged learning, it inspires students to obtain a deeper knowledge of the subjects they're studying. Research also indicates that students are more likely to retain the knowledge gained through this approach far more readily than through traditional textbook-centered learning. In addition, students develop confidence and self-direction as they move through both team-based and independent work.

In the process of completing their projects, students also hone their organizational and research skills, develop better communication with their peers and adults, and often work within their community while seeing the positive effect of their work.

Because students are evaluated on the basis of their projects, rather than on the comparatively narrow rubrics defined by exams, essays, and written reports, assessment of project-based work is often more meaningful to them. They quickly see how academic work can connect to real-life issues -- and may even be inspired to pursue a career or engage in activism that relates to the project they developed.

Students also thrive on the greater flexibility of project learning. In addition to participating in traditional assessment, they might be evaluated on presentations to a community audience they have assiduously prepared for, informative tours of a local historical site based on their recently acquired expertise, or screening of a scripted film they have painstakingly produced.

Project learning is also an effective way to integrate technology into the curriculum. A typical project can easily accommodate computers and the Internet, as well as interactive whiteboards, global-positioning-system (GPS) devices, digital still cameras, video cameras, and associated editing equipment.

Adopting a project-learning approach in your classroom or school can invigorate your learning environment, energizing the curriculum with a real-world relevance and sparking students' desire to explore, investigate, and understand their world. Return to our Project Learning page to learn more.

This article originally published on 2/28/2008

Think-Puzzle-Explore

Here are the questions that would be used to guide students through the think-puzzle-explore thinking routine.

What do we think we know about this situation?

press the student: What makes you think that?

This first stage is like KWL except one major difference - conditional language: What do we think we know, (but it might not be correct?) This encourages students to offer tentative ideas and personal thoughts and to remain open to inquiry and discovery. Teacher respects the process of student generated ideas and inquiry, pressing for deeper thinking.

What are you puzzling over? More active and engaging than what would you like to know. Invites personal thinking and problem-solving than just stockpiling facts.

How might we solve our puzzles? What means and methods might we use? How might we work together?

goal: to make classroom inquiry more learning oriented than work oriented.

Introduction to Learning by Doing

This is a 10 minutes video that highlights real students working in teams to think about real world projects, studying everything from worms to robots. The main advantages to this type of learning is that kids retain more of what they are actually able to to, skills such as research and communication skills are easily embedded in the learning, and kids have a voice in what they are learning out. The excitement about learning is very noticeable.

In the middle part of the video, MIT mathemetician talks about the first step to transforming our practice to learning by doing is giving up the idea of a staid and set curriculum and exchange it for pushing and challenging student to think and tackle real work challenges in real time. Learning becomes less controlled and more expansive and creative. Students become managers of their own learning. Students learn knowledge by using it.

Visible Thinking Core Routines

This site offers a detailed explanation of the core thinking routines:

ore Routines

The core routines are a set of seven or so routines that target different types of thinking from across the modules. These routines are easy to get started with and are commonly found in Visible Thinking teachers' toolkits. Try getting started with with one of these routines.

What Makes You Say That? Interpretation with justification routine

Think Puzzle Explore A routine that sets the stage for deeper inquiry

Think Pair Share A routine for active reasoning and explanation

Circle of Viewpoints A routine for exploring diverse perspectives

I used to Think... Now I think... A routine for reflecting on how and why our thinking has changed

See Think Wonder A routine for exploring works of art and other
interesting things

Compass Points A routine for examining propositions

Learning in Today's World

Marco Torres is a leading voice in creating engaging and technology rich learning experiences for kids. This video interview students, mostly high school age, about how realistic projects that empower them get them really excited and interested in learning.