What would it mean for ALL of our young people to feel safe and that they belong in our schools? This week, it's fantastic to have Dr Emily Meadows with us on the podcast to talk about creating spaces of belonging for everyone, but in particular for LGBTQ+ young people.

There are many myths that hold teaching back. But more than any 'trad' or 'prog' debates about pedagogy, perhaps the most powerful one is the mind-body split. This week we welcome Professor Guy Claxton to talk about his forthcoming book on the importance of 're-membering' our learning bodies and reconnecting our ideas about education!

With the recent release of her book 'Every Child Can: Riverside School's Design-Led Approach to Empower Children', the wonderful Kiran Bir Sethi is joining us again on the podcast this week.

This episode will hopefully give you a sense of where the most promising organisations in the world who are innovating around assessment are at, and what the prospects are looking forward for significant assessment change.

Kevin Simpson is one of those rare special people who thrive on connecting others And bringing people together around shared causes and visions of a different kind of education system free from injustice and discrimination.

All the talk about systems change in education is great, and a topic we cover lots on the podcast. But the current reality for many educators might feel very removed from such visions. And yet, when you get into the details of what really deep and energised inquiry looks like with curious and questioning young people in classrooms, the two worlds feel a lot closer. And there are few people that know the specifics of what great inquiry-based learning looks like in theory and practice better than Trevor Mackenzie, so it was fantastic to be able to sit down with him this week to chat about it.

Over the last decade, there has been a surge of interest in the evidence and research-backing that support choices that educators and leaders are making in schools. In an effort to prove “what works” they reach for the Cognitive and so-called learning sciences. Personally, I’ve always felt a bit uncomfortable about how narrow these discussions are, focusing only on memory, cognitive load, retrieval and other terms that will be familiar to you if you’ve been involved in these discussions. As you’ll hear in this conversation with Dr Laura Desirèe Di Paolo, our brains are not simply memory machines! In fact, our mind-brain-bodies are incredible production machines performing active inference constantly in order to make sense of and act in the world

Eric Dozier (https://www.ericdozier.com/) is not only an incredible musician and, as he calls himself, itinerant blues preacher, but also a cultural activist and anti-racism educator. 

What does it mean to help our young people understand all of the forces that have brought us to where we are, and also to take real responsibility for all of the benefits and harms that that has caused, in particular to indigenous communities around the world?

With so much talk about 'systems thinking' in education, sometimes it can become framework overload! Which one should I pick? What's the difference between them anyway?! This week, it is a huge privilege to chat to someone who has been doing this longer than most! Professor Ray Ison has been teaching systems practice for the Open University for the last 4 decades. He shares his wisdom to cut through the jargon!

This week I’m chatting with Jamilah Pitts, whose incredible work challenges us to root our educational practices in activism, healing and love. This is so that we tell the truth about the deep biases and harms that continue to persist within our societies and many of our educational settings. Jamilah’s work follows in the incredible tradition of bell hooks, Audre Lorde, James Baldwin and many others.

In this week’s conversation, with Professor Rex Li and Dr Clara Cheng, we take a wide-ranging look at how we can take inspiration and ideas from past educational projects, such as those of John Dewey and Howard Gardner, as we develop education into the future. But also learning from their experience at GT College in Hong Kong, how can we use research and inquiry themselves as practices to enable students and educators to deepen their own learning and growth as individuals, but also as part of a broader learning community.

Homa Tavangar (⁠https://homatavangar.com/⁠ ) is an incredible educator and leader. She is the co-founder of the ⁠Oneness Lab⁠ with Eric Dozier  (⁠https://www.onenesslab.com/⁠ ) where she helps schools and companies go ‘deeper than diversity,’ as well as the ⁠Big Questions Institute⁠, (⁠https://bigquestions.institute/⁠)  where, with her co-founder Will Richardson, she leads professional learning opportunities to build capacity and design the future with fearless inquiry for individuals, schools, and many other education-related organisations.

How are the knowledge and skills that we choose to teach or not teach implicated in the power structures and political histories of the places in which we live?

This week’s episode is a conversation about the importance of play and playfulness with the fantastic Dr. Jane Hession and Ronan Healy. Based on their extensive research and expertise of the Lego Serious Play method, Jane and Ronan are successfully reintroducing play to learning and work environments as an invitation to qualitatively different modes and types of experiences for teams. We also talk about the way in which play using boundary objects such as Lego, can enable inclusive learning environments. 

Professor Natalia Kucirkova⁠ is Professor of Reading and Early Childhood Development at the University of Stavanger.

⁠Yong Zhao⁠⁠ is a Foundation Distinguished Professor in the ⁠⁠School of Education at the University of Kansas⁠⁠ and a professor in Educational Leadership at the Faculty of Education, University of Melbourne in Australia. He previously served as the Presidential Chair, Associate Dean, and Director of the Institute for Global and Online Education in the College of Education, University of Oregon, where he was also a Professor in the Department of Educational Measurement, Policy, and Leadership. Prior to Oregon, Yong Zhao was University Distinguished Professor at the College of Education, Michigan State University, where he also served as the founding director of the Center for Teaching and Technology, executive director of the ⁠⁠Confucius Institute⁠⁠, as well as the US-China Center for Research on Educational Excellence. He is an elected member of the ⁠⁠National Academy of Education⁠⁠ and a fellow of the ⁠⁠International Academy of Education⁠⁠.

Alicia Juarrero, is Co-Founder and President of VectorAnalytica and Professor Emerita of Philosophy at Prince George’s Community College (MD).

Dr. Jared Cooney Horvath is an award-winning cognitive neuroscientist, best-selling author and renowned keynote speaker with an expertise in human learning, memory, and brain stimulation. 

It is increasingly clear that recruiting, developing and retaining teachers is a very real issue around the world. ⁠Dr. Rachel Lofthouse⁠ is at the forefront of thinking through how we might be able to address some of these challenges.