Social Innovation Mapping: Entrepreneurial Patterns for the Future of Learning

ENTREPRENEURIAL PATTERNS FOR THE FUTURE OF LEARNING SOCIAL INNOVATION MAPPING WORKING PAPER - AUGUST 2014

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FOREWORD The following report is an invitation to join Ashoka and the LEGO Foundation in building a network to Re-imagine Learning. Based on the work of leading social-entrepreneurs, the report highlights eight common innovation patterns utilized across seventeen countries around the world, and tells the stories of how these social entrepreneurs are creating widespread impact through these shared approaches, even in disparate contexts.

With the launch of the online challenge to Reimagine Learning, we then asked every participant to identify which pattern their work most aligns with, and posed additional questions to deepen our understanding of the network and its approaches.

Over 630 idea responded to the challenge, representing impact in over 70 countries. While every participant is welcomed as an essential part of the #Play2Learn network, practitioners helped in identifying which ideas would gain additional distinction as either Pacesetters (top 325), Pioneers (top 30) or Champions (top 10).

The Social Innovation Mapping report has been updated to include a listing of the ideas that came across the strongest: the 10 Challenge Champions, along with the 8 newly-minted Ashoka Fellows (see page 16 and appendix a). An epilogue includes what we learned about the #Play2Learn network from looking at the data across all participants, along with initial ideas for growing the impact of the network.

All responses, along with interactive data trends are openly available on changemakers.com/play2learn.

We know, however, that not all solutions and insights that are critical to transforming learning are represented here. If you’re designing environments where kids and adults are learning through play, whether at home, in a classroom or on a playground, we want to hear from you: what’s missing from this innovation mapping and from the Re-imagine Learning network? What does this report get right, and what needs to be better understood in order to change the way the world learns?

Help us map the landscape of innovation in education and build a global network of parents, educators, researchers, administrators, and social entrepreneurs. Connect with us online at Changemakers.com/play2learn or via e-mail at rrahman@ashoka.org.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction

Design Principles in Focus

Page 04

1.

Everyone an imagineer: Equip Adults to Drive Change in Learning.

Page 32

2.

A world of possibilities: Actively Design Space & Culture as Essential Elements for Learning.

Page 35

3.

Better together: Create Peer Support Networks for All Stakeholders in Education.

Page 36

4.

Wired for learning: Put Children in Charge.

Page 39

About Ashoka’s Social

Innovation Mapping Page 08

Patterns In Social Innovation

Re-envisioning what is possible: guiding Design Principles and Barriers tackled Page 12

Epilogue

Barriers Tackled A. “Whole child” development is undervalued.

Page 20 B. One-size-fits-all fits none: Students are disengaged and not being prepared for real life.

Page 23

What We Learned after the Reimagine Learning Challenge Launched Page 42

C. Not enough capacity to re-imagine and restructure educational settings.

Page 26 D. Lack of structures to facilitate meaningful community ownership in learning process.

Page 29

APPENDIX A: Index of Social Entrepreneurs

Page 48

APPENDIX C: References

Page 50

APPENDIX B: 2014 Re-imagining Learning Challenge Data Analysis

Page 49

APPENDIX D: Acknowledgements

Page 54

List of Figures Figure 1: Geographic Spread of Education & Learning Fellows Page 05

Figure 2: Ashoka Fellows’ Selection Criteria Page 05

Figure 3: Social Innovation Mapping: 3 Key Components Page 09

Figure 4: Pattern Recognition Methodology Page 11

Figure 5: Social Innovation Map: The Future of Transforming Learning Page 16

Figure 6: Pattern Recognition Methodology 2 Page 17

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INTRODUCTION

Consider two striking facts about the world that we live in: first, it is changing more rapidly1 than ever before, requiring young people to be equipped with the problem-solving, critical thinking, empathetic2, and creative skills they need to adapt quickly to changing workplaces and societies. Second, the average strength of creative thinking among children is decreasing over time3.Divergent thinking, in particular, is dropping rapidly after the age of five4. This decline is happening despite creativity being an essential ingredient5 for ensuring children are prepared to thrive and lead as the innovators of tomorrow. As education innovation expert Ken Robinson 6 aptly notes, “we don’t grow into creativity, we grow out of it. Or rather, we get educated out if it; we are educating people out of their creative capacities.”

With these issues in mind, the following Social Innovation Mapping is centered on identifying solutions that tackle the following framing question:

HOW CAN PLAY TRANSFORM LEARNING TO EMPOWER A GENERATION OF CREATIVE AND ENGAGED LIFELONG LEARNERS? 4

Figure 2

Thus, this analysis focuses on patterns across social innovations that: •

• •

•

include play, fun, and creativity as essential ingredients for more engaged learning; solutions analyzed are not necessarily limited to explicit mentions of “play” but do represent an expanded definition of learning through play. focus on transforming learning rather than education only because solutions may stem from a broad range of education movements and need not be limited to the school day alone. empower this generation of children as young people, recognizing the vital importance of not viewing youth as disempowered children, but as people that are capable of remarkable achievements, no matter how young they are. are intent on preparing young people as lifelong learners, recognizing that the goal of transforming learning is not only so that children get better grades or are more likely to be employed, but also so that young people are equipped with the skills and experiences needed to thrive and make a difference throughout their lives.

Using this framing question as a focal point for finding cross-cutting insights, we sifted through 429 Ashoka Fellows who were identified as having a focus on learning and education from 60 countries. Of these, a further 23 were selected to provide an international, diverse sample of approaches that are dedicated to transforming learning and utilizing fun, play, and creativity as essential ingredients for engaging children and youth. The sub-set chosen for analysis represents a diverse sample of solutions, with impact in more than 17 countries on five continents, and some solutions being replicated internationally.

Figure 1

GEOGRAPHIC SPREAD OF EDUCATION & LEARNING FELLOWS (429)

SELECTION OF ASHOKA FELLOWS Ashoka is the world’s largest association of leading social entrepreneurs, with over 3,000 Fellows worldwide. After reviewing an initial pool of over 10,000 candidates annually, Ashoka elects approximately 150-200 of the most promising candidates as Ashoka Fellows. In order to be elected a Fellow, each candidate undergoes an extensive interview process with Ashoka leadership and global sector experts. Each Ashoka Fellow must meet the following five criteria: 1. New Idea: The work of a Fellow must be genuinely unique, with the potential to cause disruptive systems change.

2. Social Impact: A Fellow’s idea must have clear social impact on a national, regional, or even global scale.

It must address the deep, systemic problems facing society.

3. Creativity: A Fellow must creatively approach a situation, devise unique solutions to overcome obstacles, and build networks and partnerships for success.

4. Entrepreneurial Quality: A Fellow must be passionate and dedicated to his work. He or she will not rest until the social problem is completely resolved.

5. Ethical Fiber: A Fellow must act ethically, and have a high level of integrity and commitment to the social cause.

Through this five-step process, each entrepreneur is thoroughly vetted for his or her character and capability to create systemic change. The process is long but fruitful. In fact, many candidates describe the selection procedure as one of the most difficult but enlightening experiences of their careers.

Candidates must communicate their ideas, scrutinize their methods, and reflect on themselves as individuals. Ashoka then provides stipends to allow Fellows the financial flexibility to fully dedicate themselves to their new ideas.

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We recognize the creative potential in teachers,

acknowledge and celebrate their uniqueness and invite them to bring care and empathy into the learning space. It’s no longer about reading out of a textbook and asking children to memorize it, but creating a space of learning through play. When a child is challenged with something new, within a space of discovery, then the child is automatically engaged, having fun and learning.�

Dream A Dream, Vishal Talreja, India

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ABOUT THE SOCIAL INNOVATION MAPPING

A CASE FOR HOPE As a network of the world’s leading social entrepreneurs, Ashoka has intimately explored how an entrepreneurial mindset can unlock solutions to the world’s most pressing problems. Across over 75 countries, and dozens of sectors, social entrepreneurs in Ashoka’s Fellowship network have been undaunted by how complex or unsolvable a problem may appear to be, instead turning challenges into opportunities. They create sustainable solutions for the communities they are rooted within and find creative ways to ensure their impact spreads regionally, and even globally, to become new, widespread norms.

Ashoka has intimately explored how an entrepreneurial mindset can unlock solutions to the world’s most pressing problems.

Ashoka’s Social Innovation Mapping illustrates common patterns in how social entrepreneurs are creating widespread change. It centers around two types of patterns: Barriers, or the components of a complex problem entrepreneurs have chosen to focus on tackling, and Design Principles, or the innovative approach that is a defining feature of an entrepreneurs’ work, based upon their decades of iteration on the ground.

Based upon case studies and interviews of solutions that have proven success, the Social Innovation Mapping offers an inductive understanding of how the solutions work together in context to affect change. While addressing a complex or entrenched social challenge can easily get mired in descriptions of the problems and their numerous causes, this

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report tells the stories of effective solutions in order to offer a different way of thinking about systems change—one that values practice over theory and on-the-ground invention over deductive analysis. Thus, the solutions profiled in the report point to a case for hope, to a future that can get better. Ultimately, these pages should be seen as an invitation to reenvision what is possible, through the eyes of entrepreneurs.

INNOVATION PATTERN-RECOGNITION PROCESS: Ashoka’s Social Innovation Mapping is built on an analysis of solutions created by Ashoka Fellows, experts, and thought-leaders to distill “design principles” for change. The mapping illuminates how change is happening by uncovering patterns of what works in the field and what new solutions deserve further exploration. For any given pattern-analysis, we begin by determining a single framing question.

The Social Innovation Map should be seen as an invitation: to re-envision what is possible, through the eyes of entrepreneurs.

The question both describes the shift we hope to see around a given issue in the future, as well as the goal of the organizations and entrepreneurs whose work we include in the mapping.

Next, we sift through Ashoka’s Fellow database of more than 3,000 solutions from social entrepreneurs to select those most applicable to the field. These innovators go through a rigorous approval process before their election

to the fellowship, which includes a thorough vetting of their ideas and performance.

Then, we pare down the set of solutions to those that are the most relevant and innovative, focusing on a further 15-30 solutions for casestudies and interviews. Finally, we cluster them and look for patterns in how the innovators both define the problem they face, and what they do to solve it. These patterns can point to powerful ways to reframe a problem, as well as new ways of addressing it. Ultimately, this analysis reveals the “a-ha” moment of recognition, in which an entrepreneur accurately pairs a powerful idea with a compelling need.

Figure 3

SOCIAL INNOVATION MAPPING: 3 KEY COMPONENTS FOR UNDERSTANDING THE ENTREPRENEURIAL LENSE

Once the analysis is mapped in a grid, the distribution of the solutions becomes apparent, showing which strategies are most commonly (and most powerfully) used. Additionally, it can point to “holes” or areas where there can be unmet potential for a solution to be invented at the nexus of need and idea.

An analogy illustrates why two main patterns form the core of the Social Innovation Mapping: to unleash the potential of social change, it is as important to identify the keys (Design Principles) as it is to clearly see the locks (Barriers) which shackle change. It is also vital to explore new combinations that can further unlock successful change.

To unleash the potential of social

change, it is as important to identify the keys (Design Principles) as it is to clearly see the locks (Barriers) which shackle change.

Solutions, and how they work in context, form the heart of the Social Innovation Mapping analysis. They are used to identify two types of cross-cutting patterns, each representing a unique part of the field that the social entrepreneur has chosen to focus on: Barriers and Design Principles. The solutions used for analysis are those that have been vetted by the Ashoka Fellowship process to be pragmatic, effective, and visionary.

Design Principles are clarifying insights that are distilled from the work of leading social entrepreneurs; they can be incorporated into how solutions are designed in order to increase their impact.

Similar to the identification of principles in any design process, these principles apply more broadly than just a single tool or organizational strategy.

Barriers are core components of a problem that, if overcome, could result in significant opportunities. These are not just descriptions of the problem, nor of its underlying causes. Instead, they are moveable, actionable parts of the problem that the social entrepreneur has chosen to tackle.

New Teacher Center, Ellen Moir, Chicago, United States 9

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THE STRENGTHS OF SOCIAL INNOVATION MAPPING • It creates an entrepreneur’s view of the world, by focusing on common patterns across solutions,. Entrepreneurs—of necessity— design solutions that address the thorniest aspect of effecting change: the human interactions in a system. Recommendations based on entrepreneurial solutions can predict and show ways to circumvent behavioral barriers to change that are often not addressed in strategies crafted from a more idealized viewpoint.

• It allows successful solutions to be examined in context with one another. The mapping shows how ideas relate to one another, as well as to the core elements of the problem. The result is the emergence of clear patterns: Which aspects of a problem are going unaddressed?

Are some strategies underutilized? Over utilized? Is there an aspect of a problem that has yet to be named? Are there holes in the system that await the design of a new solution?

• It provides the map for deriving a theory of change at a systems level. The patterns and insights revealed by the mapping allows the development of an integrated strategy around what mix of solutions could lead to an overall increase in heat applied to the problem. While any theory of change is subjective, this contextual mapping allows for a holistic approach that merely quantifying the success of individual projects may not provide.

• It creates criteria for predicting success. The design principles and barriers provide a road map for evaluating new projects and for guiding the invention of new ideas.

Figure 4

PATTERN-RECOGNITION METHODOLOGY 1

This document begins with an introduction to the framing question, which determines the focus of the analysis. We then describe the fundamental system barriers. Next, we delineate principles that enable learning to be transformed so that young people are adequately prepared for the future. Finally, we map innovations onto a grid, followed by descriptions of the social innovations that have been studied, together with excerpts from interviews of the social entrepreneurs that are driving the solutions.

This mapping is intended to create a more specific focus on one (of many) elements that encompass the field of education and learning. It also provides a baseline knowledge that will continue to evolve, building on the solutions that are submitted on changemakers.com, relating to the 2014 Re-imagining Learning Challenge.

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PATTERNS IN SOCIAL INNOVATION

The following are common patterns that were found across 23 social entrepreneurs’ work spanning over 17 countries (See Appendix A for full list of social entrepreneurs). The two types of patterns featured include the Barriers which the social entrepreneurs choose to focus on; as well as the design principles they use to overcome them. While the pattern itself might not be entirely novel, the social entrepreneurs’ focus on this type of approach, along with the creative ways they have customized their solutions to create impact in their local context are featured to spark further inspiration.

BARRIERS Barriers are core components of a problem that, if altered, could allow for true systems change. Barriers are not underlying causes that merely describe a situation, such as something as broad as “cultural attitudes”. Instead, they are moveable, actionable, and specific to the problem. This is because the pattern-mapping is designed to highlight the key issues social entrepreneurs have chosen to tackle with pragmatic solutions. The following is a synthesis of the key barriers to emerge from our analysis of leading social entrepreneurs’ approaches.

BARRIER A.

BARRIER B.

WHOLE CHILD DEVELOPMENT IS UNDERVALUED

ONE-SIZE-FITS-ALL FITS NONE: STUDENTS ARE DISENGAGED AND NOT BEING PREPARED FOR REAL LIFE

While the importance of social and emotional learning (SEL) and healthy habits are widely recognized, focus on the whole child is left behind due to the increased workload or lack of understanding of how it is incorporated into the existing curriculum, given other priorities.

Deliberate focus on topics such as emotional literacy, health, confidence, and teamwork is seen as a nice-to-have, instead of recognized as essential for ensuring greater success within the classroom and beyond, and an artificial wall is placed between academic learning and citizen education.

Examples of social entrepreneurs tackling this barrier include: * Yuhyun Park, Infollution Zero * Jill Vialet, Playworks * Heidrun Mayer, PAPAILIO

Center for Inspired Teaching, Aleta Margolis, U.S. 12

Students are apathetic because content comes across as irrelevant or boring. Increased testing causes essential life skills to become deemphasized and adds pressure that is counterproductive to learning, especially as testing spreads to younger and younger age groups, such as kindergarten students.

Examples of social entrepreneurs tackling this barrier include: * Larry Rosenstock, High Tech High * Eric Dawson, Peace First

Playworks, Jill Vialet, U.S.

BARRIER C. TRAPPED BETWEEN COMPETING PRESSURES: NOT ENOUGH CAPACITY TO RE-IMAGINE AND RESTRUCTURE EDUCATIONAL SETTINGS Teachers are under pressure to deliver better test results with decreased resources, competing voices about what to test, and increased requirements. It is difficult to adjust to expectations, given ongoing changes at the local, state, and national levels. Even with access to alternative curricula, teachers lack the capacity they need to innovate, experiment, and teach outside the existing curricula.

Examples of social entrepreneurs tackling this barrier include: * Aleta Margolis, Center for Inspired Teaching * Scott Hartl, Expeditionary Learning

* Marian Chwastniewski, Creative and Educational Association ISLAND

BARRIER D. LACK OF STRUCTURES TO FACILITATE MEANINGFUL COMMUNITY OWNERSHIP IN LEARNING PROCESS Even if classrooms are able to teach all of the right things, challenges outside of the school day can derail successes inside the classroom.

Community participation is an essential part of the learning process to ensure that there isn’t a harmful disconnect between what is happening inside of the classroom and what is happening outside the classroom. However, the existing mechanisms aren’t flexible enough to ensure that parents and other adults aren’t just engaged, but become full co-owners of the learning process.

Examples of social entrepreneurs tackling this barrier include: * Maria Diarra Keita, Institute for Popular Education

“We focus on changing the mindset of the adults around the children...

Adults have been taught in a way that was so plastic, and hard, and not easy. Now they’re trying to get that to the children, and learning is no fun.” - Maria Keita, Institute for Popular Education Infollution Zero, Yuhyun Park, South Korea

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DESIGN PRINCIPLES Design Principles are clarifying insights that are distilled from the work of leading social entrepreneurs; they can be incorporated into how solutions are designed in order to increase their impact. Similar to the identification of principles in any design process, these principles apply more broadly than just a single tool or organizational strategy.

DESIGN PRINCIPLE 1. EVERYONE AN IMAGINEER!: EQUIP ADULTS TO DRIVE CHANGE IN LEARNING The transformation of learning requires teachers and other adults to not just implement the latest policies and programs, but to be empowered as changemakers: formulating their own solutions, taking action to make them a reality, and quickly adjusting and iterating along the way.

Social entrepreneurs are crafting new types of experiences and curricula that help adults drive change, despite the multiple pressures that have already been placed on their time and resources.

They help adults rethink their environment and see new opportunities and resources within it.

Examples of social entrepreneurs modeling this approach include: * Vishal Talreja, Dream A Dream * Terrie Rose, Baby’s Space

DESIGN PRINCIPLE 2. A WORLD OF POSSIBILITIES: ACTIVELY DESIGN SPACE & CULTURE AS ESSENTIAL ELEMENTS FOR LEARNING Social entrepreneurs are creating cost-effective ways to infuse schools with the type of culture and design that is required for curiosity, creativity, and imagination to truly flourish. In the process of creating new school-wide norms for language, habits, and behavior modeling by adults, they are also demonstrating how culture and design are not just nice-to-haves, but also must-haves in order to achieve learning outcomes.

Examples of social entrepreneurs modeling this approach include: * Mary Gordon , Roots of Empathy * Kabir Vajpeyi, Vinyas Centre for Architectural Research and Design * Victoria (Vicky) Colbert , Fundacion Escuela Nueva * Kiran Bir Sethi , Riverside School

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“Schools have an invisible

curriculum, schools have cultures, Boys and Girls Clubs have cultures, after school programs have cultures and organizing principles. And we have to get purposeful about those environments and those values, if we’re going to create change.” - Eric Dawson, PeaceFirst

DESIGN PRINCIPLE 3. BETTER TOGETHER: CREATE PEER SUPPORT NETWORKS FOR ALL STAKEHOLDERS IN EDUCATION Social entrepreneurs are creating peer-topeer networks that enable every stakeholder in education to have an active role in shaping the education system, including teachers, parents, expecting mothers, and others, enabling them all to transform learning. The peer-to-peer aspect builds the trust needed to share the lessons learned, and it creates a social-support structure to overcome complex challenges that might not fit a particular dimension of a professional development or outreach program.

Examples of social entrepreneurs modeling this approach include: * Ellen Moir, New Teacher Center * Meinrad Armbruster, Eltern AG (Parenting Community) * Kathryn Hall-Trujillo, The Birthing Project

DESIGN PRINCIPLE 4. WIRED FOR LEARNING: PUT CHILDREN IN CHARGE Children are born with natural habits of curiosity, risk-taking, and experimentation.

Although children are expressive, hands-on, and continually synthesizing new ideas and skills with passion, traditional education can often squelch these qualities as children get older. Recognizing this, social entrepreneurs are providing adults with the tools to know when to get out of the way. They are crafting curricula and culture that make it easy for adults to cultivate children’s voice and agency, and achieve excellent learning outcomes as a result.

Thus, adults hold an essential role in cultivating the right type of experiences and challenges while children thrive as drivers of their own learning.​ Examples of social entrepreneurs modeling this approach include: *Kjartan Eide, Trivelsprogram (Wellbeing Program) * Irene Mutumba, Young Entrepreneurs Clubs Community) * Kiran Bir Sethi, Riverside School

Eltern AG (Parenting Community), Meinrad Armbruster, Germany

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SOCIAL INNOVATION MAPPING: THE FUTURE OF LEARNING The following grid shows how existing solutions address specific components of a challenge within the field. It can show which strategies are most commonly (and most powerfully) used. Additionally, it can point to “holes” or areas where there can be unmet potential for a solution to be invented at the nexus of need and idea. For the purposes of this mapping, entrepreneurs have been categorized by the predominant design principle they are applying and the barrier they are focused on. By no means does this suggest that innovators are limited to those principles and barriers; in fact, most solutions by leading social entrepreneurs do apply several principles to address multiple barriers.

To learn more about hundreds of additional solutions from across the world that joined the call for ideas in response to the 2014 Re-imagining Learning Challeng, visit www.changemakers.com/ play2learn.

Figure 5

‘Everyone an imagineer!: Equip adults to drive change in learning * Mike McGalliard

A world of possibilities: Actively design space & culture to be essential elements for learning

* Andrew Mangino

* Mary Anne Amorim Ribeiro * Kevin Marinacci * Alison Naftalin * Mike McGalliard

* Beatriz Diuk

* Emrah Kırımsoy * Oliver Percovich * Azize Leygara * Wannakanok Pohiraedaoh

* Thorsten Kiefer

Better together: Create peer support networks for all stakeholders in education

* RawawnAbu Al Failat * Admir Lucas Civic

4. Wired for learning: Put children in charge

* * Andrew Mangino*

* Guy Etienne

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2015 Re-imagine Learning Ashoka Fellows or Champions * social entrepreneur listed as an example for more than one pattern

Design Principles

Figure 6

PATTERN-RECOGNITION METHODOLOGY 2

FRAME

QUESTION

RESEARCH

SOLUTIONS

IDENTIFY PATTERNS IDENTIFY

IDENTIFY

DESIGN PRINCIPLES

BARRIERS

CREATE SOCIAL INNOVATION MAPPING

IDENTIFY

OPPORTUNITIES 17

We focus on changing the mindset of

the adults around the children... Adults have been taught in a way that was so plastic, and hard, and not easy.

Now they’re trying to get that to the children, and learning is no fun.�

Maria Keita, Institute for Popular Education

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BARRIERS IN FOCUS

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BARRIER A

“Whole child” development is undervalued.

Essential parts of development get left behind as children get older such as healthy habits, executive function, and social and emotional learning.

INFOLLUTION ZERO SOUTH KOREA

SOLUTION EXAMPLE:

Yuhyun Park | izhero.org

As a mother of two, Yuhyun Park was worried about how easy it was for children to freely access digital media. 8-10 year olds in the U.S., for example, spend more than 7.5 hours daily on average engaged with digital media, which is a longer time than they spend in school or with family. Park was particularly concerned about how exposure to negative online content and digital addiction can stunt children’s social, emotional, and physical development – causing them to spend so much time in the virtual world that their development of life skills stagnates.

To overcome such information pollution, Park founded “ infollutionZERO” (iZ). While traditional approaches to digital risk education focus on instructive methods for adolescents, the organization’s iZ HERO program prioritizes prevention, rather than intervention within the 6-13 year old age group.

The program provides an integrated multimedia play & learning experience, including a web game, online portal, and comic book in addition to an interactive digital exhibition. It aims to provide an engaging, safe, and fun environment for children and their families. In so doing, the goal is to empower young children with responsible digital citizenship and character development through participation in a wide range of online and offline activities.

IMPACT: > The iZ HERO Exhibition serves as a learning hub for primary schools and is installed in three Korean cities as well as in Singapore. > 90% of children report enjoying the iZ HERO educational exhibition while a study by the Singaporean National Institute of Education found iZ to improve attitudes toward cyber-risks. > iZ is expanding globally through partnerships with the U.S., Korean, and Canadian governments on a global mobile security campaign, and expansion of programs in Southeast Asia through UNESCO. Additional Pattern: *Wired for Learning: Put Children in Charge (Design Principle 4)

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“In Korea, digital media can start quite young, at three years old. ...If you lose the time window of ages of six to thirteen to teach digital literacy, there can be no turning back.”

“Kids have so far been treated as kids who need to be taught and instead we want to empower them as heroes who can make a difference.”

BARRIER A

“Whole child” Development is Undervalued.

Essential parts of development get left behind as children get older--such as healthy habits, executive function, and social and emotional learning.

PLAYWORKS UNITED STATES

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: In 1996, Jill Vialet noticed that the culture of play in the schools where she was working California had changed dramatically. Kids were coming to school without the basic skills needed to get games going, keep games going, and resolve conflicts. As a result, recess was a time filled with discipline problems, contributing to a negative school climate which interfered with teaching and learning.

Vialet founded Playworks to maximize the power of play to bring out the best in every kid. By focusing on this time of day that had previously been so detrimental to the school experience, and consciously norming empathy, teamwork, leadership and inclusion as essential play values, she found that the program was able to have a measurable and dramatic impact on the overall school climate.

Integrating directly into the school day, Playworks builds a culture of inclusion, respect, and fun starting before the first morning bell. The direct service model places full-time, trained adults at low-income schools to provide play and physical activity to students throughout the day and Playworks training program works nationwide offering technical assistance to schools, districts and other youth-serving organizations.

As a result, students come to class feeling safer and ready to learn, administrators cut down on discipline problems, and teachers have more instructional time to focus on the important work of teaching and learning. No longer tied to the false tension between physical health and academic achievement, principals and teachers cite Playworks as one of the most indispensable programs in their schools.

IMPACT: > Playworks will reach 185,000 students through direct services in 23 cities around the nation in the 2013-14 school year (this includes over 8,000 4th and 5th grade students trained as Junior Coaches for their peers), and an additional 300,000 students through training.

Jill Vialet | playworks.org

“We’re seeing a growing amount of demand and recognition from educators that the times in the day that are set aside for kids to play have real value to the school environment.”

“To build schools that work, you need both formal and informal education fused into the environment so that kids feel safe, included and heard. They need experiences of choice and control, the opportunity to know and be known by others, and to feel like they have a voice.”

>89% of staff nationwide7 report an increased ability of students to focus on class activities, 85% report a decrease in the amount of class time spent resolving conflicts, and 98% report an increase in the number of students that are physically active; these effects on the school climate are also confirmed by independent research8.

Additional Patterns: *Everyone an Imagineer! Equip Adults to Drive Change in Learning (Design Principle 1) *Wired for Learning: Put Children in Charge (Design Principle 4)

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BARRIER A

“Whole child” development is undervalued.

Essential parts of development get left behind as children get older such as healthy habits, executive function, and social and emotional learning.

PAPILIO GERMANY Heidrun Mayer | papilio.de

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: It is known from research that behavioral problems are the main risk factors for the development of addiction and violent behavior. These problems manifest themselves for the first time in kindergarten age children and become embedded by the age of 8. In order to act against these problems effectively one must act early and encourage healthy development of children in an age appropriate way. That is why Papilio is implemented in kindergartens.

Heidrun Mayer co-founded Papilio in order to strengthen children’s social-emotional competences as they are the basis for learning each and every life skill. With its innovative modules Papilio equips German kindergarten children with these crucial skills and can thus protect them from addiction and violence later on. The program uses three childorientated measures (the “Toys-go-on-holiday-day”, the story “Paula and the trunk pixies”, and the “Mine-yoursyours-our-game”) to teach children emotions, communication, and interaction. Papilio works through trainers and kindergarten teachers to reach both children and their parents. The program has been validated in a study with more than 700 children, 1,200 parents and 100 kindergarten teachers. Mayer’s vision is to reach an entire generation of children with Papilio.

PAPLIO protects

and empowers children by promoting social-emotional competences. It reduces first instances of disturbed behavior and therefore protects children from the development of addiction and violence problems later on.”

IMPACT: > Papilio has trained 181 trainers13 who trained more than 5500 kindergarten teachers, reaching 111,980 children across Germany so far. > Papilio is starting to develop its emotional literacy education in crèches for children under the age of three as well as in elementary schools. > The new parents’ club (ElternClub) allows parents to improve their educational competences within a group of other parents and a specially trained kindergarten teacher. > Papilio is currently developing a training program for kindergarten teachers from other European countries in order to prepare them for working in German kindergartens.

Additional Patterns: *Everyone an Imagineer! Equip Adults to Drive Change in Learning (Design Principle 1)

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The program uses childorientated measures to teach children emotions, communication, and interaction. It works through trainers and kindergarten teachers to reach both children and their parents.”

BARRIER B

One-Size-Fits-All Fits None: Students are Disengaged and Not Being Prepared for Real Life PEACE FIRST UNITED STATES

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: Determined to reverse cultural norms that overlook the contributions of young people in creating peace and justice, Eric Dawson co-founded Peace First to instead create an environment where students feel empowered to prevent violence and create positive change by applying their peacemaking skills by starting projects in their communities.

Eric Dawson | peacefirst.org

For 22 years, Peace First has used an innovative, project-based curriculum (now available digitally) that links lessons on literacy, social studies and critical thinking to social-emotional learning, conflict resolution, and civic engagement to teach young people peacemaking skills. Peace First recently launched the national Peace First Prize to catalyze a youth peacemaking movement by recognizing and investing in youth social entrepreneurs as role models and spokespersons for peace.

IMPACT:

Young people are not objects that we do things

“

to: we don’t need to protect them, or incarcerate them. They’re actually powerful agents of change.” > Peace First has worked in 32 states and 23 countries from school partnerships in Boston, Los Angeles and New York, to helping the government of Colombia build its citizenship competency frameworks. > Evaluation partners in universities and the World Bank as well as organizational surveys9 have demonstrated that the program reduces incidents of violence and increases long-term, pro-social efficacy of youth. 92% of teachers report positive social gains in students, including treating each other with respect in their classroom (65%), calmly resolving disagreements with their peers (61%), choosing to walk away from a fight or conflict (48%) and standing up or looking out for each other (55%). > Peace First’s annual Peace First Prize reached 100 million people through social media, corporate partners and a network of national partners such as Boys and Girls Clubs of America, the Girl Scouts, and Big Brothers Big Sisters.

Additional Patterns: *Everyone an Imagineer! Equip Adults to Drive Change in Learning (Design Principle 1) *Actively Design Space & Culture as Essential Elements for Learning. (Design Principle 2) *Wired for Learning: Put Children in Charge (Design Principle 4) *“Whole child” development is undervalued (Barrier A)

“Every student—from the 8th Graders down to the itty bitty ones—go out into their neighborhoods, identify a problem and actually solve it. We have Kindergarteners who start recycling programs, 2nd graders who reclaim brownfields, 3rd graders who start yoga programs for the 8th graders who were picking on them; 8th graders who taught workshops for their teachers on sexism. So students got to actually go out, and design projects to make their schools and neighborhoods safer.”

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BARRIER B

One-Size-Fits-All Fits None: Students are Disengaged and Not Being Prepared for Real Life HIGH TECH HIGH UNITED STATES

SOLUTION EXAMPLE:

Larry Rosenstock | hightechhigh.org

Larry Rosenstock founded High Tech High (HTH) to shatter the dichotomy between technical and liberal arts education and close employment gaps caused by failings of urban high schools, especially for minority students.

Instead of attending regular classroom lectures, taking tests, and turning in homework assignments, HTH students spend four years working primarily on individual and group projects that provide hands-on experiences, complemented by academic curricula. With this model, HTH students prepare for the world of work, while surpassing traditional benchmarks of academic success.

Thus, HTH synthesizes previously separate reforms - thoughtful use of technology, mentoring, project-based learning, teams of teachers, and portfolio assessment - into one cohesive model. Developed from a lifetime of study and research, the HTH model brings the core of best practices to lowincome neighborhoods to revitalize education among the underserved.

In addition to an integrated network of schools spanning grades K-12, HTH also houses a comprehensive teacher certification program, and a new, innovative Graduate School of Education, all designed to develop academic, workplace, and citizenship skills for postsecondary success. Renowned in its field, HTH has also received accolades from the Harvard Graduate School of Education and the New Schools Venture Fund.

IMPACT: > HTH comprises 12 schools10 (five high schools, four middle schools, and three elementary schools) serving 5,200 students, 98% of whom have gone on to college, 75% to four-year institutions. >It has 500+ employees, $57 million in real estate holdings and an annual operating budget of approximately $40 million.

Additional Patterns: *Wired for Learning: Put Children in Charge (Design Principle 4)

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“HTH offers a highly stimulating educational environment that encourages students to immerse themselves in real-world career experiences.�

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BARRIER C

Trapped Between Competing Pressures: Not Enough Capacity to Re-imagine and Restructure Educational Settings.

Educators face a lack of capacity to reimagine and restructure educational settings.

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: Center for Inspired Teaching is building a better school experience for students by training teachers to provide high quality, engaging instruction. Inspired Teaching’s professional development model allows teachers to rethink their role in the classroom, moving from information provider to Instigator of Thought®.

Inspired Teaching is committed to ending the practice of “delivering” professional development to teachers and is working to make teachers full collaborators in school improvement and reform strategies.

Inspired Teaching‘s theory of change is three-part: to model Inspired Teaching inquiry-based instructional model at the Inspired Teaching Demonstration School; to prepare excellent new teachers through the Inspired Teacher Certification Program, a 24-month residency model; and to shift the practice of current teachers through district partnerships supporting successful implementation of the Common Core State Standards.

All Inspired Teaching programs are based in best practices in teacher education and in the belief that each student possesses the ability to think critically, understand information, and solve complex problems. Students of Inspired Teachers aren’t told what to think, they learn how to think, thereby developing the critical, 21st century skills needed to succeed in school today and in college and careers tomorrow.

CENTER FOR INSPIRED TEACHING UNITED STATES Aleta Margolis | inspiredteaching.org

Teachers trained by

the Center for Inspired Teaching spend 50% less time disciplining, and more time instructing, coaching, facilitating, and working one-onone.

IMPACT: > Inspired Teaching’s work is primarily focused in Washington, DC where 77% of students11 qualify for free or reduced price meals and are therefore considered low income. > All programs are routinely evaluated through rigorous, evidence-based assessment of data collected through surveys, observations, and a wide-range of student assessments. > As measured by the CLASS™ assessment tool, new teachers trained through the Inspired Teacher Certification Program routinely outscore the national average for all key instructional and support domains directly tied to student achievement. > In the Inspired Teaching Demonstration School’s second year of existence, students showed a 26% gain on the 2013 DC-CAS, the highest growth by a public or public charter school in DC. > Over 90% of preschool and preK students at the Demonstration School met or exceeded all literacy benchmarks; over 91% of preschool and preK students met or exceeded all math benchmarks.

Additional Patterns: *Everyone an Imagineer! Equip Adults to Drive Change in Learning (Design Principle 1) 26

CIT is building teachers’ capacity to facilitate the independent analysis and reasoning skills their students need to thrive in school today and in colleges and careers tomorrow.

BARRIER C

Trapped Between Competing Pressures: Not Enough Capacity to Re-imagine and Restructure Educational Settings.

Educators face a lack of capacity to reimagine and restructure educational settings.

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: Expeditionary Learning (EL) transforms schools by building teachers’ capacity to ignite students’ motivation, persistence, and compassion so they become active contributors to building a better world. Through its open-source curriculum, teacher-created resources, and professional development, EL partners with new and veteran teachers in every kind of school setting, helping them achieve their highest aspirations and strive for a vision of student success that joins academic achievement, character and high quality work. The EL model challenges students to think critically and take active roles in their classrooms and communities, resulting in higher achievement and engagement.

Expeditionary Learning schools fuse the power of character, social-emotional learning and citizenship to a strong focus on academic achievement. This model of learning compels students to struggle with complex texts and problems, often beyond what they think they can handle. EL students conduct months-long, cross-curricular explorations of issues where they connect their own passion to new content and step up their courage as citizens to lead significant projects for the community beyond the school.

Expeditionary Learning has been recognized for its innovative approach to education by the Social Impact Exchange, which named it one of the leading non-profits bringing the most promising social strategies to scale.

It also recently received a federal Investing in Innovation grant to scale its professional development model to all teachers.

EXPEDITIONARY LEARNING UNITED STATES Scott Hartl | elschools.org

Expeditionary Learning is creating curriculum and providing training to make learning authentic and engaging, while still being relevant to the college career agenda. It provides a standards base that is rigorous but not at the expense of engagement and doing work with a real purpose.”

IMPACT: >Expeditionary Learning has a network of more than 160 schools in 33 states, serving over 53,000 students and 4,000 teachers. >A Mathematica Research Group study12 found that Expeditionary Learning students accumulate about an extra seven months of learning growth in reading and 10 months of extra learning growth in math after three years. >Its Grade 3-8 English Language Arts Common Core curriculum was recognized by the New York City Department of Education as among “the highest-quality Common Core-aligned curriculum materials currently available.” It is being used by more than 1,000 schools across New York State and other schools in California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Kansas, and New Jersey. >Its curriculum has received the highest ratings from two sources – EquiP (Educators Evaluating Quality Instructional Products) and the state of Connecticut.

Expeditionary Learning created the reading and learning curriculum for all of New York state. It is free and being adopted at the same rate as curriculum from very large publishing houses

Additional Patterns: *Everyone an Imagineer! Equip Adults to Drive Change in Learning (Design Principle 1) 27

BARRIER C

Trapped Between Competing Pressures: Not Enough Capacity to Re-imagine and Restructure Educational Settings.

Educators face a lack of capacity to reimagine and restructure educational settings.

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: Marian Chwastniewski founded the Creative and Educational Association ISLAND to counter formulaic methods of teaching that suppress children’s natural curiosity through “read and repeat” format, while overcoming the lack of administrative support for teachers to incorporate innovative methodologies.

ISLAND’s programs target gaps in teacher training by helping teachers believe in the power of creativity in the classroom.

ISLAND redefines teachers’ role in the classroom by helping them move from being disciplinarians to supportive guides in discovering students’ interests and potential. With its local and regional educational centers, ISLAND conducts workshops and conferences, building a network of teachers eager to educate in imaginative ways. To further spread new teaching, ISLAND develops training materials, education centers, and student competitions to encourage creative, engaged, and open-minded teaching methods for student learning.

Through its trainings, competitions, and support networks, ISLAND builds a community of teachers who see students’ potential and are dedicated to cultivating it at school.

ISLAND overcomes disheartened educational

environments, inspiring and empowering teachers to change their classrooms for the better.

IMPACT:

> ISLAND has engaged over 5,000 pupils and 400 teachers in its nationwide programs to push the envelope on teacher training in public education. >It continues to expand its number of programs by developing experimental curricula, problem solving competitions, public education counsels, education centers, teacher networks, professional development programs, and scientific camps and is planning on spreading its model further within Western Europe.

Additional Patterns: *Everyone an Imagineer! Equip Adults to Drive Change in Learning (Design Principle 1)

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CREATIVE AND EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION ISLAND POLAND Marian Chwastniewski | wyspa.org.pl

BARRIER D

Lack of Structures to Facilitate Meaningful Community Ownership in the Learning Process.

Overcoming challenges to ensure parents and the broader community are involved as full co-owners in the learning process.

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: Vicky founded the Fundacion Nueva Escuela (FEN) to ensure quality education would reach diverse segments of Columbia’s population, including rural and displaced communities. She converted dysfunctional rural schools into those that connected with students, taught relevant skills, linked schools to community life, and offered participatory and self-paced learning to students. The Ministry of Education later made this model a part of national policy, bringing it to 18,000 rural schools in Colombia. When faced with political changes, she worked with community groups like the National Federation of Coffee Producers to ensure rural schools would continue to receive support.

Vicky has spread the model to low-income urban schools in Colombia and is now working to reach communities displaced due to political instability.

To do so, FEN is developing a kit with select lessons related to health, the environment, culture, conflict resolution, sex education, and essential reading, writing, and math skills. Since there are no teachers and no schools, she plans to transfer this model directly to the community and train young community members, many of whom studied in New Schools prior to their displacement, as informal educators who can direct the education of the children.

IMPACT: > With the support of the Ministry of Education and World Bank, the New School’s rural curriculum was established in 30,000 schools reaching over 2.5 million students; UNESCO deemed Colombia’s rural education system a leader in Latin America14. > The New School model has inspired and guided education reform in thirteen other countries including Brazil, India, Mexico, and Vietnam.

FUNDACION ESCUELA NUEVA: VOLVAMOS A LA GENTE COLOMBIA Victoria Colbert | escuelanueva.org

I

“ nternal diagnostics reveal that New School students have closer relationships with their parents and communities, noticeable by families around the region.”

> It is partnering with USAID and UNICEF to expand to 8,700 displaced children and 9,200 tutors.

Additional Patterns: *Better Together: Create Peer Support Networks for All Stakeholders in Education.

(Design Principle 4) *Wired for Learning: Put Children in Charge (Design Principle 4)

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BARRIER D

Lack of Structures to Facilitate Meaningful Community Ownership in the Learning Process.

Overcoming challenges to ensure parents and the broader community are involved as full co-owners in the learning process.

INSTITUTE FOR POPULAR EDUCATION

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: Maria founded the Institute for Popular Education (IPE) with the intention of changing mindsets about learning - how it can incorporate indigenous wisdom and language, interactive lessons, and community members as cocreators in the education process. Her team begins by observing the existing teaching methods, before beginning to engage the community in improving the education system.

IPE hosts community classes under the shade trees of the village and focuses on what Maria calls “empowering themes,” such as how groups are organized, the family, gender relations and rights. A key part of the gathering includes encouraging adults’ reflection and empathy for what education was like for them, and to find what they would like to change in the current system.

The Institute for Popular Education insists that rural adults design the curriculum for children. To better enable this, Maria provides literacy training of young adults as a means to “women a voice, to value the knowledge that these women possess, and so to empower them.”

At the heart of her training program is a process of action research, by which local knowledge is called forth. This can include learning local games, analyzing what type of learning they convey, and systematizing it as a part of the local curricula. Other examples include women writing their autobiographies, by tape recording and transcribing parts of the Malian oral tradition.

Maria summarizes her work as a “quest for two things: empowerment through knowledge, and, or appropriate structures to institutionalize our methods.”

MALI Maria Diarra Keita

“We have young people, from 16 to 25 years old around us, and they have been victims of miseducation. We give them skills because we know that soon they will be parents. We try to help them grow with new ideas of treating kids and how you deal with difficult problems, so they can be prepared as parents. And those people end up by being around the school and help parents with reading camps, math camps, and gym camps...to help the teaching to happen in the community.”

IMPACT: > The Institute for Popular Education is active in 1001 schools, including teacher training to deliver more enriched curricula, students achieving better academic outcomes, and community engagement. > IPE trains development practitioners (in schools, NGOs and government) in their approach and is working with the Ministry of Education to ensure its best educational practices can spread nationwide.

Additional Patterns: *Everyone an Imagineer! Equip Adults to Drive Change in Learning (Design Principle 1)

30

“Sometimes people want kids to be very classic and very formal.

We think the opposite.

For what kids really need - especially preschool - we have to make up games that help them think and act and practice.”

DESIGN PRINCIPLES IN FOCUS

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DESIGN PRINCIPLE 1

Everyone an Imagineer!: Equip Adults to Drive Change in Learning.

Providing creative learning experiences for teachers, parents, working professions, and others that empower them to drive change in any part of the learning ecosystem.

DREAM A DREAM SOLUTION EXAMPLE: Vishal co-founded Dream A Dream to create a world where each individual is appreciated for who they are, irrespective of their backgrounds. He was concerned by how young people, especially from vulnerable backgrounds, have to respond to an increasingly complex world, needing the right abilities and social and emotional skills to succeed.

INDIA Vishal Talreja | dreamadream.org

At Dream A Dream, 8-18 year olds develop Life Skills through highly experiential programmes delivered by a team of facilitators and volunteers.

Interventions that keep the child and how a child learns at the center of its approach include: 1. After school Life Skills programmes for over 50,000 young people using sports and arts, also engaging over 2,000 volunteers 2. Career enhancing Life Skills modules for over 8,000 youth 3. Transformative Life Skills training for over 500 educators impacting an additional 50,000 young people The curriculums are designed to be fun, engaging and experiential, creating space for learning moments to happen. In addition, there is emphasis on bringing care and empathy into the learning space by supporting facilitators, trainers and teachers to recognize their own unique abilities and invest in developing their own life skills.

IMPACT: >Dream A Dream reaches over 50,000 young people using sports and arts, also engaging over 2,000 volunteers (see above for more info). > Established relationships with over 30 partners across 3 states of India to scale the programme. (see above for more info). > Developed the Life Skills Assessment Scale (LSAS) as a peer-reviewed scale to measure improvement in Life Skills amongst disadvantaged children. > 65% of young people in after-school life skills programme show an improvement in life skills year-on-year and 90% of teachers15 trained report understanding children better and being more empathetic towards them.

Additional Patterns: *Everyone an Imagineer! Equip Adults to Drive Change in Learning (Design Principle 1) *Wired for Learning: Put Children in Charge (Design Principle 4) *“Whole child” development is undervalued (Barrier A)

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“Adults volunteering with Dream A Dream tell us, ‘I realize that if there are challenges in my community, I don’t need to go necessarily looking for someone to solve them for me, I can solve them myself.”

DESIGN PRINCIPLE 1:

Everyone an Imagineer!: Equip Adults to Drive Change in Learning.

Providing creative learning experiences for teachers, parents, working professions, and others that empower them to drive change in any part of the learning ecosystem.

BABY’S SPACE A PLACE TO GROW

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: Terrie Rose founded Baby Space, a state-of-the art childcare that meets the emotional health and development needs of babies and young children exposed to trauma and poverty. Developed with local experts, Baby’s Space includes interactive spaces, mirrored walls, and cozy nooks that facilitate multi-sensory learning. In addition to the physical environment, Baby’s Space provides relationship-based program to promote healthy attachments between caring adults and children. A part of the curriculum, for example, helps parents and childcare providers to see themselves as superheroes in the lives of young children.

To further its impact, Baby’s Space has become a full-service organization providing child care, a K-3rd elementary school, tutoring, parenting services and employment for parents and community members.

I

“ n all of our approaches we’re really trying to help adults see from the child’s point of view.”

UNITED STATES Terrie Rose | babyspace.org

“If you talk about things, it can become too academic. You have to bring kinesthetic opportunity when teaching about early childhood learning, because that’s really where adults live in terms of their memory of what play means and gives them the chance to think from the child’s point of view.”

IMPACT: > Baby’s Space serves the most at-risk American Indian children, with over 95% of Baby Space’s children passing the kindergarten readiness test compared to 45% readiness in the school district. Over 85% of elementary students score at or above grade level in math. And, 100% of parents16 are engaged in their children’s learning. > The Baby’s Space model has been adopted by childcare and Head Start centers located in low-income neighborhoods and on Indian Reservations across Minnesota. To further spread the model’s principles of emotional health and learning through exploration and play, Terrie is launching KinderView, an all-inclusive curriculum for early childhood organizations serving children ages 6 weeks to 6-years-of-age. > The science of early relationships and emotional development is spread through frequent keynote addresses, a TEDxTalk, and Dr. Rose’s book, “Emotional Readiness: How Early Experience and Mental Health Lead to School Success.”

Additional Patterns: * Lack of structures to facilitate meaningful community ownership in learning process. (Barrier D)

33

DESIGN PRINCIPLE 1

Everyone an Imagineer!: Equip Adults to Drive Change in Learning.

Providing creative learning experiences for teachers, parents, working professions, and others that empower them to drive change in any part of the learning ecosystem.

DEPORT-ES PARA COMPARTIR (DPC)

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: Deport-es para Compartir’s provides interactive curricula centered around physical activity, particularly interactive games and simulations for students rather than only traditional sports. A core part of the model includes training teachers to understand and enjoy the importance of play, and how to utilize the curricula for academic outcomes. This model not only encourages a more active lifestyle for Mexican children, but also makes learning more fun and increases student retention. It enables the students themselves to discover the value of intangible principles like empathy, teamwork, fair play, gender equality, and respect. Rather than merely reading about world challenges in their textbooks, students are encouraged to create solutions and implement them in their communities on topics such as poverty, disease, and discrimination As an example of how DpC focuses on empowering children, when students graduate from the program they prepare an ambassador session for their parents and their teachers in their community, implementing the learning games and posing reflective questions to the grownups.

The content covered by DpC revolves around three main topics: The United Nations Millennium Development Goals, healthy lifestyles, and diversity. DpC is determined to reach all types of rural and urban school settings in DpC’s network, including public and private schools, as well as indigenous shelters in the most marginalized communities.

MÉXICO Dina Buchbinder | sports4sharing.org

“Inspiration and motivation of teachers is essential, introducing them into the world of play, and training them in an experiential way where they can actually grasp what it’s like to translate, for example, civic values, into practical situations.”

IMPACT: > Deport-es para Compartir’s has reached 110,000 children17, 150,000 parents, and 4,000 teachers from 26 states of Mexicoengaged in their children’s learning. > In an internal survey, 95 percent of teachers said that DpC had improved classroom behavior, 86 percent said that the program had instilled healthy habits among their students, another 86 percent said the program had reduced bullying.

Additional Patterns: *Wired for Learning: Put Children in Charge (Design Principle 4) *“Whole child” development is undervalued (Barrier A) *One-size-fits-all fits none: Students are disengaged and not being prepared for real life. (Barrier B)

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“In order to reach children, to truly reach children, we work with the actors that are the closest to children also, meaning the parents and the teachers.”

DESIGN PRINCIPLE 2

A World of Possibilities: Actively Design Space and Culture as Essential Elements for Learning.

Creating cost-effective methods that infuse a school with habits, language, and materials needed for learning through play ecosystem.

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: Kabir Vajpeyi and his team founded Building as Learning Aid (BaLA) to improve the quality of education by transforming the one common element in all rural schools – even the poorest—the physical infrastructure. Its Building as Learning Aid (BaLA) idea uses school spaces, including classrooms, steps, and the natural environment, to create affordable learning settings that can be actively used with learning resources, with or without teacher presence: a window security grill to help students conceptualize fractions, a range of angles marked under a door to explain basic geometry, and ceiling fans painted with color wheels to understand rotational symmetry. By creating individualized indoor and outdoor spaces of learning, BaLA’s 150 three-dimensional spaces optimize existing resources to aid child development.

A key part of the strategy includes optimization of existing infrastructure and building participation and ownership of multidisciplinary teams ranging from local teachers and administrators to designers and engineers. Vajpeyi believes existing infrastructure, policy, and knowledge can be better harmonized to transform student learning and revolutionize the Indian education system.

“The moment you have playful settings there is more constructive engagement…. You don’t have to restrict children for doing this or that because they are engaging themselves on their own. A lot of activities are now self-directed, so you don’t have to have somebody looking after each and everything.”

IMPACT: > In partnership with the government’s Education for All program, BaLA impact has been in 19 Indian states and has trained over 9,500 administrators, engineers, architects, school head masters, teachers, and community members.

VINYAS CENTRE FOR ARCHITECTURAL RESEARCH AND DESIGN INDIA Kabir Vajpeyi

“Often the building needs repair in a band of 1.5 meter high zone from the ground floor, wall, door and windows, etc. This is also the zone where maximum interaction of a child happens with a building. While repairing, if this zone can innovatively include settings and resources for child development and learning, one is able to shift the focus from the dull, ugly, building, to a more playful and childfriendly environment.”

> In India, it has been implemented across more than 25,000 schools, in varying quality and slated to reach several times more in future, due to its inclusion in the National policy. > BaLA has been proven to increase enrollment, retention, and attendance in school; teachers also report an increased willingness among children to come to school and a reduction in vandalism.

Additional Patterns: *One-size-fits-all fits none: Students are disengaged and not being prepared for real life. (Barrier B) * Trapped Between Competing Pressures: Not enough capacity to re-imagine and restructure educational settings. (Barrier C)

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DESIGN PRINCIPLE 3

Better Together: Create Peer Support Networks for All Stakeholders in Education.

Creating peer-to-peer learning and support for teachers, parents, expecting mothers, and more that enables them to transform learning.

NEW TEACHER CENTER UNITED STATES

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: Ellen Moir co-founded the New Teacher Center (NTC) to fill the gap between existing teacher training and the skills and support needed in the classroom. She observed how, for example, new teachers are often given the hardest classrooms, being forced to either “sink or swim” and to struggle with classroom realities. Combined with limited mentoring and few advancement opportunities, this mentality fuels high teacher turnover. Multiple teachers furthers education inequity, disproportionately affecting underprivileged students and deepening the achievement gap.

NTC establishes a comprehensive induction program for all new teachers and builds a corps of professional mentors from expert teachers. No longer left to fend for themselves, new teachers learn through mentoring from their expert colleagues, developing new skills and passions instead of burning out in a few years time. Simultaneously, expert teachers who may have begun to languish in the classroom are given an alternate career move to help them stay engaged in the education system. As such, NTC invigorates all teachers, producing higher student learning and performance outcomes.

IMPACT: > Annually, NTC supports over 6,30018 mentors to improve the effectiveness of 26,000 teachers across the country - reaching over 1.5 million students. > After two years of mentoring support 99% of new teachers report that mentoring has improved their practice.

Ellen Moir | newteachercenter.org

“Parenting sessions will not work unless they are informal and participatory and involve peer-to-peer learning rather than lectures from experts.

Parents must feel that they are in charge of their lives, must experience some quick successes at home, and must not be made to feel inadequate or delinquent.”

> Independent, third-party research19 has shown that teachers who receive at least two years of mentoring in an NTC program significantly advance student learning scores in both math and reading. > NTC is partnering with States and school districts across America to reach more new teachers and expand its impact. NTC is also a partner of the Ministry of Education in Singapore.

Additional Patterns: * Trapped Between Competing Pressures: Not enough capacity to re-imagine and restructure educational settings. (Barrier C) *Everyone an Imagineer! Equip Adults to Drive Change in Learning (Design Principle 1)

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“Hard-to-reach families are exactly the families that we need to tailor our efforts towards; it is essential for breaking the cycle of social injustice where it begins. delinquent.”

DESIGN PRINCIPLE 3

Better Together: Create Peer Support Networks for All Stakeholders in Education.

Creating peer-to-peer learning and support for teachers, parents, expecting mothers, and others that enables them to transform learning.

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: Meinrad Armbruster founded Eltern AG given concern that children from working class families enter the school system more prone to emotional instability and poor performance due to a higher risk of violence or parental neglect. Without confident parents willing to ask for help, these children - almost 2 million – are at risk of falling through the cracks, generation after generation.

Believing in the importance of parental involvement, Eltern AG establishes community-based, self-help parenting groups for lowerclass, less educated working class families, particularly for parents with children ages 0-6. The program moves from basic parenting issues to personal parenting problems, developing a trusted community in which parents can learn, share, and explore. By incorporating doctors, teachers, and government officials into its network, as well, Eltern AG facilitates an entire community dedicated to supporting parenting.

“Hard-to-reach families are exactly the families that we need to tailor our efforts towards; it is essential for breaking the cycle of social injustice where it begins.”

For example, Armbruster’s teams spend weeks getting to know the target neighborhood and locating spots where parents congregate such as soccer matches and supermarkets, and inviting them to participate in events with other parents. A five-month parenting program is offered at local schools for parents with children under six. Most of the participants are single mothers. It is facilitated by two trained mentors and consists of twenty weekly sessions, each designed as a stand-alone module to accommodate parents who cannot attend every time.

ELTERNAG (PARENTING COMMUNITY) GERMANY Meinrad Armbruster | eltern-ag.de

“Parenting sessions will not work unless they are informal and participatory and involve peer-to-peer learning rather than lectures from experts.

Parents must feel that they are in charge of their lives, must experience some quick successes at home, and must not be made to feel inadequate or delinquent.they are in charge of their lives, must experience some quick successes at home, and must not be made to feel inadequate or delinquent.”

IMPACT: > As of December 2013, 204 mentors from 13 german federal states have been trained, reaching 2,029 parents with 4,662 children. > After joining the course, the participants feel more secure in their children’s education and the children show a improved emotional development. > Participating parents feel more comfortable as parents, and their children show demonstrably fewer learning disabilities and perform better in school than non-participants.

Additional Patterns: * Better Together: Create Peer Support Networks for All Stakeholders in Education.

(Barrier D)

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DESIGN PRINCIPLE 3

Better Together: Create Peer Support Networks for All Stakeholders in Education.

Creating peer-to-peer learning and support for teachers, parents, expecting mothers and others that enables them to transform learning.

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: Kathryn founded the Birthing Project to counteract worrying societal inequalities such as the fact that African-American babies are more than twice as likely to die before the age of 1 than non-Hispanic white babies (OMH, 2009). She recognized that the moment of pregnancy—a time when even women engaging in the riskiest behaviors may be open to change—is a prime opportunity to pair the most vulnerable young black women with a decisionmaking partner.

THE BIRTHING PROJECT UNITED STATES Kathryn Hall-Trujillo | birthingprojectusa.org

To this end, the Birthing Project mobilizes African American women to assume this partnership role, taking responsibility for the future of an at-risk pregnant woman and her baby through, at minimum, the baby’s first birthday. Kathryn has carefully engineered a series of activities to encourage empathy and openness between sisters.

Together, “SisterFriends” take on the health care monolith and personal situations, doing whatever it takes—from regular doctor’s visits to planning and problem solving. This “big sister” role is designed to help a young, pregnant woman take action towards protecting her baby’s health and future. As a result, Kathryn’s work gives children the chance to be born to, and to grow up with, mothers committed to their health and well-being.

In its efforts to support underserved women globally in becoming maternal and child health leaders in their own communities, the Birthing Project also helps to integrate traditional midwives into their local health care system.

“What happens to you when you are pregnant is not as important as the condition you were in before you got pregnant. that is what most strongly impacts your birth outcome.”

IMPACT: >Since its inception, the Birthing Project has welcomed more than 12,000 babies20 and been replicated in 105 communities in the United States, Canada, Cuba, Honduras and Malawi. > Birthing Project babies tend to weigh an average of 7.5 pounds compared to a 6.5-pound average as well as gestation periods of 40 weeks compared to the 38 week-term average. > Women attend 80% of their prenatal appointments after being matched with a SisterFriend and 70% of their postpartum appointments, as compared to about 35% and 40%, respectively, in the target population.

Additional Patterns: * Better Together: Create Peer Support Networks for All Stakeholders in Education.

(Barrier D)

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“Peer support groups of expectant mothers and volunteer SisterFriends gives children the chance to be born to, and to grow up with, mothers committed to their health and well-being.”

DESIGN PRINCIPLE 4

Wired for Learning: Put Children in Charge. for Learning.

Giving children a voice and cultivating agency through experiential learning, project-based learning, and civic engagement.

SOLUTION EXAMPLE:

TRIVSELSPROGRAM (WELLBEING PROGRAM) SCANDINAVIA

Kjartan founded TL given concern that the once spirited playground have become a haven for discord, misconduct, and malaise. By encouraging young people to engage in physical activity and serve as role models for their classmates, Trivselsprogram (TL) is an activities program that creates recess systems for active play in elementary and junior high schools. The program instills regular practice of personal leadership, active play, and teamwork, enabling children to create a school environment that is free from verbal and physical bullying, gossip, and ostracism.

As a part of the program, Activity Leaders are elected twice a year by their fellow students according to how well they model compassionate behavior.

With over 50,000 TL leaders in Norway alone, Activity Leaders receive are responsible for creating weekly recess plans and acting as facilitators of inclusive recess activities. Such program design allows teachers to focus on teaching, while cultivating empathy, inclusion, and leadership among youth.

As the program makes plans to expand into other countries, it also developing a classroom curriculum for playful learning, making it easy for teachers to teach mathematics, history, and science through outdoors activities, as well as exploring a model that is specifically targeted for kindergartners.

Kjartan Eide | trivselsleder.no

“TL has tens of thousands of student leaders every year throughout Scandanvia who lead play during recess and are elected by fellow pupils based on certain values including being nice, kind and inclusive towards all students.”

IMPACT: > 97% of TL staff note increased physical activity at recess; 69% feel that student conflict has decreased; and 90% feel that the program is highly effective. > Since its founding in 2009, TL has grown to reach over 1,000 schools21 in Scandinavia including 900 schools in Norway, 100 in Sweden, and pilot programs in Iceland and Denmark. > It also reaches 400 teachers through an annual conference in Oslo. > NTC is partnering with States and school districts across America to reach more new teachers and expand its impact. NTC is also a partner of the Ministry of Education in Singapore..

Additional Patterns: *“Whole child” development is undervalued (Barrier A)

“For kids, play is actually kids’ first meeting with democracy. During play kids need to adjust towards others, they have to agree on certain rules, they have to develop problem solving and they have to interact with other pupils, other human beings actually.”

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DESIGN PRINCIPLE 4

Wired for Learning: Put Children in Charge.

Giving children a voice and cultivating agency through experiential learning, project-based learning, and civic engagement.

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: Irene Mutumba founded the Private Education Development Network (PEDN) given concern that universal primary education was straining under outdated infrastructure, causing students to lack the practical skills to enter the skilled labor market.

To encourage initiative, creativity, discipline, independent thinking, and selfmanagement skills needed to be successful, PEDN creates action-oriented, student-centered youth clubs cultivating entrepreneurship. In both secondary school Young Entrepreneurs’ Clubs and primary school Alfatoon Clubs, students discover and develop their talents, youth are groomed to seize opportunities, be confident, and find their own paths as they mature into competitive and productive individuals in society. Mentored by volunteers from the business and citizen sectors, students create and run small business projects that simultaneously promote a money management culture and children’s rights and responsibilities.

In doing so, PEDN also educates the entire community about children’s potential in the modern economy.

By cultivating a culture of entrepreneurship, PEDN transforms Ugandan society and facilitates vibrant youth leadership in the business world for generations to come. Its integration into the existing education system, engagement of surrounding business and citizen sectors, and focus on life skills for employment all build PEDN’s strong roots in the community.

“Teachers should be more of facilitators leaving the young people to take charge - leaving young people in control of the actual learning by giving them activities such as debate, role play, group work... where young people actually participate.”

IMPACT: > PEDN is reaching 503,279 youth22 with 9 programs in over 313 schools. > PEDN is working with the Head Teachers’ Association, the Curriculum Development Center, Members of Parliament, Young Entrepreneurs-UK, and Teaching Kids Business-Canada to weave a “curriculum of entrepreneurship” into the formal education system nationwide and create supplementary materials that teachers countrywide can use as part of their education tools.

Additional Patterns: *“One-size-fits-all fits none: Students are disengaged and not being prepared for real life. (Barrier B)

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“YOUNG ENTREPRENEURS CLUBS” UGANDA Irene Mutumba | pedn.org

“Through entrepreneurial teaching, we can have more flourishing families and communities. Young people can be catalysts of change within their own schools, within their families and communities, and of course the country at large.”

DESIGN PRINCIPLE 4

Wired for Learning: Put Children in Charge. for Learning.

Giving children a voice and cultivating agency through experiential learning, project-based learning, and civic engagement.

RIVERSIDE SCHOOL INDIA Kiran Bir Sethi | schoolriverside.com

SOLUTION EXAMPLE: Kiran founded Riverside School as a mainstream option for students through Grade 12. Riverside’s curriculum gives students the tools and opportunity to explore and hone their visual/spatial, bodily/kinesthetic, musical, interpersonal, naturalist, and intrapersonal intelligence.

Although the classes are unconventional, the students achieve at a high level in competitive exams.

The “A Protagonist in Every Child” (aProCh) campaign extends beyond the school to teach children how to be protagonists in their community.

Examples include: Friends of the Children, which partners with businesses, news agencies, and institutes, to open their premises to children so that they can explore and appreciate the social infrastructure of a city. In another initiative, twenty children along with experts from design institute have begun to create a children’s park in the city.

Design for Change, a campaign founded by Kiran as a way to spread the principles of the Riverside School, has reached over 35 countries and 250,000 children who are designing and implementing solutions in the areas of education, environment, child.

“The whole point of the first years is about building creative confidenceabout turning fear into courage, or dependence into independence. It’s a huge story around that and it comes with the idea of illumination of the self...In a way, our learning journey is: aware, enable, empower”

IMPACT: > The Riverside School has over 374 students24 and was ranked the No.3 Day School in India ( Education World in 2013). > The school has franchised to nearby cities and become the model for municipal schools in Ahmedabad; nationwide, the Riverside model will soon be implemented in India’s Army Schools and neighboring Bhutan.

“We aim to see that shift in mindset between ‘I can’t’ and ‘I can.’

> In national exams (ASSET), students outperform peers by up to 50% in languages, 60% in math, and 40% in science.

Additional Patterns: *Actively Design Space & Culture as Essential Elements for Learning. (Design Principle 2 *“One-size-fits-all fits none: Students are disengaged and not being prepared for real life. (Barrier B)

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4

EPILOGUE

What We Learned from the Re-imagine Learning Challenge Seven Tips for Growing the Network When we launched the Re-imagine Learning Challenge in spring 2014, the unexpected happened: for the first time in Ashoka history, Players (challenge entrants) generated 19 times more peer-to-peer feedback than our Ashoka review teams had ever had in a single challenge. Players from around the world exchanged tips on strengths and weaknesses, and suggested connections in the thousands; with 631 ideas shared across 70 countries, they answered the challenge to Re-imagine Learning with inspiring gusto.

When the online challenge to Re-imagine Learning launched, we asked every participant to identify which innovation pattern their work most closely aligns with. These patterns included:

Design Principles adopted by leading social entrepreneurs: 1.

Equip Adults to Drive Change in Learning: Providing creative learning experiences for teachers, parents, working professions and others that empowers them to drive change in any part of the learning ecosystem.

2.

Actively Designing Space & Culture as Essential Elements for Learning: Creating cost-effective methods to infuse a school with habits, language, and materials needed for learning through play.

3.

Creating Peer Support Networks for All Stakeholders in Education: Creating peer-to-peer learning and support for teachers, parents, expecting mothers and more that enables them to transform learning.

4.

Putting Children in Charge: Giving children a voice and cultivating agency via experiential learning, project-based learning, and civic engagement.

Barriers tackled by leading social entrepreneurs: • Whole child development is undervalued: Essential parts of development get left behind as children get older, such as healthy habits, executive function, and social and emotional learning.

• One size fits all fits none: Students are disengaged and not being prepared for “real life.”

• Trapped Between Competing Pressures: Educators face a lack of capacity to re-imagine and restructure educational settings • Lack of structures to facilitate meaningful community ownership in learning process: It is challenging to ensure parents and the broader community are involved as full co-owners in the learning process.

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[Online charts available at Changemakers.com/play2learn]

I

n addition to asking entrants to identify which of the patterns most closely aligned with their theory of change, we also posed questions to deepen our understanding of the network and its approaches. While every participant has been welcomed as an essential part of the Re-imagine Learning network, practitioners identified which ideas would gain additional distinction as Pacesetters (top 304), Pioneers (top 30) or Champions of learning through play (top 10).

The following insights draw on Ashoka’s analysis of the Re-imagine Learning participants, along with the attributes that distinguish the 10 Champions from the other 621 solutions that were submitted. We have also included recommendations for the broader Re-imagine Learning network and the power it has to deliver on the future of learning, along with references to interactive online charts where the data can be more fully explored.

Visit Changemakers.com/play2learn to view the interactive data part one “About the 631 Players” (Charts A-L) and part two “What Distinguished the 10 Champions From the 631 Players” (Charts M-Y).

About the Re-imagine Learning Network

Wide Geographic Spread

The Re-imagine Learning Players shared more than 630 ideas representing impact in over 70 countries. The majority of entries were submitted by educator-innovators in North America (30%), followed by those in South America (29%), Europe (16%), Asia (16%), Africa (7%), and Oceania (0.79%). [online chart a] Although Europe and Africa were represented in the group of Pioneers, they were significantly under-represented within the final group of 10 Champions of learning through play, which featured innovators from Kenya and Uganda but none from Europe. It’s worth noting that three of the 10 Champions of learning through play are headquartered in Europe, but their organizations are making impact abroad. [online chart o].

Network Tip No. 1: Offer Capacity Building and Engagement Outreach for Underrepresented Regions To grow the network, it will be necessary to offer capacity and evidence building services, and generally expand engagement to include more projects that intend to create impact within Europe and Africa.

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Shifting Mindsets and Attitudes: Common innovation Patterns When asked to choose from a list of design solutions to challenges in education, the most popular approach selected by Players at almost every stage was to Put Children in Charge. Nearly half (more than 44%) of Players in the Re-imagine Learning Challenge selected ‘Putting Children in Charge’ as the education solution that best represented their work.

This design solution was twice as popular as other approaches. The only exception was at the final stage—six of the 10 Champions of learning through play represented the design principle ‘Equipping Adults to Drive Change in Learning.’ [online chart m] When asked to select a barrier, ‘Whole Child Development is Undervalued’ was identified by Players at every stage as the most significant barrier to focus on solving.

Measurement: Importance of External Studies Pioneers and Champions were twice as likely to have had their impact measured and evaluated by an “external study”—a third-party, objective assessment of their work. More than 55 percent of the Champions of learning through play had an external study completed, compared to only 31 percent of Pacesetters. [online chart q]

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Network Tip No. 2: 70 Countries, Hundreds of Common Innovative Approaches: Spotlight Shared Stories for unlocking change The diversity of the Challenge pool offers an opportunity to showcase a the broad range of ways Players Put Children in Charge. Similarly, the network is now primed to articulate the value of Whole Child Development nearly anywhere in the world. [online chart n]

Network Tip No. 3: Spread proven evidence and spark more studies through research partnerships External studies detailing the impact of Challenge Pioneers and Champions of learning through play could offer a rich insights about what may work for the broader network. Champions of learning through play and Pioneers might also be able to recommend the best way for practitioners to receive evaluation of impact from a third party. (This shortfall of evaluation support is a commonly cited reason for not being able to conduct more studies.)

Mostly New Projects... Except for Champions The Challenge drew a significant number of idea-stage projects or start-up projects (48% of all projects); these remained well-represented among the 304 Pacesetters, with idea-stage or start-up projects representing more than one-third (36%) of all the Pioneers projects. However, among the 30 Pioneers, there were no idea-stage projects, while 16 percent (5 projects) are start-ups. Half of the Champions of learning through play were in the scaling phase of their work, meeting Challenge criteria for “demonstrated impact.” [online chart r]

Network Tip No. 4: Grow the Network by Unlocking the Potential of New Ideas Given the desire to engage the full range of stakeholders needed to transform learning, including students and parents, it may still be worth pursuing a specific way to nurture, recognize, and grow projects that are in the idea or start-up phases. While these early-stage projects are unlikely to be successful in attracting funding when judged against projects that are already scaling proven impact, they should still have the opportunity to develop as highpotential solutions in the long-run.

START-UP PHASE PIONEERS • JeepNeed’s Lab in Box • Tackle • codeSpark • EduSpot • Make it Epic! Middle School Re-imagined.

[Online charts available at Changemakers.com/play2learn]

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Varied Intervention Focus Interventions featured in the Re-imagine Learning Challenge covered almost every category, from childcare and community-based interventions to curricular or policy. [online chart w] Players identified with a full range of roles related to learning, including teachers, administrators, coaches, parents, and students. [online chart y] They also engaged with three distinct age groups. It was also promising to see how many Players in the Challenge were affiliated with formal schools (more than 53%, or about 334 projects self-identified with a public or private school), demonstrating how their work is being actively developed within formal learning contexts where learning outcomes are a central focus. Furthermore, at every stage, more Players associated with public (tuition-free) schools than with private schools. [online chart x]

Network Tip No. 5: Build upon strong ties to schools The range of connections held by members of the network sends the strong signal that playful learning isn’t accessible only to students at schools of means, nor is it limited to specific age groups; the network already has a presence in schools across the world - both public and private - that can serve to inspire and spread effective approaches, or strengthen the impact of existing ones.

It would be worthwhile to design more specific questions to better understand those educatorinnovators who are operating without any affiliation to schools, or posing a more specific call for solutions by parents or other leaders in informal learning settings.

[Online charts available at Changemakers.com/play2learn]

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Diverse Organization Structure A large percentage of organizations (43%) identified as having some for-profit element, either as as hybrid organizations or as for-profits. On the other hand, when asked to identify what type of intervention a project focused on, projects that indicated they were focused on making financing available for learning initiatives were either underrepresented or not represented at all (fewer than 2%).

Network Tip No. 6: Create a dedicated call for ideas for financing solutions Given the importance of resources for being able to create change within educational systems, a more targeted call may be needed to attract interventions specifically focused on financing.

Alternatively, the hybrid of forprofit organizations may be a source of learning for the broader network on creative ways to ease access to resources.

Network Tip No. 7: Share the inspiration of nimble teams

Looking Ahead Ultimately, our goal has been to create and launch a Re-imagine Learning Challenge network built on a foundation of transparency. Sharing Challenge data and its relationship to the Social Innovation Mapping is part of our “everyone a winner� strategy: Every person in the network has a role to play and each contributor is needed to achieve deep and lasting change for the future of learning.

In terms of organizational size, four of the 10 Champions of learning through play are operating with fewer than 10 employees. This is a great sign: more personnel doesn’t necessarily suggest a greater ability to create change. [online chart v]

We are also interested in learning and growing collaboratively. We know that not every solution and insight critical to transforming learning has been represented in this report, or in the Challenge. If you are designing environments where kids and adults are learning through play, whether at home, in a classroom or on a playground, we want to hear from you.

What is missing from this innovation mapping? What does this report get right? Where does it fall short? What needs to be better understood in order to change the way the world learns?

Help us continue to map the landscape of innovation in education and learning and build a global network of parents, educators, researchers, administrators, and social entrepreneurs dedicated to changing the way the world learns.

Connect with us online at Changemakers.com/play2learn or via e-mail at dmatielo@ashoka.org

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5

APPENDIX

APPENDIX A: 2014 RE-IMAGINING LEARNING CHALLENGE DATA ANALYSIS Interactive data visualizations of all entrants to the

2014 Re-imagining Learning global challenge can be found at the following links: Part 1: “About the 631 Players” (Charts A-L) - http://www. changemakers.com/play2learn/infographic Part 2: “What Distinguished the 10 Champions from the 631 Players” (Charts M-Y) - http://www.changemakers.com/ play2learn/infographic2

The categories that were utilized for the data visualizations are as follows: Innovation Patterns and Approach: Barriers tackled Design principles Intervention focus Approaches to play Outside impact evaluation study conducted

About the Team: Role in education Number of employees Number of volunteers Geography: Country State Continent Languages spoken Advanced vs. emerging economy Quality: All 631 entrants (players) Top 304 (pacesetters) Top 30 (pioneers) Top 10 among (champions)

About the Organization: Year founded Organization type Stage

In particular, the Design Principles and Barriers (innovation patterns) that the entrants were summarized for the entrants to self-select from as follows:

DESIGN PRINCIPLES

BARRIERS

• Equip Adults to Drive Change in Learning: Providing creative learning experiences for teachers, parents, working professions, and others that empower them to drive change in any part of the learning ecosystem.

• Actively Designing Space and Culture as Essential Elements for Learning: Creating cost-effective methods that infuse a school with habits, language, and materials needed for learning through play.

• Creating Peer Support Networks for All Stakeholders in Education: Creating peer-to-peer learning and support for teachers, parents, expecting mothers, and others that enables them to transform learning.

• Putting Children in Charge: Giving children a voice and cultivating agency through experiential learning, project-based learning, and civic engagement.

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Budget Funding sources School type

• Whole Child Development is Undervalued: Essential parts of development get left behind as children get older--such as healthy habits, executive function, and social and emotional learning.

• One-Size-Fits-All Fits None: Students are disengaged and not being prepared for real life.

• Trapped Between Competing Pressures: Educators face a lack of capacity to re-imagine and restructure educational settings.

• Lack of Structures to Facilitate Meaningful Community Ownership in the Learning Process: It is challenging to ensure that parents and the broader community are involved as full co-owners in the learning process.

APPENDIX B: REFERENCES 1. Drayton, Bill. (2013). A Team of Team Worlds. Stanford Social Innovation Review. Retrieved from http://www. ssireview.org/articles/entry/a_team_ of_teams_world 2. Tavangar, Homa. (2013, August 12).

Empathy: The most Important Backto-School Supply. Edutopia. Retrieved from http://www.edutopia.org/blog/ empathy-back-to-school-supply-homa-tavangar 3. Kyung Hee Kim (2011) The Creativity Crisis: The Decrease in Creative Thinking Scores on the Torrance.

Tests of Creative Thinking, Creativity Research Journal, 23:4, 285-295, DOI: 10.1080/10400419.2011.627805 Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1 0400419.2011.627805 4. Vint, larry. (Autumn 2005) Fresh Thinking Drives Creativity, Innovation.

Griffith University. Retrieved from http://www98.griffith.edu.au/dspace/ bitstream/handle/10072/7880/33187_1. pdf?sequence 5. Gauntlett, D., Ackermann, E., Whitebread, D. Wolbers, T., Weckstrom, C., Thomsen, B.S. (2011) The Future of Learning. LEGO Learning Institute. Retrieved from http://cache.lego.com/r/ legofoundation/-/media/LEGO%20 Foundation/Downloads/Foundation%20 research/Future%20of%20Learning%20REPORT.pdf 6. TED. (2006). How Schools Kill Creativity [Video webcast]. Retrieved from http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity 7. Playworks. (2013) 2013 Annual Report. Retrieved from http://www. playworks.org/about/media/annual-report/2013

8. Mathematica Policy Research, John W. Gardner Center for Youth and their Communities. (May 2013) Impact and Implementation Findings from an Experimental Evaluation of Playworks: Effects on School Climate, Academic Learning, Student Social Skills and Behavior. Retrieved from http://www. rwjf.org/content/dam/farm/reports/ evaluations/2013/rwjf405971 9. Peace First. (2011). Peace First National Evaluation Report 2010-2011.

Retrieved from http://www.peacefirst. org/images/pdf/fy11%20peace%20 first%20national%20evaluation%20report%20final.pdf 10. High Tech High. High Tech High Achievements to Date. Retrieved March 31, 2014 from http://www.hightechhigh. org/about/results.php 11. Center for Inspired Teaching.

Impact. Retrieved March 31, 2014 from http://www.inspiredteaching.org/impact 12. Nichoals-Barrer, I., Haimson, J. (2013) Mathematica Policy Research.

Impacts of Five Expeditionary Learning Middle schools on Academic Achievement. Retrieved from http://www.mathematica-mpr.com/publications/pdfs/ education/EL_middle_Schools.pdf

16. Riverside School. History. Retrieved March 31, 2013 from http://www. schoolriverside.com/node.aspx?nodeId=65&siteID=1 17. Deportes para compartir. ResultsImpact Reports. Retrieved March 31, 2013 from http://deportesparacompartir.org.mx/es/reportes-de-impacto/ 18. New Teacher Center. Impact.

Retrieved March 31, 2013 from http:// www.newteachercenter.org/impact 19. Glazerman, S., Isenberg, E., Dolfin, S., Bleeker, M., Johnson, A., Grider, M., Jacobus, M., Mathematica Policy Research, Ali, M. (June 2010) Impacts of Comprehensive Teacher Induction: Final Results from a Randomized Controlled Study. Retrieved from: http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/pubs/20104027/ pdf/20104027.pdf 20. Birthing Project. Birthing ProjectNashville. Retrieved March 31, 2013 from http://www.birthingprojectusa. org/changes111811/AMCHP%20Poster%20Nashvillepdf.pdf 21. Trivselprogram. About Wellbeing Program. Retrieved March 31, 2013 from http://www.trivselsleder.no/no/ OM-PROGRAMMET/

13. Papilo. Facts and Figures. Retrieved March 31, 2014 from http://www.papilio.de/papilio_zahlen-daten-fakten.php

22. Private Education Development Network. About PEDN. Retrived March 31, 2013 from http://www.pedn.org/ index.php/who-we-are/overview.html

14. Execuela Nueva. Escuela Neuva & FEN milestones. Retrieved March 31, 2014 from http://www.escuelanueva. org/portal/en/escuela-nueva-model/ history.html

23. Communities that Care. Demonstrated Effectiveness. Retrieved March 31, 2013 from http://www. gruene-liste-praevention.de/nano.cms/ datenbank/programm/26

15. Dream A Dream. Dream A Dream Annual Report 2012-2013. Retrieved from http://dreamadream.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Dream-ADream-Annual-Report-2012-13.pdf

24. Riverside School. History. Retrieved March 31, 2013 from http://www. schoolriverside.com/node.aspx?nodeId=65&siteID=1

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APPENDIX C: INDEX OF SOCIAL ENTREPRENEURS THE SOCIAL ENTREPRENUERS CHOSEN FOR ANALYSIS. After the launch of the Re-imagine Learning challenge, over 631 projects also shared their ideas. The resulting Champions and Ashoka Fellows are are also listed with a STAR.

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Admir Lukacevic

Aleta Margolis

Organization: Idrott Utan Gränser Country: Sweden Page Featured: page 16

Organization: Center for Inspired Teaching Country: United States Page Featured: page 25

Alison Naftalin

Ana Maria de Araújo Mello

Organization: Lively Minds Community-Run Play Centres Country: Uganda Page Featured: page 16

Organization: Creche Carochinha (Fairytale Nursery) Country: Brazil Page Featured: page 16

Andrew Mangino

Azize Leygara

Organization: Dream Directors Country: United States Page Featured: page 16

Organization: ÇAÇA Country: Turkey Page Featured: page 16

Beatriz Diuk

Darrel Hammond

Organization: Derecho a Aprender a Leer y a Escribir Country: Argentina Page Featured: page 16

Organization: KaBOOM! Country: United States Page Featured: page 16

Dina Buchbinder

Ellen Moir

Organization: Deportes para Compartir (DpC) Country: Mexico Page Featured: page 34

Organization: New Teacher Center Country: United States Page Featured: page 36

Eric Dawson

Emrah Kırımsoy

Organization: Peace First Country: United States Page Featured: page 22

Organization: Agenda Children Country: Turkey Page Featured: page 16

Gabriela Arenas

Guy Etienne

Organization: Fundación TAAP Country: Venezuela Page Featured: page 16

Organization: College Catts Pressoir Country: Haiti Page Featured: page 16

Heidrun Mayer

Irene Mutumba

Organization: PAPILIO Country: Germany Page Featured: page 28

Organization: “Young Entrepreneurs Clubs” Country: Uganda Page Featured: page 40

Jill Vialet

Kabir Vajpeyi

Organization: Playworks Country: United States Page Featured: page 21

Organization: Vinyas Centre for Architectural Research and Design Country: India Page Featured: page 35

Kathryn Hall-Trujillo

Kevin Marinacci

Organization: The Birthing Project Country: United States Page Featured: page 38

Organization: Fabretto Children’s Foundation Country: Nicaragua Page Featured: page 16

Kiran Bir Sethi

Kjartan Eide

Organization: Riverside School Country: India Page Featured: page 41

Organization: Trivselsprogram (Wellbeing Program) Country: Norway, Sweden, Iceland Page Featured: page 39

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Larry Rosenstock

Maria Diarra Keita

Organization: High Tech High Country: United States Page Featured: page 23

Organization: Institute for Popular Education Country: Mali Page Featured: page 30

Marian Chwastniewski

Mike McGalliard

Organization: Stowarzyszenie Tworcze i Edukacyjne WYSPA (Creative and Educational Association ISLAND) Country: Poland Page Featured: page 27

Organization: Global Cardboard Challenge: Imagination Foundation Country: United States and activities in 50 countries Page Featured: page 16

Mary Anne Amorim Ribeiro

Mary Gordon

Organization: PUPA Early Childhood Development Country: Brazil Page Featured: page 16

Organization: Roots of Empathy Country: Canada Page Featured: page 16

Molly Barker

Meinrad Armbruster

Organization: Girls on the Run Country: United States Page Featured: page 16

Organization: Eltern AG (Parenting Community) Country: Germany Page Featured: page 37

Oliver Percovich

Rawan Barakat

Organization: Skateistan Country: Afghanistan, Kabul & Mazar-e-Sharif Page Featured: page 16

Organization: Raneen Country: Jordan Page Featured: page 16

Scott Hartl

Terrie Rose

Organization: Expeditionary Learning Country: United States Page Featured: page 26

Organization: Baby’s Space - A Place to Grow Country: United States Page Featured: page 33

Thorsten Kiefer

Victoria (Vicky) Colbert

Organization: WASH United (WASH = Water, Sanitation and Hgyiene) Country: Kenya Page Featured: page 16

Organization: Fundacion Escuela Nueva: Volvamos a la Gente (New School Fund: Back to the People) Country: Colombia Page Featured: page 29

Vishal Talreja

Wannakanok Pohiraedaoh

Organization: Dream a Dream Country: India Page Featured: page 32

Organization: Luuk Rieng Group (Youth for the Peace) Country: Thailand Page Featured: page 16

Yuyhun Park Organization: Infollution Zero Country: South Korea, Singapore Page Featured: page 20

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APPENDIX D: ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS AUTHORED BY REEM RAHMAN WITH THANKS TO ASHOKA COLLEAGUES JOCELYN FONG, LAURA WHITE, DANIELLE GOLDSTONE, SALLY STEPHENSON, SANDRA HINDERLITER, LINDSAY HORIKOSHI, SHILPA CHANDRAN, DANI MATIELO, TIM SCHEU, MARZENA ZUKOWSKA, THE ASHOKA VENTURE TEAM, AND THE GENEROSITY OF THE INTERVIEWEES FOR THEIR CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE THINKING THAT PRODUCED THIS REPORT. ASHOKA IS GRATEFUL TO THE LEGO FOUNDATION FOR ITS SUPPORT ON THE 2014 REIMAGINING LEARNING GLOBAL CHALLENGE THAT MADE THIS REPORT POSSIBLE.

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