Transforming Teaching

Developed by member deans of Deans for Impact in close collaboration with Dan Willingham and Paul Bruno, the Science of Learning document is intended as a resource to teacher-educators, new teachers, or anyone in the education profession interested in understanding the existing scientific consensus around basic cognitive principles — and practical implications for the classroom. Deans for Impact - a national organization committed to improving student-learning outcomes by stewarding the transformation of educator preparation - spearheaded a collaborative effort among two dozen schools of education to contribute to the field’s overall understanding about what teacher-candidates should learn as part of their preparation. The group’s efforts are grounded in a commitment to data-informed continuous improvement and empirical testing. You can download the recently released document at http://www.deansforimpact.org/

How might we innovate teacher preparation in the United States to improve outcomes for all students? That is the question driving the work of Dr. Deborah Hirsch, Executive Director of the Woodrow Wilson Academy of Teaching and Learning. She and her team are preparing to launch the nation’s first competency-based graduate school of education. How and why they are “throwing out the clock” to prepare teachers, what design challenges they face, where their graduates will teach, and how they might open source both their platform and curriculum are among the questions explored on this 29 minute-long Transforming Teaching podcast. Founded in 1945, the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation identifies and develops leaders and institutions to meet the nation’s critical challenges.

Housed at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, The Transforming Teaching Project aims to revolutionize the way teaching is organized, supported, and regarded in the United States. We work with a growing coalition of teacher training programs, higher education institutions, non-profits, funding organizations, state and district agencies, teacher unions, and others committed to working in concert with one another to deliver transformative change to the teaching profession. The first episode includes an interview with Dr. Jal Mehta, Associate Professor at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education and Leader of The Transforming Teaching Project.

000: Welcome to The Transforming Teaching Podcast