Kyle Wagner on 12 Shifts for Student-Centered Environments

Shownotes

In this episode of the Getting Smart Podcast, Tom Vander Ark is joined by project-based learning (PBL) advocate Kyle Wagner to dive into the transformative power of PBL in creating student-centered environments. Kyle shares his journey from visiting innovative schools like High Tech High to becoming a global ambassador for PBL. They discuss how these educational models foster creativity, agency, and purpose among students, and explore the broader implications for education systems worldwide. Whether you’re an educator, administrator, or parent, this episode provides valuable insights into how project-based learning can reshape the future of education. Tune in to learn about Kyle’s new book, “Where’s the Teacher? 12 Shifts for Student-Centered Environments,” and discover strategies for implementing PBL in your own educational context.

Introduction to Project-Based Learning

Tom Vander Ark: You’re listening to the Getting Smart Podcast. I’m Tom Vander Ark, and we’re talking to project-based learning advocate Kyle Wagner today. Kyle, it’s great to see you.

Kyle Wagner: Yeah, it’s great to be here, Tom. Thanks for having me.

Tom Vander Ark: Kyle, your book really made me smile because your opening story reminded me of the first time I visited a great project-based school. It was a New Tech Network school. Some students met me at the door and said, “Hi Tom, we’re waiting for you.” And they took me into this big double classroom that was really abuzz with activity. It felt more like Google. There were these teams of students doing work that seemed really important. And I looked over at the students and I said, “Where are the teachers?” And they said, “Oh, they’re in the back,” and they slowly unpacked the project-based model. And it’s been exciting to see this pedagogy grow, but I think you had a similar experience when you visited High Tech High. Is that part of the origin of this new book, Kyle?

Kyle Wagner: Yeah, definitely. It’s very similar to what you described at New Tech. It was a wild experience because when I stepped foot into this large atrium, I guess is the best way to describe it—large open space, right? I didn’t see your typical formal desks or the stuffy kind of office that you typically see. It was two teenagers dressed in nice plaid shirts who said, “Oh, hello Kyle.” Like, similar to what they said to you. And I was taken aback because, look, I’m a new teacher, and one of the first things they tell you is to make sure they call you by your last name. I was taken aback, and I did roll with it. And I said, “Yeah, I’m Mr. Wagner, but okay. If you want to call me Mr. Kyle.” And then they proceeded to just tour me of this space. And one of the first things they pointed me to was the work that they were producing. And I think if you’ve ever been to High Tech High, New Tech is probably maybe similar, just what’s hanging from the walls. You can’t help but feel like you’ve entered this museum, this sacred kind of space that’s really owned by the students, where they’re doing professional work that they’re not afraid to talk about.

Tom Vander Ark: Kyle, I’ve said a hundred times that High Tech High is the best art school in the world. It’s probably the best example of exhibiting student work of any school network that I’ve ever visited. And I think it’s particularly true for the middle schools. Why are the High Tech High middle schools so remarkable?

Kyle Wagner: Yeah, that’s a good question. To be fair, I was at one of the middle schools, so I definitely have a bias. Perhaps it’s the way in which the art teachers there guide the conversation, I think a little bit, in terms of how you curate that space. So maybe it’s the actual faculty there. Perhaps it’s the actual age of the students themselves, really taking this great fidelity towards their work. And you touched on it there. I feel like, again, my bias—that the prime kind of learning years, and so maybe that’s part of it. Maybe it’s the actual projects that they’re engaged in themselves. Those are my speculations on it.

Tom Vander Ark: I do love how the art teachers push into the disciplines and how they infuse art. I think the middle schools seem to have a lot of identity art where students are in some way expressing who they’re becoming or possible futures. And maybe that’s part of what’s so remarkable is because that place is so good at asking kids to consider big questions and so good at cultivating identity and agency and purpose that it seems to be reflected in a lot of the art products that are displayed. Does that make sense?

Kyle Wagner: Yeah, no, I think you touched on identity, agency, and purpose, right? If we can fuse those things together in terms of how we design learning experiences—you also mentioned that big question. I think that if we can get those things in place, sure, of course, they’re formulating that in their middle school years. But I think even outside of those years, those kinds of big questions, those big drivers are going to produce things, you know, those kinds of results that kids really are proud of, that they want to share with others and showcase.

The Magic of High Tech High

Tom Vander Ark: I’m thinking about my first day on the High Tech High campus. It was like visiting this abandoned Navy base, and I walked into an open warehouse. And Larry Rosenstock started describing the course of study, the kinds of projects that students were going to do. I think Riordan had some influence on your life and career.

Kyle Wagner: Rob Riordan, yeah, is named co-founder of High Tech High. And he had a huge influence because you mentioned going into this space, and it’s easy to be awestruck by it, but easy to forget that the real kind of work is happening within the classrooms still. And they might look a little bit different, and you might be collaborating with another teacher to put together some of these experiences, but all of that magic is happening within these transparent classrooms. So they look a little bit different, but still, I mean, you can transfer these kinds of classrooms anywhere in the world. And I was a new teacher there, entering this kind of space, and there is a sharp learning curve, to be honest, because we’re so used to, in teacher credential school, what’s your classroom management plan? What’s your five-step kind of lesson plan that you’ve put together? Where can we give some agency to students is a peripheral question. But when it’s like central to the way in which learning is delivered, it’s very hard to make that transition. And Rob was very pivotal in helping me make those transitions. And he gave me a sheet of paper that showed the kinds of shifts he was looking for to move from teacher-led to student-centered, which kind of became the whole starting point for this concept of the student-centered environments and how we can best curate them.

Tom Vander Ark: What led you to High Tech High—the sort of logistics, and what was the impulse that brought you there?

Kyle Wagner: Yeah, great question. I remember actually sitting in a staff room one time, and we had a very supportive principal, so I can’t say I wasn’t supported in the kind of new moves I wanted to make as a teacher. I was young, I was excited, energetic, and I remember talking about some of the things that I was trying to do or wanted to do, and there were some other teachers on board as well. I mean, I had my gifted class—I put that in quotes because I really truly believe that all students are gifted and that we should make inclusive environments. But I did have a gifted class, and that was kind of my experimental ground where I could try some of these things out. Kids were putting on full-fledged history plays and productions based on what we were studying. These kinds of extensions that we usually call projects that we give to these kinds of classes. I was experiencing some good results with that and was excited about it and wanted to do more of that. I did have, as I mentioned, a supportive principal, but the administration as a whole wanted to move more in a standardized direction. And in the lunchroom, I remember talking to another teacher who was also a great teacher, but said, “Look Kyle, the quicker you can realize that this is the way this system works, and this is the way it’s going to be everywhere, the less frustrated you’re going to be in trying to make any changes.” I remember at that point saying, “I’m going to explore to see if there’s something else out there.” And that kind of began my search for these kinds of places. And I discovered High Tech High, which, lo and behold, wasn’t halfway across the globe—it was 15 miles away.

Transition to International Education

Tom Vander Ark: Kyle, you’ve been an international educator for, I don’t know, a decade now. How did that start?

Kyle Wagner: Yeah. There were summer programs being offered over in Shenzhen, China, to teach in an interdisciplinary fashion, to have these students putting on these plays in English—full production plays out in English that had drama, that had some of the other core kinds of content or classes all infused together. And they were looking for young teachers to go out there. And I had wanted to go to Thailand. I think a lot of people want to travel for the first time. Shenzhen, China, is probably not the first place they want to go. You know, I wanted to get out there. I was young, didn’t have a lot of money at that point, and they were going to pay for this all-expense trip to Shenzhen to do these camps. And they were looking for energetic teachers to do that. And so that landed me in Shenzhen, and that’s where I fell in love with this concept of, “Hey, I don’t have to just travel to these places. I might be able to teach in these backgrounds.” And these kids just saturated and soaked up anything from the West. They were very curious as to pop culture and these kinds of things. I have a music background in addition to my humanities background. And so that began my love affair with this part of the world. And now I’ve been spreading this kind of pedagogy, starting up new programs, and now training teachers to be able to make these kinds of shifts in the classroom.

Tom Vander Ark: Kyle, I want to jump ahead in your story to the International School of Beijing. You had the chance to create what I’d call a micro school. The Futures Academy was a wall-to-wall PBL. We’ll come back and talk about how systems can implement PBL, but are you bullish on micro schools as a way for us to stand up a small community around project-based learning?

Kyle Wagner: I was very bullish, to be honest, about micro schools. I do still believe that micro schools or smaller schools in general, smaller systems—and it doesn’t have to be a micro school, right? I think I would say micro learning communities, I think, is maybe a better word for it. I am a strong advocate for those. I’m less bullish about a school within a school model. We, of course, tried that at the International School of Beijing. I think there are a lot of stakeholders to appease all at the same time when you’re trying to make a big shift in a large school and you’re doing it on a small scale because there’s a culture that exists in that place already. And even though Futures Academy was wildly successful—they said we’d be lucky to get 24 to start our first year; we had a waiting list. We grew; it tripled in size within a year. And then we outgrew ourselves and looked for how to expand. And of course, if you’re still within a larger school, it’s a very tenuous kind of relationship to have as that school. So I think I’m a very strong advocate for micro learning communities because they can accelerate these changes. We need to see whether it’s AI, whether it’s digital learning, whether it’s project-based experiences, whether it’s better connections to the community—whatever the pedagogy is for preparing students better for what we call the future. I think you can accelerate those in smaller learning communities.

Tom Vander Ark: I ask for a variety of reasons. One, we’re working with a number of public systems that are trying to create a school within a school model, and they’re typically project-based. I think, taking inspiration from your Futures Academy, Singapore American School created Quest, a high school micro school, and they created a number of Pathfinder spaces that were project-based. And I think those had some success at flipping the host—at least it helped sell a bond or fundraise for converting the facility and the academic programs. So that may be a successful flip-the-host model, but it is fair that a lot of these school-within-the-schools can get stuck as a special sidelight and not influence the greater whole.

Kyle Wagner: Yeah. Yeah. And I’m glad you mentioned those places. I’m familiar with those places. In fact, we had a teacher from Futures Academy who went over to Singapore American School to teach in that program. And yeah, we’ve got to be fair in terms of how we’re defining these micro schools, micro communities, and what the outcomes are. Let’s say, for example, at the International School of Beijing, one of the things they took on that they learned from the micro school is how do we do this interdisciplinary type of learning? And so they were able to transfer that kind of concept into the high school, and they built out some of these spaces to allow for this much more flexible learning environment. I guess if it’s to inform the larger school on kind of shifts that they can make, and that’s really clearly communicated to the community, and it’s not necessarily us versus them—the micro school program versus, for lack of better words, the traditional program or the non-micro school program—because that’s where it gets a little bit tricky. But they can definitely accelerate if it’s really well communicated; they can accelerate some of these changes that we’re wanting to see in larger systems that have a harder time moving.

Tom Vander Ark: Kyle, we’re really excited about your new book, Where’s the Teacher? 12 Shifts for Student-Centered Environments. You have matured into, I think, one of the most important advocates for project-based learning. You’re the international troubadour for PBL, and your writing and storytelling, even your graphics, are just—they’re beautiful and thoughtful. So just, I guess, a big thank you for your work, particularly over the last five years, where it just feels like it’s very productive, very thoughtful, and super timely.

Kyle Wagner: Yeah. I want to give a big shout-out to you, Tom, and the whole Getting Smart team because when I was starting to make this shift into more of the professional development space, I specifically remember you having a project with One Stone, which, for whoever’s listening to this podcast, what a fabulous place, but very much student-run. And I remember you orchestrating this two-day journey of them really defining themselves and what they were about and bringing a lot of people on board, myself included, which I think is one of your many superpowers. But I wanted to highlight that work that you did, and that really propelled me into thinking that this is important work and how do we get more people involved.

Exploring the Global Stage

Tom Vander Ark: Your book on the 12 shifts—it’s centered on project-based learning, but these 12 shifts really together illustrate a learning model, right? A school model. It’s not just kids doing projects. It really, taken together, the 12 shifts are, I think, a really coherent learning model. You do a nice job of that in your book, where you organize this into parts. So part one is on learner-centered design and unleashing student inquiry. The first one is on co-design, the first shift from teacher-designed learning to co-design. That is super important. The interesting thing about PBL is that it’s like the old pedagogy that’s new. It’s suddenly in the age of AI where we’re living with these, with this co-intelligence, that the essence of PBL and your 12 shifts are, I think, more timely than ever. Talk about why that idea of co-designer is so important.

Kyle Wagner: We’re not going to have very clear-cut paths of learning when students exit school. So how can we create a much more dynamic, kind of divergent path? I go back to a quote that Rob Reardon gave me. He said, “We’re not a project-based school. We’re a dialogue school.” And I think that’s it. It’s a constant dialogue in learning and negotiation with what are we about? What are we trying to learn? What’s a question that really captures what we’re trying to learn if it’s done as a class or collectively? How then can we chart out a path to learn this together? And what might we produce that’s going to be meaningful, some kind of outcomes as well? And of course, that’s something that everybody has to think about—varying levels of comfort with. If you have your set curriculum, of course, you can negotiate more around what you’re needing to teach more topically, more curriculum-wise. And if you have a little bit more open curriculum, which a lot of these schools in the international world with the PYP kind of curriculum, which is a little bit more open, or maybe Montessori or Reggio Emilia, then that is something that should be done naturally. It’s a consistent conversation—learning is. And co-design is constantly negotiating with students really what we are most intrigued about learning. You know, what do we need to get there? What are those missing pieces in terms of what we’re trying to do and what we might produce as a result?

Tom Vander Ark: I want to shift ahead to shift number eight: from independent task completion to collaborative task completion. It’s about fostering teamwork. How much of project-based learning should be individual, and how much of it should be a team?

Kyle Wagner: I guess it’s less about quantifying it, and it’s more about looking at your set of learners. That’s a question you’ve got to negotiate. I think students’ level of comfort in working with teams and team dynamics has to be another question that you’re asking yourself in terms of the learning experience, what you are undergoing, how much of that naturally is something that would be done in teams outside of school. So just to give an example, we had an individual experience around identity and students really better understanding their identity, where that comes from. They had a lot of conversations with their relatives. They interviewed grandparents for the first time about some of these bigger questions about where they came from, in terms of how they developed certain family kind of traits, and these kinds of things. That’s maybe more independent and an individual kind of thing where they’re putting all this together in some kind of story of their identity. However, there’s these team projects as well. One that a school put together where students were exploring a little bit of sharing community stories, and they’re using community stories to redefine the American dream that always taught. The Great Gatsby—they talk about the American dream, but this is the area of Southeast San Diego that doesn’t really relate to the story of wealth that you see in The Great Gatsby. They worked in teams to put together these podcast episodes to share different community stories, to really open up a broader conversation. Now, to create that kind of podcast, that was naturally—you know, you need a team to be able to do that. We’re recording right now. You have a team. So those are two different kinds of examples. I think it’s for a teacher to determine what their objectives are, what they want to cover, and what’s the kind of more most natural way of going about it.

Tom Vander Ark: What kind of a role should a driving question—formulating a driving question—play?

Kyle Wagner: So I structure it in three different levels when it comes to inquiry, because really a driving question is hopefully prompting an inquiry-based approach where you’re really working in deep investigation to answer it. There’s the structured approach of inquiry, there’s the guided approach, and there’s the open approach. And this is also touched on in the shift from content-based inquiry to inquiry-based. I think if you’re taking this on for the first time, I think you go with a more structured guided approach, which you might be tackling this larger question together. Now, of course, students have a lot of agency in terms of how they’re answering this and what they’re coming up with and producing. So when I mentioned that podcast project, the big driving question is, “How do we use community stories to redefine the American dream?” So this is this teacher’s first approach in this kind of learning. And I think that structured guided approach, which you’re all answering the same big question together, that every learner has a vested interest in, is one way of doing it. And then you can move more to this open-based approach, where you might present a problem or a challenge or topic. Students are formulating their own questions in relation to that. So, for example, when we did this problem of air and water quality within Beijing, students all had their own individual questions and had results as a part of that. Some was, “How can we open up a broader conversation around transportation?” That was one student’s question. They were building bamboo bicycles. Another one was more with cosmetics and this idea of fast fashion. And she was putting this whole toxic-free line of cosmetics. So I think it goes on a continuum. And I say, if you ever walk a dog, you got your dog right next to you on the leash, then you got them walking beside you, then you got them running free. That’s the best way of looking at inquiry and in that approach.

Tom Vander Ark: I’m thinking about a couple of things. Kyle, your story reminded me that a shortcut way of thinking about this is inviting students to do work that matters, work that’s important to them and important to their community. And in your story, this group was taking on a topic that they had noticed had become important to them and was a problem in their community. So they’re doing work of mutual interest to the students and the community. That feels like part of the art is inviting students into that space where they can do work that matters to them and to their community, and where they can actually add value, of delivering some value to their community.

Kyle Wagner: I think a really simple exercise a teacher could do is say, “Hey, here’s topics potentially that are coming up. What are some ways we might be able to connect those topics to what you’re personally passionate about?” So I say passion, purpose, working that align to some kind of purpose. And I think you have the three ingredients. So I tell teachers to do this with co-design. It’s like work with your students and identify, “Here’s topics that are coming up. How can that connect to our community? And where can we find purpose in addressing these things? And where do our passions, things that we like to do outside of school, where do those kind of intersect?” And that’s where this big question can derive from, or at least the kind of larger inquiry that you’re going about in addressing.

Tom Vander Ark: Some of our listeners are thinking, “Oh, wow, that could lead to a chaotic list of projects that aren’t connected to each other and definitely don’t add up to a scope and sequence.” How do you think about an outcome framework? Should a school have an outcome framework that describes the skills and competencies that are important?

Kyle Wagner: I think it depends on, do you want the project-based experience to be the core crux of how you’re delivering the curriculum? And if so, then of course, as you’re mentioning, you need this more kind of outcome-based where you can map that out—a scope and sequence. If the projects are an extension, potentially, of these larger inquiries that you’re pursuing and you’re really going to dive deep for a week or four or five different lessons, or if they’re going to live on the periphery and you don’t necessarily need to be beholden to the curriculum. So I think that depends with your level of how you can approach project-based learning. I just worked on a scope and sequence with a school that is trying to take this as a core philosophy approach. And yeah, as you mentioned, before you bring all this to the kids and say, “What do you want to pursue?” and you have their ideas, you’re giving a little bit more—you’re working with staff to look at, “Okay, here’s our curriculum.” Kind of transition that into being a more active project, inquiry-based approach. You’re mapping that out towards the skills that students are going to be able to get within these larger units of inquiry, and then you’re having obviously that conversation with students as well as where their passions can align to those kinds of things. Many ways of approaching it. I always, you know, try to be as flexible as possible when I’m working with schools in terms of their appetite for this way of learning.

Tom Vander Ark: Okay, that’s great. And so PBL could be like New Tech Networks. They’re wall-to-wall PBL. Every course is structured, in their case, as a team-taught double block project-based course. But project-based learning could be a pedagogy that sits alongside inquiry-based learning and others to create a coherent learning model in that regard. I want to talk about shift number nine: the shift from teacher-led discussion to facilitated Socratic dialogue. Is that a pedagogy that sits next to project-based learning, or do you actually see it happening within project-based learning?

Kyle Wagner: I actually see it as a larger—it’s a larger thing that project-based learning I’m hoping is housed within because there’s projects that can get at bigger questions, but a project’s not going to answer a large question. Like when we’re talking about sustainability or AI integration and use in the future and securing ethical approaches, these are big questions that you don’t necessarily answer in a four or five-week project. So, you know, I think it sits as a larger kind of driver for the kinds of discussions that we have that are really the bigger questions that, yes, our community-driven projects can help address. It’s a larger kind of discourse. And when you enter—I don’t know if you’ve been in High Tech High classrooms, High Tech High, probably New Tech. I also enter even Montessori classrooms lots of times, you know, or you enter a PYP, MYP, this international baccalaureate, and you see this discussion that’s ongoing. So I think that’s the larger discussion. It’s where kind of project-based learning is housed within as much as we can have students driving that. I’ve seen events where students are leading panel events for the community, and it’s just—it’s really a discussion around a big issue about unused space in this abandoned space in the community. How might we best use it? And they’re leading that discussion. Whether a project comes out of that is great, but it doesn’t necessarily have to.

Tom Vander Ark: Kyle, this also reminds me of Minerva—the Minerva project. Minerva University is an example where Socratic dialogue is a core pillar of the learning model, and the students will do place-based projects as they travel around the world and study in seven or eight different home places. So that’s a place where you have sort of dialogue and PBL sitting next to each other. Two thoughts here. One, you do a beautiful job of describing student exhibitions of student work. And I want to invite you to talk about that. But then you go a step further and say it’s not all about the end product. It’s about inviting kids to reflect on the process. Why is that important?

Kyle Wagner: Let’s say we’re addressing these gigantic questions. And so I think if we can approach it more from, like, not necessarily just focus on the product. How you said, place-based partnerships—like, these are the things that are going to endure long beyond the projects. And that’s why we really should focus on this level of dialogue and reflection continuously. Yes, it’s nice for students to stand up and show what they produced, but it’s also nice to continue this conversation. You do that by really focusing on this dialogue and reflection.

Tom Vander Ark: Your chapter on reflection reminded me of Cajon Valley USD in Eastern San Diego County, just east of High Tech High, where after every unit, they invite students to reflect on a possible future that they just experienced and ask themselves, “How does that line up with my strengths, interests, and values?” That would be an active example from K to 12 now of inviting reflection on the process to get at, as you said earlier, agency, identity, and purpose. Let’s go back to this idea of exhibitions. That’s really hard for traditional schools to think about—of making work a public product. Give us a good example or two of how schools do that really well to make work public.

Kyle Wagner: Sure. Yeah. There’s one international school that I’m working with right now over in Thailand. It’s an elementary school. And you can have an actual exhibition date, you know, where all the classrooms are exhibiting, “Here’s what we’re learning,” regardless of the point in learning that they’re at. Of course, it’s nice if they’re at the—a little bit of the end of the journey where students have had multiple opportunities to create different products. And this particular school, you know, runs those exhibitions. And you see some classrooms are exhibiting how they redesigned the space outside to be more green. Some are in terms of the waste problem that they’re addressing in the cafeteria. Some have created games to help make math more accessible to younger peers. Or some of the projects on display—some had done chocolate shops and started their own businesses. And it’s really nice. I would say when you’re starting exhibition to have this kind of community-based approach, and it can feel very competitive. Because all of a sudden, my work is being on display. It’s got to be as good as the teacher next door. But I think if you take more of the approach of, “Let’s just celebrate learning and give learners an opportunity to talk about their journeys,” and just make it—you can make it classroom-based. You might have a date that you’ve put in the calendar, which everything’s going to be on display. You invite the parents, you invite the community in, and sometimes it’s going to be virtual. I saw a wonderful virtual exhibition. This was during Black History Month. Every different room was curated—every Google Meet room was curated as a different exhibition, and the students were running that. It’s your very level of appetite, but the whole onus should be on students being able to share, “What were we learning about? What are some of the things I produced? And what did I learn about myself throughout the process?”

Tom Vander Ark: I think I’m just going to have to sign up for one of your professional learning days to go into more detail on the book. It is so good, and the shifts are so important and coherent and complementary. We’re talking to Kyle Wagner about his new book called Where’s the Teacher? 12 Shifts for Student-Centered Environments.

Kyle Wagner: The question for me is, “How do we become more of a student-centered school?” And I think project-based learning is one approach. It could be inquiry-based, it could be very personalized types of pathways, so sometimes schools feel a little bit volatile or vulnerable if project-based learning is the only way to get about the student-centered environment. So that bigger question to answer it—I hope, and this is why I created this whole pathway in this whole book and these whole shifts—is that there’s a starting point really for everybody. And I’ve worked now with a few different schools and looked at, yes, even though some of the case studies are going to be project-based, in general, these are some shifts that you can start making in your classroom tomorrow. Giving students, for example, co-design—how do you help students explore their own passions or topics that they’re interested in or give them a little bit more choice in terms of what they’re producing? And this is just a conversation you can have with their learners. And that’s a shift that you’re identifying as co-design, but you might identify one of the particular shifts that you want to focus on as independent to collaborative, and you want to set up more kind of team-based opportunities within your classroom. So for implementation, I give schools a four-step process. First, okay, let’s look at what these shifts are. Let’s identify where we’re currently doing these things already. Let’s take a bit of a scorecard. So I’ve created this scorecard when it comes to each of those shifts. This is what it looks like in practice. Where are we now? Where do we want to be now? Let’s give agency to our teachers in how they approach that. We’re not saying everyone needs to do a project. We’re saying pick up one or two of these shifts, identify where in your curriculum you can make them, and let’s now have this reflective conversation. And so you have these cohorts or these teams of teachers, whether it’s department, or it’s grade level, or whether it’s individual, and they’re working towards these shifts. They’re collecting evidence of how it’s happening in their classroom. Leadership is on board to support them with observations as well. And then, of course, you know, I’m on board as well to support them with strategies. And then you’re celebrating—you’re going through these different cycles throughout the year. And, you know, celebrating at the end of this, so that’s the implementation pathway that I’ve been working on towards schools. And there’s a different part of that bone that anyone can chew off depending on what they’re willing and able to do.

Tom Vander Ark: And as those shifts begin to take place, I imagine student progress reporting changes the way we describe progress.

Kyle Wagner: And that’s part of it as well. And leadership, too—we have to hold their hands through this process as well. How do you communicate this to parents that, “Hey, we’re taking this approach. This is actually research-based. You’re going to see students not coming home with 10,000 worksheets, but more meaningful work, and that’s okay.” And you’re not going to see maybe as many tests. Students are going to be giving evidence of their learning. And it’s working with leadership on how do you communicate to parents, your stakeholders, how can we exhibit what students are doing to bring them in, to get them on board? And how do we report out on that learning? Because it’s not necessarily going to be grade-based. It’s going to be a little bit more kind of standards-based, what they’re able to do, and what they’re able to show you. And it’s going to be a more narrative approach to that. And over time, I say this is a three-year journey with anybody who’s listening to this. Don’t expect to get this right right away. Caleb Rashad said it best when I interviewed him. He said, “You’re going to mess up, and that’s okay.”

Tom Vander Ark: Caleb’s been on a couple of times. He’s the former CEO at High Tech High, a great friend of the show. AI—we haven’t spent a lot of time talking about that, but do you see artificial intelligence, particularly Gen AI, helping on a couple of these shifts?

Kyle Wagner: Yeah, 100%. If you design a really great experience, a big question to drive it, and kids are excited about what they’re doing, then AI is going to supplement that. Whether it’s helping them devise the interview questions that they’re going to go out and ask the community, whether it’s helping generate images for the memoirs that they’re writing or the people that they’re interviewing, these are all case in point how I see AI seamlessly happening. And guess what? If you’re the teacher who’s wanting to design one of these experiences who said you never had enough time—which I agreed with—now you can design it using the support of AI, one of these kinds of experiences within five minutes.

The Future of Project-Based Learning

Tom Vander Ark: Kyle, thank you for years of advocating for more student-centered, inquiry-based learning. Love that you rolled it up into a terrific book. If people want to know more, where should they go?

Kyle Wagner: So if they want to get the book, they can get it over on Amazon and Routledge as well, which is my publisher. But an easier route is transformschool.com/whereistheteacher—all one word. And also, please attend my book launch party on August 21st or 28th. The 21st is virtual, and the 28th is in person if you’re here in Hong Kong. And we’re going to have stories, strategies, and a swag giveaway. That’s at transformschool.com/booklaunch.

Tom Vander Ark: Anybody else that you want to give a shout-out to? Is there anybody besides Reardon that was really a champion for you and your work early on?

Kyle Wagner: Yes. Chief ruckus maker. If you’re listening to this, Danny Bauer does great work with Better Leaders, Better Schools. And I would say he’s been my other biggest life mentor. And a big shout-out to the Getting Smart team for constantly driving this conversation forward.

Tom Vander Ark: All right, Kyle. Thanks for being here. And thanks to our producer, Mason Pashia, and the whole Getting Smart team that makes this possible. Until next time, keep learning, keep leading, and keep promoting student-centered, inquiry-based learning. See you next week.

Kyle Wagner

Kyle Wagner is the founder and lead PBL/Learning Design Coach for Transform Educational Consulting Limited, an organization that empowers forward thinking schools and educators to create more globally, socially and emotionally aware citizens through project-based experiences and student-centered environments. He is also the former Coordinator of Futures Academy at the International School of Beijing, has 12 years classroom teaching experience, and worked as a Humanities Teacher at world-renowned High Tech High. He has authored, “The power of SIMPLE,” and “Where is the Teacher: The 12 Shifts for Student-Centered Environments” (scheduled to release in August of 2024) hosts a popular podcast called ‘Transformative Learning Experiences,’ and holds a M.Ed. in Teacher Leadership.

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