Hi, I’m Rée.
Growing up, I felt like the education system wasn’t built for people like me to succeed. As a student with undiagnosed neurodivergence, learning disabilities, and anxiety, I struggled to learn in the ways my peers learned.
In the decades following, I became an educator and taught in various classrooms around the world. I taught in public schools, private universities, large government funded programs, and small academies. I designed curriculum, measured student success, and even assessed teacher efficacy.
Then, while teaching a group of English language learners in South Korea, who like me, hadn’t received adequate attention in school, I realized I was using the same methodologies as the ones that had failed me.
homeroom is my attempt to remedy this on an international scale. To speak with as many people from around the world about their own education systems to rethink what schools can be. What it should be, when we design systems and metrics which are inclusive of more diverse types of learners and thinkers with varying levels of family involvement and access to resources.
In this episode, I speak with Bernd, an educator and author—about the rich inner world he possessed ever since he could remember, and how his interests in the arts carved his path towards a career that integrates theater, communication, and education. We talk about the elements of our education systems that need to be reformed, particularly regarding who we put on stage—hint, it’s not the teachers. Bernd tells us about his DREAM framework which he talks about in his book, The Immersive Theatre of Learning: Learning Experiences are Rehearsals for Life which shows us how to create environments that center learners. Here is our conversation—which due to technical difficulties almost didn’t make it.
Auto-generated Transcript
Accessibility Disclaimer: Below is a computer generated transcript of our conversation. Please note that there are likely very many errors––including the spelling of our names––and may not make sense, especially when taken out of context.
00:00:03:08 – 00:00:27:20
Speaker 1
Hi, I’m Ray. Growing up, I felt like the education system wasn’t built for people like me to succeed. As a student with undiagnosed neurodivergent learning disabilities and anxiety, I struggled to learn in the ways my peers learned. In the decades following, I became an educator and taught in various classrooms around the world. I taught in public schools, private universities, large government funded programs, and small academies.
00:00:27:22 – 00:00:53:00
Speaker 1
I designed curriculum, measured student success, and even assessed teacher efficacy. Then, while teaching a group of English language learners in South Korea like me, I hadn’t received adequate attention in school. I realized I was using the same methodologies as the ones that had failed me. Homeroom is my attempt to remedy this on an international scale. To speak with as many people from around the world about their own education systems.
00:00:53:06 – 00:01:23:01
Speaker 1
To rethink what schools can be, what it should be. When we design systems and metrics which are inclusive of more diverse types of learners and thinkers, with varying levels of family involvement and access to resources. In this episode, I speak with Barrett, an educator and author about the rich in the world he possessed ever since he could remember and how his interest in the arts carved his path towards a career that integrates theater, communication, and education.
00:01:23:03 – 00:01:46:10
Speaker 1
We talk about the elements of our education systems that need to be reformed, particularly regarding who we put on stage. Hint it’s not the teachers. Barrett tells us about his dream framework, which he talks about in his book, The Immersive Theater of Learning. Learning experiences are rehearsals for life, which shows us how to create environments that center learners.
00:01:46:12 – 00:01:55:03
Speaker 1
Here is our conversation in which, due to technical difficulties, almost didn’t make it.
00:01:55:05 – 00:02:36:12
Speaker 2
Right. Well, that’s a that’s a totally unexpected question. Thank you for this. I think it was a very quiet child and also very, very shy. Too shy. So I had problems, socializing, making friends and so on. And I was always very introverted. I still am, but, on the other hand, it kind of pushed me into areas where most of my, most of the children don’t go, like, poetry or, making music, writing songs, things like that.
00:02:36:14 – 00:03:01:20
Speaker 2
And, and I was not too bad at school, up to a, a point where I got bored by school and I kind of didn’t work so much. So I found other things much more stimulating, the school itself. And also, that kind of led me to the work I do now because I would like to change that.
00:03:01:22 – 00:03:11:04
Speaker 2
So I like school to be exciting. As exciting as playing songs or or playing with, other kids.
00:03:11:06 – 00:03:18:18
Speaker 1
Yeah. And, and I’m assuming that you were born and raised in France.
00:03:18:20 – 00:03:51:09
Speaker 2
No, not at all. I live in France now. I’ve been living in France for almost 30 years. So, half of my life I’ve been outside, Germany. Germany is my home country. So I was born in Cologne. Germany. That’s where band comes from. That’s, German for Bernard. And, Gibson is my British extraction. So, but I’ve lived and lived in France for such a long time.
00:03:51:09 – 00:03:52:23
Speaker 2
But I’m not French.
00:03:53:00 – 00:04:39:23
Speaker 1
Oh, okay. I was kind of wondering because I was like, there’s something about that that, feels French, but not quite 100%, so I thought I would ask. So thank you for that clarification. And also I, you mentioned that you got bored, during school. And I’m wondering, what do you remember, like what it was about, either the expectations of the students or the way that your teachers taught or, like, the underlying philosophy, behind your schooling that made you feel like you got bored or that it wasn’t right for you?
00:04:40:01 – 00:05:09:21
Speaker 2
Yes. I mean, there’s probably not just one answer, but several answers. I’d like to give you the example of, mathematics. So, I was not naturally drawn to mathematics. So it was not something that appealed to me. Naturally. And still today, I see it more as a necessity then, a subject that would fascinate me.
00:05:09:23 – 00:05:36:16
Speaker 2
But, in junior high school, I mean, in Germany, it’s all the same. Junior and senior high school, but, I use, international terms in junior high school. We had a great teacher. I think it was my first math teacher. And I also mentioned him in, in my book as an example. And that was a long time ago, long before experiential learning was really a thing.
00:05:36:18 – 00:06:05:14
Speaker 2
And he would start every lesson, basically with a little story of a boy who had a, a little problem, and we had to find a solution for this little boy. I think his name was Max. And, so we I don’t remember the name of the teacher, but I remember the name of the boy, which, also shows us how our memory works.
00:06:05:14 – 00:06:36:00
Speaker 2
Right. So we remember things that are attached to emotions. And so the problems we have solve were, of course, calculations. So we had to come up with things like multiplications and so on to solve Max’s problems. And we were very proud when we found the solutions. And that was brilliant for me. This really sold maths to me. Later on we changed teachers and we had a more traditional math teacher and I totally disconnected, unfortunately.
00:06:36:00 – 00:06:51:04
Speaker 2
And I got through school, but math was never a, a very, very, you know, really had to work hard and discipline myself to, to get it done. But it, it, it never appealed to me. It was it was never fun.
00:06:51:06 – 00:07:21:17
Speaker 1
Yeah. For sure. And you also mentioned, that you were much more interested in like, I guess you had, like, a rich inner world. And I think you started off our conversation saying you’re very introverted. So I imagine, like, you have a lot of thoughts and your imagination is rich. And so I’m wondering, you also mentioned in the beginning that you found other things to occupy your interests.
00:07:21:19 – 00:07:26:13
Speaker 1
And I’m wondering what those other things were.
00:07:26:15 – 00:07:50:15
Speaker 2
Yes. Probably it was a little bit creating my own world. In books that I read. I didn’t read many books because I’m a very slow reader. And what’s, what’s interesting, when I read books, I don’t have to read much. And then I start thinking about this and making up a story of my own or something.
00:07:50:17 – 00:08:24:10
Speaker 2
And so I find it hard sometimes to get through a complete book, especially this long. But, but I love books, and I have loads of them here. So that was one thing. And also music. So there was a time just before graduating from high school, I think, where I must have driven my parents crazy because I practiced guitar for about 4 or 5 hours every day, and I really wanted to get really, really good at it.
00:08:24:10 – 00:08:45:00
Speaker 2
And, and it was like, you know, today maybe kids would go to the gym and workout and so on. And so for me, it was a good time. And, and so that was my that was my world. But it was a bit of a dream because my parents and everybody else told me, you’re not going to be a rock star.
00:08:45:01 – 00:09:00:00
Speaker 2
You’re not going to be a musician. You’re not going to be this or that. You have to do school. You have to go to university. You have to do this and so on. So but it was never a my personal choice.
00:09:00:02 – 00:09:32:20
Speaker 1
So two questions come to mind. One is, when you look at yourself in comparison to maybe the majority of your peers at your school, do you think that most people were introverted or, like, what do you think was the percentage of your school or your classroom or your, like, connect, like peer network? That were like, you.
00:09:32:22 – 00:09:37:00
Speaker 1
I have a second question. I’ll ask that after.
00:09:37:02 – 00:10:10:15
Speaker 2
Okay. I would say I don’t know, but I would say about 5% of the people around me were perhaps introverts. And I was friends also with, outsiders in a sense, like, who didn’t participate in all the social activities and so on. Also later on, school, maybe I, I was friends with people who also found it a bit boring or who also engaged in other activities and so on.
00:10:10:16 – 00:10:22:05
Speaker 2
So, yeah. The backbenches, the critics were like, yeah, that was nice. That was kind of a culture that was created at that time. But we were a small group.
00:10:22:07 – 00:11:03:05
Speaker 1
Yeah. No. For sure. And I ask this question usually because, you know, I spent a lot of my life feeling like I was really different. Like, whoever I met, I just, thought there’s something different about me. There’s something wrong with me, and I can’t figure it out. And so I find that people who relate to that who have a lot of rich inner world tend to be world builders, who tend to go into the arts, and, like, really thrive in creative practices.
00:11:03:07 – 00:11:28:15
Speaker 1
And so, you know, I have one more question about sort of like, your upbringing and then I would love to get into what you do now because it’s so fascinating. But you mentioned just a little bit before, that your parents had these expectations of you to go to college and not pursue music or become a rock star or, you know, those kinds of things.
00:11:28:15 – 00:12:02:14
Speaker 1
And I’m wondering, what do you was that expectation societal? Was that the expectation that they had for you? Because that’s what they did or that’s what they believed everybody should be doing? Or if that was the future and they didn’t want you to, you know, miss anything. Or was there something about you specifically that they wanted to see flourish rather than your creative?
00:12:02:16 – 00:12:04:22
Speaker 1
I guess activities?
00:12:05:00 – 00:12:41:18
Speaker 2
Yeah. Well, I’m from the generation. I’m late. Baby boomer or early generation X? I don’t like these, these terms, but, but my parents were, basically, people who, who were young, during the Second World War. And so they didn’t have the chance to go to college. So basically, they wanted me to have a better life and, and, and to have to have it and easier access to a career, to money, to prosperity and so on.
00:12:41:18 – 00:13:13:17
Speaker 2
And I’m very grateful, that they pushed me into this direction. And I was probably not desperate enough to be a musician or artist in any sense. And I wasn’t good enough at the time. So I think I had to live a little bit of life before I could actually write good songs, or have good stories. I mean, I, I there there are a lot of young artists who, who creates incredible things and I wonder how they do it.
00:13:13:17 – 00:13:33:01
Speaker 2
But I had to live a bit of life before. I mean, I still write songs, and I think they’re better now than they used to be, but, but, when I was 18, my songs were lousy, to be honest. Maybe 1 or 2 good ones, but most of them. Yeah, one of that good.
00:13:33:03 – 00:14:11:10
Speaker 1
It’s so funny. So I was an art major, when I went to university, and, before I went to college, I did a lot of different things. Mostly visual things, I guess, and a lot of writing. But, when I went to university and I became an art major, I was thrown into. I was enamored with, performance art, like the the avant garde sort of, world of, seeing performance as art.
00:14:11:12 – 00:14:42:21
Speaker 1
And I fell so hard in love with that, that world that I became a performance artist for a long time, and one of my favorite artists, who I really looked up to was Marina Abramovic. And so I saw a, some photos that you had posted of your presentation at Sea Tar in Lille, France.
00:14:42:23 – 00:15:13:04
Speaker 1
And you had an entire table laid out with different, items that reminded me of one of Marina Abramovic really famous landmark, performance works. And so I was immediately interested, like, what does that do? So I would love to hear, yeah. Either tell us about this presentation that you, shared recently or how you got into that.
00:15:13:04 – 00:15:18:16
Speaker 1
Maybe that should come next. So, yeah. Could you tell us a little bit about that presentation?
00:15:18:18 – 00:16:08:06
Speaker 2
Yes. With pleasure. It was a workshop, and, I have recently published a book called The Immersive Theater of Learning. And in this book, I, it’s not so much about immersive theater itself, but its use. And it takes lessons from immersive theater and from the experience economy to kind of reinvent education, training and learning and, to be inspired by the world of theater and, and the work, the world of arts, because I think learning or teaching or whatever you would call it, facilitation, training is closer to the world of arts than it is to a service.
00:16:08:08 – 00:16:38:03
Speaker 2
So, I mean, for, for, for the Texas authorities, I’m a service provider, but I’m not a service provider because service for me is doing something for, customers. So you take them somewhere like a taxi driver or, you dry clean their, their, their suits and so on. That’s a service. And as a trainer or facilitator, we help people learn, but they have to do the job.
00:16:38:03 – 00:17:13:11
Speaker 2
So that’s not a service that’s more an experience or it’s it’s transformation. Basically we, we work in so in this, workshop, I wanted to, take people into another world to, show them how learning can be more immersive. So, so, and I wanted to do this with very simple, means. And so I had the idea to create a little universe of pirates.
00:17:13:11 – 00:17:48:23
Speaker 2
So I make people believe that the classroom they were in, the seminar room they were in was actually a ship. And the ship was called transformation. And I was the captain of the ship, and I was wearing a pirate shirt. I didn’t go further than that. Was was just shirt. And, and I brought some props so that basically there was a table with props like, a telescope, an old telescope and, a compass and, and a bell.
00:17:48:23 – 00:18:14:22
Speaker 2
Or you could find on a on the ship and a little treasure chest, that I opened at the end of the workshop. And actually, it was one that I picked up in a in a little store, in, in a volcanic region in France, where it was for another workshop. And it’s actually, it’s inside this, this little treasure chest that were real minerals.
00:18:15:02 – 00:18:33:18
Speaker 2
So everybody could pick a mineral at the end as a take away. And so people were very happy about this because there was nothing. But there were was a lot because it’s memorabilia of that particular, workshop.
00:18:33:20 – 00:18:56:07
Speaker 1
Yeah, absolutely. And I think that that’s really brilliant. And I’m wondering, like, was there a goal or something that you wanted, you know, your participants to, achieve by the end or, ponder during the workshop up.
00:18:56:09 – 00:19:21:03
Speaker 2
Yes. It was a little bit about the spirit of being a pirate. Or you could use other images. You could say, I have a friend and colleague I talked to this morning and he said, yeah, I’m not a pirate. I see myself as a hacker, but I think we we could get along just fine. So people who are inside a system but kind of want to do things differently.
00:19:21:05 – 00:19:53:14
Speaker 2
So a bit of a mini revolution in our, in our environment, but in a nonviolent revolution. So just doing things differently and then maybe inspiring others and the, the goal of the workshop, the learning outcome was to, to use story, and to use emotions to use to, to link everything to, to, to theme the whole workshop around one particular thing.
00:19:53:16 – 00:20:20:16
Speaker 2
It could be right in your face, like the pirate saying, or it could be something much more subtle, but to have a cohesive theme for the whole session. And, it was based on a, on a framework that I came up with, which has the acronym Dream. And D stands for drama. So that’s basically the story or the dramatic arc structure.
00:20:20:16 – 00:20:54:15
Speaker 2
So I think even a class should have this kind of structure, so that people actually pay attention and are engaged, until the end of the session. The honor stands for relationship. So you want people to actually relate to the subject to you, but also to the other learners. These stands for emotions. So it’s not just about information, it’s about getting into it emotionally.
00:20:54:19 – 00:21:24:12
Speaker 2
A is for action, not just sitting down on your bum and listening to somebody, but actually doing something. And M is probably the most important one for me. This is meaning, meaning. So making it meaningful for for the learner and at the end of the workshop, I asked a buddy to share, experiences that they had had already staged where, they could then link the elements to the dream framework.
00:21:24:12 – 00:21:32:18
Speaker 2
So what was meaningful for my learners? So what was, emotional and and so on. So that was that was the idea.
00:21:32:20 – 00:22:00:10
Speaker 1
Well, that’s so brilliant. And I think that’s a really great, I guess, entry point in kind of understanding your philosophy around education. So thank you for sharing that. I have so through this podcast, in the first season, I learned really that, so I think I was telling you earlier, when I was younger, I felt kind of stupid.
00:22:00:10 – 00:22:35:21
Speaker 1
I kind of felt really inferior to my peers, and I felt different. And, during the first season of my podcast, I realized why, and, and the reason and the reason is that the education system is really designed in a way where there’s a singular definition of success. And the teachers and the education system is really you is really acting like a service.
00:22:35:21 – 00:23:07:03
Speaker 1
They’re acting kind of like an insightful pedia, a talking encyclopedia, kind of like what Paulo Ferri talks about, like the banking, model of education where we treat our children like, you know, little piggy banks, and we’re depositing information and knowledge, and there’s no action, as part of your framework, that is, really given to the student to take ownership of what they’re learning.
00:23:07:05 – 00:23:51:00
Speaker 1
And so, you know, looking back at my upbringing, I’m just kind of like, what could I have achieved if I had been given the ability to pursue an education that was meaningful for me? If I could pursue subjects and, topics that were interesting for me? And so I would love to hear kind of about your philosophy about, or like your ideas for how we can sort of transform the educational paradigm of how we deliver, education to our, to the next generation.
00:23:51:00 – 00:23:54:20
Speaker 1
What do you think needs to change?
00:23:54:22 – 00:24:22:19
Speaker 2
Quite a lot. But know I and I think we can all only go bit by bit, but I’d like to start, with a point. You made a very, very clearly about not feeling comfortable in the system. And the system was created, in, in the industrial age. Right. And then later on was taken into the service economy.
00:24:22:19 – 00:24:59:21
Speaker 2
And it’s basically to create people who can function and it has always been unfair because it was created for a certain type of learner, and the others dropped out. And some of them were fortunate, like you and me, who found their way. And but others then, well, were were leftovers. But I think the system itself has also come to the end of its life cycle, because we have artificial intelligence coming in and so we don’t need people to function anymore.
00:24:59:21 – 00:25:23:00
Speaker 2
We need people to be critical. We need people to be human. We need people to have value to what machines can already do. And that is something that can only be done in a system I think I would like to I mean, it’s very complicated to change the system, but I would like to sum it up in just one sentence.
00:25:23:00 – 00:25:49:12
Speaker 2
We have to get away from content and we have to move towards the learner. So we have to start with the learner and not with content. All schools have a syllabus. They have a program. They have this and that to go through. But it doesn’t really make sense anymore because we don’t know what the workers of the future will need.
00:25:49:14 – 00:26:23:06
Speaker 2
We don’t know. We prepare people for jobs that may no longer exist by the time they graduate. We, yes. So we should rather focus on more, transversal or more more general skills, like critical thinking, like making connections, creativity, resilience, all these things that we will definitely need more than ever in the future where things change very, very quickly.
00:26:23:08 – 00:26:52:14
Speaker 2
And I would like to use a verb that you used to deliver. So we need to get away from delivering education to staging experiences. So that’s a different term. Or even better, guiding people towards their has their own aspirations. So it’s not delivering anymore. So we can’t deliver in this new system. So we have to get away from that.
00:26:52:17 – 00:26:58:18
Speaker 2
We have to basically guide learners and not deliver education.
00:26:58:19 – 00:27:22:23
Speaker 1
Right. And, you know, I think there’s kind of a bit of a debate, I don’t know if it’s really a debate. But there’s a lot of chatter, in different pockets who are all sort of, trying to either exist in or change, the paradigm of education because a lot of people are realizing, you know, our education systems are outdated.
00:27:22:23 – 00:28:00:03
Speaker 1
You know, like you said, they, they were established during the Industrial Revolution. And the foundations of that model have not changed, for, you know, centuries. And so, like, what do you think is kind of the mindset that needs to change? And I think you sort of, mentioned a lot of amazing things, like, the idea of staging rather than delivering, right, creating opportunities for connection and, for thought and critical thinking.
00:28:00:05 – 00:28:27:04
Speaker 1
So there are lots of words here, that are very evocative. And I wonder if you could maybe, narrow it down to, a mindset that needs to change. Is there something at the foundation of, these things that we need to strive towards, that is operating, that should that we should be operating? Yeah.
00:28:27:06 – 00:29:06:14
Speaker 2
Yeah. Yes. Very, very good question. Let me go back to the not a metaphor, but it’s an analogy with the theater that I used in my book is that the traditional teacher is on stage, a bit like a stand up comedian or a, an actor, reading a monologue on stage. No. There’s nothing. I have nothing against a great keynote, nothing against a wonderful TEDx talk and nothing against an exciting a stand up comedian.
00:29:06:16 – 00:29:41:06
Speaker 2
But to be honest, most of us as teachers are not as good. So we don’t really deliver speech things that really touch people’s hearts. Right? So basically, people fall asleep. So that has to that has to change. And the, the people who should be on the stage are the learners. So we should not be, actors, we should be stage directors, we should be, maybe script, script writers, to a certain extent, playwrights.
00:29:41:08 – 00:30:11:09
Speaker 2
Maybe we should be set designers and allow learners to experiment to make mistakes. That is something that needs to change as well. We need to build failure into education, not as a a red flag. Don’t mess up. Otherwise you will get a bad grade and you will not graduate. Failure is useful. Failure is good to if as long as you learn from it.
00:30:11:11 – 00:30:38:06
Speaker 2
And so we need to build that into the system so that people can fail intelligently and learn from it. And, and all these, all these little things. But the basic shift is towards the learner. So in a way, traditional teachers may feel that they’re giving up control, but all they do is they give up control over the contents.
00:30:38:08 – 00:31:09:12
Speaker 2
But they never had any control over the learning. Right? Never. So here, when learners themselves are in charge, and if we help them take responsibility for their own learning, the content may go a little bit all over the place. Even though we can, of course, guided and influenced that. But in general, there is much more learning involved and so we have more control over the outcome.
00:31:09:14 – 00:31:39:01
Speaker 1
Right. And, you know, I think something that I think a lot of people think is learning how they define learning, you know, like colloquially like when, you know, a child comes home from school, like a parent might ask, what did you learn today? And, generally in that sense, learning means what new piece of information did you, input into your mind?
00:31:39:03 – 00:32:12:16
Speaker 1
And so there’s been a lot of emphasis on new and information, but not enough, I guess, a tension around establishing connections between what is known and, maybe new pieces of information that are coming in. And so I wonder, you like using, your dream framework and also, the work that you do and what you’ve written about, in the past, what do you think?
00:32:12:18 – 00:32:30:15
Speaker 1
We need to do differently, to focus less on inputs, new information, and focus on creating those connections for our children or helping facilitate their connection of things that are in their minds.
00:32:30:17 – 00:32:59:17
Speaker 2
Yes. I mean, information is still useful. Of course. And that’s one form of learning. But I think it goes back a long time. I think it’s mesirow, though, who wrote about transformative learning. And he makes that distinction between just, you know, adding information to what we already know or really creating this cognitive dissonance.
00:32:59:19 – 00:33:32:06
Speaker 2
Oh, wait a minute, maybe I’ve been doing this the wrong way. And and that’s not an easy way of learning that makes people feel uncomfortable. So at first and then later on, they think, yeah, it’s great because now I can do things in a different way. So very often we have to unlearn in order to, to learn. Now adding information is useful, but only to a certain extent because information is available now, from our phones everywhere.
00:33:32:06 – 00:34:00:08
Speaker 2
So information is not really the currency anymore. It’s not how much, you know, but it’s what you can do, or who? You know, who. You know, I think today’s forum is more important than what you know, so I don’t know, but I know somebody who might know it. So that’s an important skill. So networking is one thing that is totally neglected in schools.
00:34:00:10 – 00:34:22:22
Speaker 2
People are always in the same class formation. They’re always with the same people. Why don’t they meet other people? Right. So, so work on, on projects, in mixed teams and so on. So that’s, that’s how you create bonds. And then if you, if you work on a project at school, maybe later on you will start a company together.
00:34:23:00 – 00:34:52:03
Speaker 2
And, and so a lot of this is already happening. Universities, colleges have incubators, a lot of that’s already there. The project that you presented with your colleague is very much in that sense. So actually allowing people to create something and it’s and that’s fantastic. But it’s not the majority of stuff that is happening. So a lot of it is still taking in information.
00:34:52:03 – 00:35:31:22
Speaker 2
And then spitting it out. The, the, the problem with information is also that it only it’s only stored in our short term memory. So if it’s about information it’s not really durable learning. The kids or the students, they just learn it for the exam and after the exam they make space for new stuff. So because unless it is used again and again and again, and that’s why learning I think is not linear, a bit more, circular like a spiral.
00:35:32:00 – 00:35:56:08
Speaker 2
So things have to come back again and again and again. This one of the things, yeah, that’s one of the things in the book that I’m would like to put into the Museum of Obsolescence, as I call it, is the is the one chance, learning schools. So basically we’ve seen that before. You should know that.
00:35:56:10 – 00:35:57:08
Speaker 1
00:35:57:18 – 00:36:15:20
Speaker 2
But it’s so natural for our brains to forget. Forgetting is part of learning. So we probably have to forget three times before we actually remember things. And, and and that is not taken into consideration at all.
00:36:15:22 – 00:36:56:09
Speaker 1
Yeah. No, absolutely. And you know, something that, you mentioned about, project based, learning and things of that nature, I think just a little while back, you were talking about this shift from content. Right. And I just think about, you know, the people at the top have a very, very specific criteria, curriculum for what they believe everybody should know and what they should graduate knowing.
00:36:56:11 – 00:37:42:02
Speaker 1
And I think that that is why they, have a very big, their focus is on self-assess or student assessment. Right. Evaluating how students are, comparing against their peers to, meet those expectations or meet those milestones. And so, you know, sort of like the paradigm that I think you and I are in agreement that we need to head in, is going to kind of like be a total knife or a wrench in the system of assessing students.
00:37:42:04 – 00:37:56:17
Speaker 1
And so I wonder for you, as we look at the future of education, how do you think we need to change how we assess our students or if we need to call it that at all?
00:37:56:18 – 00:38:29:03
Speaker 2
Yes. I mentioned artificial intelligence before. I mean one of the issues, I see it rather as a, as hope than an issue. But one of the issues that some of the universities colleges I work for are facing right now is that okay? How can we make it possible that students don’t cheat in their assignments or in their exams?
00:38:29:05 – 00:38:54:09
Speaker 2
For instance, we usually ask students to, to write something, in the form of an essay. There’s a little bit of creativity in there, but of course, they could do this in and with a great prompt. They could do this in two seconds. And, and then I would receive the work and I could use, artificial intelligence as well, so I could and I’ve done it.
00:38:54:11 – 00:39:20:14
Speaker 2
I could prompt, ChatGPT or whatever with, the criteria, and then I could feed the text into the system and it would graded probably more accurately than I would with feedback and so on in a couple of seconds. So basically, at the end of the day, nobody would be working anymore. Nobody would be thinking anymore. It would just be machines grading each other.
00:39:20:16 – 00:39:46:15
Speaker 2
And everybody would have a wonderful, great, and nobody would be able to do anything. Nobody would be able to actually to do anything. I think one of the I don’t have the solution, but I think one of the, one of the things I, I like, to, to do in my courses is to give open end projects where I don’t necessarily know the answer.
00:39:46:17 – 00:40:12:05
Speaker 2
So it’s not that I expect students to find, though, one answer that I have in my mind, or the one solution. But find a solution. Maybe they find a better one than than I had in mind. Maybe I’d like them to surprise me. So come up with something and then it’s more about evaluating the process. And if they don’t find a solution, that’s fine too.
00:40:12:07 – 00:40:46:15
Speaker 2
But you need to evaluate the process, how they get there, how they work together as a team, how they, analyze the data, how they, how considerate they were with, I don’t know, the people they are designing for. And so, so, so, so something that is also that reflects real work out there. And, and I think that’s, that’s why I use the subtitle in my, my book learning experiences are rehearsals for life.
00:40:46:17 – 00:40:57:13
Speaker 2
They’re, they should use the school of life as a template and not, classic academic learning.
00:40:57:15 – 00:41:40:04
Speaker 1
Yeah. For sure. And what this kind of makes me think about is, I sort of think about the future of education, being very, a space where students can really figure out what it is that, they’re interested in and what they feel like they want to change in society and how they can establish or work towards the skills they need to make those changes happen.
00:41:40:06 – 00:42:14:19
Speaker 1
And I, I went back to school to study filmmaking. And in the process, I, realized that I really love, I think, like, a documentary filmmaker. And so I think you probably are familiar with this, but just in case the audience might not be, the documentary filmmaking is sort of like you have an idea for what you want to learn, or what you want to, show the world about.
00:42:14:21 – 00:42:37:04
Speaker 1
And so you kind of go out into the world and you don’t plan in advance what you’re going to film, frame by frame. And you have a general idea of what you’re going to film and where you’re going to film and who you’re going to speak with. But and maybe some questions and topics, but, the actual content isn’t fixed.
00:42:37:06 – 00:43:13:18
Speaker 1
And so you go and you look for it, and then after you feel like you’ve got enough content, you sit down and you analyze what you’ve found and you arrange it in a meaningful way, or as with fiction, storytelling or making films that are fictional, you sort of have a plan, you have an outline, everything is planned, down to the second or to the minute, and then you just go out and you shoot it and you make it happen.
00:43:13:20 – 00:43:43:07
Speaker 1
And you know, what was written and what people actually watch is, is fairly different. I mean, there are some creative decisions that happen in the editing and post-production process. But anyway, so those are the two types of, filmmaking. And I realized that the way that my brain works, I’m a bottom up thinker. I color first, an outline later.
00:43:43:09 – 00:44:18:16
Speaker 1
I realized, okay, so this is how I learn best. And that’s when I feel like, my self-esteem is the highest because I’m being very self efficacious. And I’m actually learning, with my curiosity. And, the thing that I will learn next is connected to what I just learned. And so I kind of think about the future of education as being more bottom up thinking, more documentary film type, education rather than this fictional type, that I just mentioned.
00:44:18:16 – 00:44:22:15
Speaker 1
And I wonder what you think about that.
00:44:22:17 – 00:44:47:09
Speaker 2
Yeah. It’s a it’s a very, I love that, it’s it’s really, it’s it’s it’s really, the essence of it. I mean, there are some fictional, filmmakers, I think, who use a different process with Improvization and so on. And the story kind of is co-created with actors and so on. But that’s, as I said, that’s very rare.
00:44:47:09 – 00:45:18:15
Speaker 2
And it’s not the mainstream cinema. We we see. Right. So that that sometimes happens, but not very often. And a documentary is, is an open and project, what I called open and project earlier on. So you have an idea. And it’s not just documentary filmmaking, it’s also the scientists basically work like that. Right? So they, they have an assumption and then they make tests, experiments and so on, and then they draw their conclusions and then they have to test again.
00:45:18:15 – 00:45:41:19
Speaker 2
So it’s kind of open end. It’s trial and error. And at the end they try to make sense of it and they publish an article or they get a peer review and so on. So it is a process that is long and sometimes painful. But as we present science and other things in school today, it’s all very easy and linear.
00:45:41:21 – 00:46:03:03
Speaker 2
And there’s one element that is missing there. Two elements are missing there. One is the pain and the friction that you need to feel like when you play a game, if it’s too easy, you don’t want to play again, right? So if it’s easier to win, you know, nobody’s nobody wants to play the game, right? It has to be a little hard, an escape game.
00:46:03:03 – 00:46:22:12
Speaker 2
If it’s too easy, it’s not an escape thing. You know, it’s it’s not worth the money you pay for it. So you want to suffer. And through the struggle and, so you need to struggle a little bit both to find the solutions and, and projects, or to come up with something that shouldn’t be too easy.
00:46:22:12 – 00:46:46:14
Speaker 2
So that’s one element that is often missing today in education. And the second element of surprise. So surprise, wonder or all these wonderful things that we kind of forgot even in life, you know, we always we numb our selves with the same stuff all over again, the same social media, the same kind of film and so on.
00:46:46:14 – 00:47:18:07
Speaker 2
So basically we just kill time. But how many people can still experience all kind of really standard front of, I don’t know, a mountain and say, wow, this is great or a sunrise or something like that. So I think we should learn to be in the moment and focus on the people we are with and the project at hand, and so on, and then also celebrate together the little successes or failures that we have experienced.
00:47:18:07 – 00:47:23:19
Speaker 2
You know, we failed gloriously, but we had a good time. That’s wonderful.
00:47:23:21 – 00:47:52:02
Speaker 1
Absolutely. And, you know, I realized that I jumped in to sort of like what you do now and sort of like what your thoughts are, but I, forgot to sort of ask you, maybe I should say forget, I should say I would love to ask you. Now, about, what do you think? Was the catalyst in your life after school?
00:47:52:02 – 00:48:06:03
Speaker 1
And, you know, after. Oh, I forgot to ask, did you actually pursue, did you go to universal, like your parents wanted you to? And if you did, what did you study?
00:48:06:05 – 00:48:15:03
Speaker 2
Right. Well, I basically, I, I was always a bit of a I’ve always been a bit of a lightweight, in terms of degrees.
00:48:15:05 – 00:48:16:00
Speaker 1
Okay.
00:48:16:02 – 00:48:46:18
Speaker 2
Probably not surprised. Now after the introduction of the first part of the interview. So basically I took, I mean, I pursued, of course, music and all kinds of other activities, but I also went to college and I studied languages, which was kind of the probably the easiest way for me because I was already kind of bilingual in English and German, and then I took 1 or 2 other languages so that was kind of an easy way.
00:48:46:20 – 00:49:17:02
Speaker 2
And actually I was studying to become an interpreter and and translator. So I hardly ever worked in this field. So there were some very interesting projects that I was involved in where I actually could do some translation and interpreting work, and I made some interesting people through these projects. But but very early, when I was still a student, I needed a bit of cash because I wanted to live on my own.
00:49:17:02 – 00:49:34:13
Speaker 2
And that’s what I, I felt that I should leave my parents home and I should, you know, have my own life. So I needed to to to get a job. And I did some odd jobs, as most students do. And then somebody said to me, why don’t you teach English? And it wasn’t for me at the time, right.
00:49:34:14 – 00:50:01:12
Speaker 2
So why don’t you teach English? And I said, well, I’m not a teacher. Well, anybody could do that, which is not true. I discovered it the hard way, but, but basically I was hired by a language school, and they gave me perhaps half an hour of training, and then they let me do the classes, and probably I just reproduced what I saw at school myself.
00:50:01:14 – 00:50:25:12
Speaker 2
And I didn’t really know how to go about it, but probably had a bit of a natural talent for it. And I thought, well, this is not too bad. And then later on, I moved to London, and in London I, I did some teacher training and and then discovered, oh, teaching can be so different. It can be much more interactive, it can be much more creative.
00:50:25:14 – 00:50:50:23
Speaker 2
And then I thought, wow, this is where can I where I can put my creative energy that I would have never thought relevant in a professional context, only with music and other stuff. And then I thought, well, this is great. So I can create games, I can create activities, I can create my own material. I don’t have to use the boring textbooks.
00:50:50:23 – 00:51:18:23
Speaker 2
I can do this and that. And I did this for a couple of, well, quite, quite a number of years in the in the language field. So I was basically a language trainer then. And, and later on I moved into intercultural training, for several reasons. First of all, because, it’s less content based, it’s more based on skills and, and on the people.
00:51:19:01 – 00:51:42:03
Speaker 2
So, there’s a little bit of coaching involved there as well. So which is a different approach. And so, and also less preparation. If you are a language teacher, you have to come up with something new. Every lesson. And for intercultural stuff, basically you look what is there. So basically it’s a bit like a documentary.
00:51:42:05 – 00:51:59:01
Speaker 2
Here we are again with the documentary. So you don’t come with a, fantastic lesson plan or anything. But you come with nothing and you want to see what’s there. Okay. What are your problems? And, so let’s see what we can do.
00:51:59:03 – 00:52:25:10
Speaker 1
That’s so fascinating. Because, you know, after I studied art, I was like, what do I do with my life? And so I immediately moved to South Korea and I started teaching English. And, you know, I probably had about a week’s worth of training, but it was mostly about how to survive in South Korea, not how do you actually teach?
00:52:25:12 – 00:52:52:21
Speaker 1
And so, I did learn a lot of things. The hard way myself. And I think it’s very fascinating that you and I both kind of, went onto that track and both sort of discovered, the world of arts and the stage or like, teaching being, these immersive experiences that we give to our students.
00:52:52:23 – 00:53:30:19
Speaker 1
I remember a lot of my assignments that I would give my students is like writing scripts and, you know, pulling from their inner world. And so I just think it’s kind of interesting that our worlds ran a bit parallel, on opposite sides of the world. And I wanted to ask you this question of, what do you think it was about teaching English and then going into language training and then the intercultural, training.
00:53:30:21 – 00:54:02:09
Speaker 1
Like, what do you think is different about. Pursuing these paths that are different from the traditional type of, like, banking education that maybe you and I both kind of experienced when we were younger, that allowed us to sort of have this conclusion, for you, the dream framework and for me, maybe, you know, like this documentary filmmaking type, yeah.
00:54:02:11 – 00:54:05:19
Speaker 1
I wonder.
00:54:05:21 – 00:54:36:15
Speaker 2
Yes. I mean, it’s it’s it’s kind of it’s feels like magic, right? So, I mean, we’ve met, we haven’t really met. So it’s all virtual and kind of, you know, we’re at opposite ends of the world. And, and we experienced so many similarities, but I’ve been, probably since since the pandemic, I’ve been pretty active, in a number of communities.
00:54:36:17 – 00:55:07:14
Speaker 2
And, and I think there are more of us than we think. So there are a lot of people out there who think differently, who do things differently. And it’s, there’s a whole new economy emerging, right, of people who are very creative. And I think that’s the future. It’s also about, actually having a better life, I think, because I think consumerism is on its way out.
00:55:07:16 – 00:55:39:22
Speaker 2
So people are not really happy with buying a lot of stuff. They rather want rich experiences with friends, and then they can share them on social media and so on. So they want this kind of connection. And I think education should go, the same way. So it’s shouldn’t be only about the degree. But I mean, I talked to a, to a guy in the US a couple of weeks ago, and he is in charge of the faculty.
00:55:39:22 – 00:56:08:02
Speaker 2
And, and he said, well, to be honest, I mean, it’s transactional. So the students come to us not to learn. They come to us for a degree. Yeah. And we give it to them. We don’t make it too easy for them so that they struggle a little bit. But basically, if they pay the tuition fee, they get the degree, and then they go out there and and can make some money and pay back their loans.
00:56:08:04 – 00:56:33:05
Speaker 2
That’s how the system works. And that’s very sad, isn’t it? Because in a way, you waste your time. Yeah. You waste your time. So why not have a little bit of fun while they’re there? Well, not really, you know, stimulate them. And maybe I mean, in France, you have. That’s why I like working for so-called management schools, or business schools in France.
00:56:33:05 – 00:56:43:10
Speaker 2
So they’re basically private colleges. And when, the, the young kids come in after high school, they basically don’t know what they want to do.
00:56:43:12 – 00:56:44:02
Speaker 1
Yeah.
00:56:44:04 – 00:57:10:15
Speaker 2
And so a lot of the stuff is basically orientation. And the first 2 or 3 years, they get a little bit of this, a little bit of that with this. And they have projects and they do this and then they do their first internship and then they may go abroad and so on. And at some stage they realize, yeah, I want to go into finance or I want to go into law or I want to go into marketing or whatever, human resources.
00:57:10:17 – 00:57:35:09
Speaker 2
That’s fine. And I think that’s how, kids I mean, I was totally for me, it was impossible at the age of 18 to decide what I wanted to do with my life. And yet I had to make that decision and study something. So I think colleges all over the world should go into this more kind of a funnel thing, like, you do a lot of general stuff at the beginning.
00:57:35:11 – 00:58:09:03
Speaker 2
You give orientations and then allow learners to find their, their path. And, but at the same time, they also learn basic stuff that probably everybody needs, right? Like, finance, for example, accounting. So everybody should know a little bit about that if they want to go into business, even if they don’t want to be an accountant and, and things like that, even if they’re very creative and they want to be an entrepreneur, they should know a little bit about, you know, finance as well.
00:58:09:05 – 00:58:42:07
Speaker 1
Yeah, absolutely. And I guess sort of as we wrap up, I, I’m, I have two more questions for you. One is really, when we look back, when you look back on your education journey and your career journey, is there anything that you wish you had learned earlier, like when you were in school, for example, that, you know, your classes or your educators did not prepare you for?
00:58:42:12 – 00:58:46:06
Speaker 1
I guess is my first question.
00:58:46:08 – 00:59:13:02
Speaker 2
Yes. I mean, I don’t really have regrets because, you know, life is just what it is. Some people take longer to learn and some people never learn, and some people learn very early. But I’m actually, professionally speaking, a well, I’m actually in a, in a, at the moment at a place in my life where I actually do the stuff that I really like doing.
00:59:13:04 – 00:59:38:11
Speaker 2
And that has not always been the case. So I wish I had discovered that a little bit earlier. Maybe also putting this all into something. I mean in my case it was a book, but it could have been something else, a documentary or whatever. So I could have done that a little earlier, but it didn’t happen.
00:59:38:11 – 01:00:06:20
Speaker 2
So it’s happening now, so that’s great. So why not? And, and maybe all this, maybe I personally, I had a little bit of a loyalty problem sometimes to stick with jobs or stick with teams and people and companies and so on for too long and, before moved on. So I think now I’m a little bit more into X, fermenting.
01:00:06:20 – 01:00:34:06
Speaker 2
I mean, I keep a certain number of regular stuff, but I would like to go more into cross-sectional work. So to maybe start projects with people who are not in education, but maybe actors, maybe experienced designers in other fields and then create a part of the dream that I have, you know, to I don’t know, what I really like is cross-pollination, right.
01:00:34:06 – 01:01:03:04
Speaker 2
So the being inspired by other industries and at the moment, I’m teaching a course here in Lille with international students on, on innovation. And yesterday I had them work on. Yeah, yesterday I had to work on combinations. We had these random combinations. So we had education as well as an industry, and it was randomly paired with theme parks.
01:01:03:06 – 01:01:32:00
Speaker 2
And the students came up with brilliant ideas of making education a little bit like Disneyland. And yeah, I think that’s the inspiration doesn’t necessarily come from. And that goes for every industry, doesn’t necessarily come from the industry itself. We have to look elsewhere for inspiration. My inspiration came from theater, but it could also come from something else.
01:01:32:02 – 01:01:44:04
Speaker 2
And I think that is way to innovate inside the educational system, to look at other fields and to collaborate with people from other fields.
01:01:44:06 – 01:02:24:14
Speaker 1
Yeah, 100%. I’m taking, right now, a course, from Idaho, University or Idaho. And it’s on human centered systems thinking, and, yeah. And so I really love the course, but one of the things that they, talk about, is this idea of analogous inspiration, where you look for inspiration from fields outside of yours, to see, you know, what are they doing that can inform or, elevate or innovate what you are doing in your own field.
01:02:24:18 – 01:03:11:21
Speaker 1
So I love that you talk about that. It’s so relevant right now. And it’s also very connected to my final question for you, which is, as we head towards a future that is, less top down, and less authority controlled and is more student driven and is more collaborative. What is one very impactful next step that we can take from where we are now to get to that sort of ideal paradigm in the future?
01:03:11:23 – 01:03:47:01
Speaker 2
I think we need to start with projects. I mean, the project you presented with your colleague is one thing. So we have to have these little gems that pop up here and there and we need to gets, certain credibility and reputation for these institutions that do things differently. It will take a long time to change the system, because the system is kind of interdependent and also, has these expectations.
01:03:47:01 – 01:04:22:23
Speaker 2
I mean, in France, it’s very, very, very, how should I put it? It’s very career oriented, especially in the private sector. And, and in the US, it’s certainly very similar, that, you wouldn’t necessarily get a job if you go to a school or a university or college. That is brain friendly, learner friendly and so on.
01:04:23:00 – 01:04:42:00
Speaker 2
So you would probably have to go to a treadmill school that’s called in column like that to be to, to, to, to to to show the world that, okay, you’ve been to one of these fancy places. You paid all that money or your parents, did you? You’ve done all the hard work. So you’re a resilient you can do this.
01:04:42:02 – 01:05:09:23
Speaker 2
So I think these fancy places, these these these great gems that we’re trying to create, they don’t have the reputation on the market yet. But I think there will come a time where, people will understand that in the 21st century and after, I think it’s more about creativity and agility and so on than about functionality.
01:05:09:23 – 01:05:25:19
Speaker 2
So that’s on its way out. So I see artificial intelligence and all the rest actually as an opportunity to finally get rid of a system that is totally out of date.
01:05:25:21 – 01:05:34:19
Speaker 1
Thank you so much for listening. If any part of this episode resonated with you, please connect with us on social media at the links in the show notes. Until next time.
About Bernd
Bernd Gibson is a Learning Experience Designer and Facilitator and the author of The Immersive Theatre of Learning. In his work he helps organisations, groups and individuals adapt to new cultural environments and to change. He facilitates seminars to foster a culture of innovation and to develop personal and team leadership. Currently based in France, Bernd has worked with learners from all over the world. He also works in higher education, namely at IESEG School of Management in Paris and Lille, as an adjunct professor for Cultural Diversity. Bernd is influenced by research and practices in the fields of theatre, immersive experiences and emotional learning. He is a proud member of the World Experience Organisation, a Pine&Gilmore Certified Experience Economy Expert and a NeuroHeart Education Coach. Outside his regular work in the Learning & Development field, he also designs and stages Immersive Learning Experiences such as retreats and learning games.