Shari Tishman is a co-director of Out of Eden Learn and a former director of Project Zero.

Many readers of this blog know that Out of Eden Learn’s academic home is Project Zero, a research center at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. This is a big year for Project Zero, because it is our 50th anniversary. For five decades, researchers at Project Zero have led dozens of research projects that have influenced the field of education around the globe. Various special events will occur throughout the year, and to launch its 50th anniversary, PZ convened a special event on Friday, October 13th, 2017.

The event, entitled Changes in Mind, was part of Boston’s HUBweek forum. It was introduced by Drew Gilpin Faust, President of Harvard University, and James E. Ryan, Dean of Harvard Graduate School of Education, and featured five short presentations by five Project Zero directors past and present: Howard Gardner, David Perkins, Steve Seidel, Shari Tishman (yours truly), and Daniel Wilson. Each presentation focused on different aspects of Project Zero work that have shaped contemporary ideas about learning.

A video of the entire event can be found here, and all of the 15 minute presentations are worth watching. My presentation, From Invisible to Visible (viewable below), focuses on the purpose and impact of making student thinking visible.

Although I don’t discuss Out of Eden Learn specifically, the theme of visibility is central to the Out of Eden Learn curriculum, which is designed to encourage students to make their thinking and learning visible in a variety of ways. In the talk, I use a range of images to show how instruction can be designed to encourage students to externalize their own thinking processes as they unfold, thereby creating a dynamic learning experience in which students’ emerging ideas help shape the knowledge they build. Check out a few of the images from the presentation below. Relatedly, I invite you to check out my new book on Slow Looking, which is very much inspired by Out of Eden Learn. If you are inclined to order a copy from the Routledge website, please use this discount code at checkout for a 20% discount: FLR40. I’d love to know what you think of the book!