If you read some of the same blogs I read, you’ll see that Christian Long has been circulating some really good questions about School 2.0 and Will Richardson has been talking about re-envisioning schools, but through it all, something has been making me harken back to something Tom Hoffman wrote, talking about reform in the context of what has gone before.

And that’s the thing.

For me, the definition of what we’re trying to do is pretty clear. It’s the implementation that’s hard.

School 2.0, for me, is John Dewey’s Constructivist dream made real by the use of 21st Century tools.

We must create schools that allow students to dig deep into the world of ideas, setting up structures where traditional subjects lines can be crossed. We must use the tools at our disposal to allow students to research, collaborate, create and communicate. And we must work side-by-side with our students, developing the relationships that the students need to learn how to navigate a changing and difficult world.

And then, every decision we make has to be in service of those ideas. It impacts teaching-load, scheduling, school size, assessment, course offerings — everything.

The mistake we make is thinking that those very simple ideas — constructivism / connectivism, interdisciplinarity, engagement, care, and a commitment to ensuring that our schools reflect the world our students will inherit — are edu-speak or that they can be brought into the structure of a traditional school.

These ideas are transformative. As Neil Postman wrote, when Gutenberg invented the printing press, you didn’t have Europe plus the printing press, you had a whole new Europe. If we are to bring these ideas fully into schools, we will have whole new schools.

The difficulty is in implementation, and there are different ways to do it, but the key — no matter what — is to have that clear sense of what your vision is… what you are trying to do… and then always working to act in service of that ideal.