Empowering Communities: Embark on a transformative journey to elevate your teaching skills. A 8-month program designed exclusively for teachers seeking to take their teaching to new heights.
During this eight-month cohort, participants will participate in 4 in-person trainings in Orlando Florida and monthly coaching meetings to embark on a mission to empower their community to shape their world.
During this cohort, teachers will take part in a variety of learning activities, community exhibitions and collaborations to explore and practice Project Zero principles and strategies for teaching and learning.
Discover the incredible practice of maker-centered learning, developed by the expert team at Agency by Design initiative at Harvard University, as you gain a practical understanding of its implementation.
Join a vibrant community of like-minded individuals who share a passion for education, inquiry, and experimentation as they embark on a journey to empower our community to shape their world. Together, we will support and inspire each other to explore new ideas and cultivate growth.
Let us ignite a spark within you to inspire a future generation of innovative thinkers and doers, as we collectively reshape the world.
Embrace the challenge of big dreams and unleash your limitless potential. Join this incredible adventure and experience the life-changing effects of maker-centered learning up close.
Discover the power of maker-centered learning! Engage students in deep and meaningful learning while fostering their creativity and problem-solving skills. Join our teacher cohort 2024-2025 to explore a range of strategies and tools created by Agency by Design, a renowned research initiative by Project Zero at Harvard University. In this year-long program, you will unlock the power of thinking routines to enhance learning for both educators and students. Experience the key practices that make thinking visible and And try out core practices associated with making thinking visible and learn how they relate to and interact with one another.
Embark on a transformative journey to enhance your teaching skills. Join our cohort and discover how to implement and document maker-centered learning practices in your classroom. Let experts guide and inspire you and help you connect theory with practice to make a real impact on your students’ education.
Experience the awe-inspiring magic at embracing innovation at our campuses at Young Innovators in Oviedo and Winter Garden.
Immerse yourself in the expertise of our dedicated practitioners who are making a real impact in their practice.
Unlock the secret to educational triumph by fostering strong connections with parents and the community through impactful events. Discover the power of involving parents in maker-centered learning and empower them to extend this remarkable experience into their own households.
Project Zero Harvard University
Edward P. Clapp, Ed.D. is a Principal Investigator at Project Zero interested in exploring creativity and innovation, design and maker-centered learning, contemporary approaches to arts teaching and learning, and diversity, equity, and inclusion in education. Edward and his colleagues explore these issues with their teacher partners through a variety of different collaborative inquiries around the world. In addition to his work as a researcher, Edward is also a Lecturer on Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Edward’s most recent books include co-author The Participatory Creativity Guide for Educators and The Maker-Centered Learning Playbook for Early Childhood Education.
Project Zero Harvard University
Lindsey Hicks is a practitioner specialist on the Envisioning Innovation in Education project at Project Zero. Lindsey was an elementary special education teacher and teacher leader for over twenty years in the Scarsdale, NY public school district. Lindsey is a co-founder of the Scarsdale Reggio Emilia study group where she leads teachers in the exploration of the Reggio approach to teaching and learning and other contemporary topics in constructivist and innovative pedagogy. Lindsey’s professional interests include diversity, equity and inclusion in education, literacy, sustainability, and music and art as empowering forces in the lives of teachers and students.
Innovation Expert
A career educator, Lisa Yokana is currently an educational consultant, specializing in innovation. She was the STEAM (science, technology, engineering, art and math) coordinator at Scarsdale High School for 15 years, where she designed and taught a three level STEAM course sequence for Scarsdale’s Design Lab. In 2019, the program won the gold medal in the STEAMEX international contest for innovative curriculum design. Lisa works with teachers across the disciplines to integrate Design Thinking and Making into their curriculum. She was a Coach for IDEO’s Teachers Guild, and co-instructed Project Zero/Harvard Graduate School.
A:To introduce a cohort of educators to maker-centered
learning practices and to support them in making practical
connections to their work in their classrooms.
B: To equip the cohort members with a working knowledge of
the practice of documentation and its application.
C: To develop a professional learning community amongst the
cohort members will serve as a place of inquiry,
experimentation, and support.
D: To engage parents in maker-centered learning so that they
may continue this work with their children at home.
E: Site visits at Young Innovators Academies- (Oviedo and
Winter Garden Campus) to experience exhibitions of teacher
inquiry, classroom observations, documentation review, focus
group discussions, planning meetings and social events with
Participants and/or key stakeholders
Children are innovators. Come experience how The Innovation Advantage makes learning visible and their plans to solve problems and challenges.
Part of the exhibit is also a visual representation of the practices of maker-centered learning in Central Florida and the opportunity for the public to participate in the experience of collaborative inquiry between parents, educators, and the community.
Come experience the excitement of bringing ideas to life in a fun-filled festival where children experience learning and build their innovation skills to identify and offer solutions to real-world challenges in their communities.
The competitions are open to schools that practice the Innovation Advantage. Teams compete to win seed funding for their innovative start-up company and receive coaching from a panel of local judges with business and financial experience.
This Innovation Advantage program is unlike anything else I have ever seen! I am an educator, and this program is truly revolutionary. It not only provides teachers with strategies to prepare kids for a world of constant change but also gives children the tools and skills they need to make their own mark on the world. It is an incredible way to develop problem-solving, critical thinking, and creative design skills. It has made a huge difference in my classroom, and I am so thankful for the tools and resources the program has provided. This program will definitely change the world, and I cannot recommend it highly enough!
Empowering Communities to Shape their World is a one year program designed for teachers preschool to elementary school. This is a hybrid program but requires participants to attend in-person meetings four weekends in one year.
Visit One:September 20 – 21, 2024
Visit Two:November 22 – 23, 2024
Visit Three:February 21 – 22, 2025
Visit Four:April 11 – 12, 2025
The in-person events allow to foster a deeper understanding of the material and allow for networking opportunities and the building of relationships between teachers in the cohort.
Between site visits, the participants will meet regularly (about every two to three weeks) in small groups to discuss the progress of their work, share documentation, and receive feedback from one another. There will be a general structure for study group meetings, which will be self-facilitated by the participating educators. The project liaison will offer on-the-ground coaching to the Participants regularly. In between site visits, teacher groups will conduct 60-minute virtual coaching sessions for the Participants.
Teachers, Teacher Leaders, and School Administrators and Leaders.
Orlando Florida Empowering will be hosted at the the hotel in Orlando and at Young Innovators Academy.
Scholarships are available for educators from qualifying organizations. With generous support from organizations and many individual donations, we are able to offer a limited number of professional learning scholarships to support a range of schools, districts, and organizations as well as a diverse group of educators.
These scholarships support educators and teams in under-resourced contexts and marginalized communities.
The deadline for registration is Sunday, July 31, 2024.
Space is limited. The courses may fill prior to the registration deadline.
