Futures Thinking: Imagining What Can Be at CEE by The Center for Early Education

Futures Thinking: Imagining What Can Be at CEE

One of the professional development highlights of the past school year was the exploration of CEE’s Futures Thinking initiative, a project that gave the school’s faculty and staff a glimpse into how the world continues to evolve and ways the school can anticipate and plan for many possible futures.

The work of The Center for Early Education is inherently futurefocused as we seek to fulfill our mission of developing lifelong learners. Many people say things like, "We're preparing students for jobs that don’t exist yet." As a school for young children, this is something The Center takes to heart. Thinking about the ways in which the world is constantly changing, and the implications these changes will have on education, continues to be a priority for the school.

Coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic—which spurred many rapid changes to how people work and study—was the right time to initiate this project of looking ahead to the future of education. With these goals in mind, the CEE Futures Thinking Task Force, consisting of faculty and administrators across divisions, was created in 2023. The diverse team represented different areas of thought and expertise to explore the concept of Futures Thinking: the ability to identify signals and trends to anticipate a range of possible futures that our students will step into upon graduating from CEE.

CEE FUTURES THINKING TASK FORCE

After working closely with organizations including Stanford University’s d.school and Institute for the Future, the Task Force brought the Futures Thinking framework to the faculty and staff with workshops and an immersive in-service experience. The workshops introduced the concept of futures thinking, highlighting the importance of questioning assumptions, staying open to change, and considering how different industries will evolve by the time our students enter the workforce. This work is essential because while The Center will always be committed to providing a developmentallyappropriate education, we must also focus on the critical thinking skills students must develop to become adaptable and forwardthinking citizens.

“When people think about their future selves, their brain activity mirrors the type of activity that occurs when they think about complete strangers.”

-Hal Hershfield, Psychologist and Professor of Marketing and Behavioral Decision Making at UCLA

The culminating in-service experience on November 10, 2023, involved visiting various organizations and companies across California that are at the forefront of innovation. The intention of these visits was to give Center employees a firsthand glimpse into all the ways organizations address practices related to the rapidly evolving future, and examine the following questions in the context of CEE.

• How might we prepare students to be lifelong and adaptive learners?

• How might the world change, and why?

• What might people need in those futures?

The task force carefully chose each site. They first began by identifying key areas of inquiry and then researching organizations and companies engaged in that type of work. For example, to explore the intersection of art and technology, they planned a visit to meet with the Principal Production Designer and Senior Research and Development Imagineer at Walt Disney’s Imagineering. An inquiry into clothing and its environmental impact led the team to choose Patagonia headquarters to meet with their Senior Environmental Impact Specialist and the design team to learn about the ways in which the company is committed to responsible business practices and environmental sustainability.

Erika Johnson, Assistant Head of School

Nassim Shandy, Director of Teaching and Learning

Kia Perry, Math Specialist Stephanie Steelman, EC Library Teacher

Beatríz Salcido, EC Teacher Lauren Trammell, UE Science Teacher

FIELDWORK EXPERIENCES AND GUIDING QUESTIONS

ACTIVISION

⚬ What steps can we take to ensure our students remain socially aware, mindful, and responsible when involved in activities within virtual spaces or alternate realities?

CREATIVE ARTISTS AGENCY (CAA)

⚬ How can we find new ways to engage in service opportunities that leverage a broader range of talents and connections?

FOOD FUTURES LAB

⚬ What will the future of food look like, and how will it impact our health, environment, and society?

THE GETTY RESEARCH INSTITUTE

⚬ How can we protect and share art and cultural artifacts from the past for the benefit of future generations?

IDEO PLAY LAB (SAN FRANCISCO)

⚬ How do we leverage the principles of play as a vehicle for engagement, change, and joy?

RESPONSIBILITY

FACULTY AND STAFF CONSIDERED THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS THROUGHOUT THEIR FUTURES THINKING EXPERIENCES.

• What skills are relevant now and may be even more relevant in the future?

• What skills are relevant now that won’t be in the future?

• Is there a curricular topic that this visit inspires?

• How does your site help different types of people come together to collaborate?

• How does the physical space contribute to collaboration?

• How are people drawing on different disciplines or connecting dots in their work?

Faculty and staff collected notes and reflections in their Fieldwork Journals

After the trips, faculty and staff engaged in several different reflection exercises. People came back to campus feeling inspired and excited to share their takeaways with the school and having formed new bonds with fellow community members. We gathered feedback on everyone’s experiences through an exercise called “Start, Stop, or Continue.” In small groups, faculty and staff suggested things the school should consider starting, stopping, or continuing based on what they learned from their various trips.

Futures Thinking has already made its way to the classroom. For instance, sixth graders participated in a workshop titled “Artifacts of the Past and

Future” during their January Intersession. They were asked to select a topic, list things that are generally true about it today, and then “flip” their truths, imagining a world in which any one of these “truths” is no longer true. In one instance, students were asked to brainstorm facts about shoes. They shared that shoes typically cost money, people usually have multiple pairs, and they take shoes off to sleep. They then flipped the facts: imagining shoes are free, people have only one pair, and they sleep with their shoes on. Through storytelling, they explored reasons why this change might occur in this “alternative world.” This type of thought experiment helped students think critically about societal changes and understand their underlying causes.

Using Futures Thinking to examine current practices and trends can provide valuable insights into how things change and how we can impact our world. The Center is enthusiastic about exploring futures thinking even further, and leveraging this valuable experience to further establish the school as a forward-thinking institution.

“Being a futures thinker is not something that only applies to certain people. We’re all futurists—whether it’s planning for our own personal lives or participating in strategic decisions at our work—we should all feel like the future is something we have agency and responsibility to impact and change. It’s better to be surprised by a simulation, rather than blindsided by reality.”

-Susanne Forchheimer, Institute for the Future (IFTF) Emerging Media Lab Research Manager