Room: E143-144

Audience: Educators

Call to Action: 

1. Understand how evolution informs us about “school” from a place for education to becoming more expansive childhood experience toward a more sustainable future?
2. Understand how evolution informs education and learning to become resilient, equitable, regenerative, innovative, and progressive!
3. Understand how human evolution informs our pre-set behavior patterns that can be impactful in envisioning places for learning central to our ecological universe.
4. Understand how subtle environmental cues can impact our experiences and cognition and create sustainable learning environments to support all humans.
5. Understand tools to leverage our predispositions for social emotional learning which inform sustainable solutions that are transformative and impactful.

Abstract: In a world cluttered by irrelevant information, clarity is power. In theory anybody can join this debate about the future of education, schools, and our humanity, but it is hard to maintain a clear vision unless we understand what it truly means to being human. Human evolution has defined us to the very core of how we perceive and experience our environment around us. As described by Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, natural selection was not always a matter of survival of the fittest but also survival of those most adaptable to changing surroundings. Walking upright, the capacity to make tools, our multisensory brain, and dependence on technology to alter the surroundings have all impacted our responses to our built environments. Our evolution can provide insight to understanding human behavior around collaboration, safety and security and behavioral responses to survival all providing cues to designing sustainable learning environments that create a sense of place and belonging for all humans big and small. This session will attempt to unfold a deeper understanding of what it means to be human and attempt to offer clarity in this debate about the future of schools. Understanding the major forces that are at play today, redefining our future will also be discussed. Let’s come together and imagine a place where humans big and small can bring crazy love, joy, energy, and warmth as a power of true connections and purpose.

Learning Objectives:

1. Understand how evolution informs us about “school” from a place for education to becoming more expansive childhood experience toward a more sustainable future?
2. Understand how evolution informs education and learning to become resilient, equitable, regenerative, innovative, and progressive!
3. Understand how human evolution informs our pre-set behavior patterns that can be impactful in envisioning places for learning central to our ecological universe.
4. Understand how subtle environmental cues can impact our experiences and cognition and create sustainable learning environments to support all humans.
5. Understand tools to leverage our predispositions for social emotional learning which inform sustainable solutions that are transformative and impactful.