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Professional Development

Opportunities to engage with the ideas of PZ both in-person and online throughout the year.

I have found this to be a powerful and thought-provoking course. Like our teachers who experience what happens in their classrooms once they start using these routines, there is no going back! Now that I have these ideas and deeper understanding, I won't lose them.
- 2021 Power of Making Thinking Visible Micro Practicum Participant

One of the ways we make our research accessible to educators around the world is through providing professional education. These offerings are scheduled at various times throughout the year, research-based, and grounded in the day-to-day work of teachers and administrators. In addition, they are an opportunity for educators to earn professional learning hours. We offer:

Micro Practicums
Online Courses
Workshops
Conferences

Scholarships


4-5 week learning experiences where students practice implementing new concepts into their teaching and learning environments and receive personalized feedback from a coach and the instructors.

Engage deeply online with Project Zero research. PZ Micro Practicums (PZMP) focus on the practical application of research-based ideas and strategies in classrooms, schools, and other learning settings.

Throughout the learning experiences, participants apply what they learn as they learn, receiving personalized feedback from the instructors, a coach, as well as from fellow participants. Upon successful completion, participants earn a certificate that documents the professional development hours completed.

You may register as either a team or an individual. If you register as an individual you will be placed on a virtual team that you will work with throughout the course.

Enrollment is limited. Practicums may fill prior to the registration deadlines.

Cultures of Thinking in Action

REGISTRATION DEADLINE: October 19, 2021
COST: $249 per individual on teams of 3-5 people. $299 for individuals without a team who will be placed on virtual teams.

During times of change, it is important to lean into our values. Doing so helps us to remain grounded and true to our vision of what a quality education looks and feels like…even as we are buffeted by the unknown forces of change and thrust into new modes of instructional delivery.

Thinking and Learning in the Maker-Centered Classroom

DATE(S): March 07, 2022 to April 03, 2022
REGISTRATION DEADLINE: February 14, 2022
COST: $249 per individual on teams of 3-5 people. $299 for individuals without a team who will be placed on virtual teams.

Let`s Play: Teaching Strategies for Playful Learning

DATE(S): April 25, 2022 to May 29, 2022
REGISTRATION DEADLINE: April 01, 2022
COST: $249 per individual on teams of 3-5 people. $299 for individuals without a team who will be placed on virtual teams.

Play is central to how children learn: the way they make sense of their world; the way they form and explore friendships; the way they shape and test hypotheses about their intellectual, social, emotional, and physical environments. Yet incorporating play into a classroom or formal school setting isn’t a straightforward endeavor, as the nature of play and the nature of school are often at odds. The “Let’s Play” five-week mini course, based on the research and frameworks developed in the Lego Foundation-funded PZ project “Pedagogy of Play” is an introduction to some of the core principles and practices of playful learning and gives participants opportunities to design and try out at least one playful learning approach in their own contexts. The course has been revised to support educators to learn about how to facilitate playful learning online, in a classroom and in hybrid learning contexts.

The Power of Making Thinking Visible

DATE(S): May 01, 2022 to May 29, 2022
REGISTRATION DEADLINE: April 10, 2022
COST: $249 per individual on teams of 3-5 people. $299 for individuals without a team who will be placed on virtual teams.

Thinking routines have become extremely popular over the last decade and are often recognized as a hallmark of Project Zero practices.  With this popularity and wide-spread use has come the opportunity to look more closely at just what effect thinking routines have on teaching, on learning, and on schooling.  These issues could not have been properly examined when thinking routines were first being introduced almost 15 years ago. Now, however, extensive research and ongoing collaboration with schools have generated new learnings that create the opportunity to take the practices of making thinking visible to the next level.

Six-session online courses where you can explore PZ frameworks for learning and teaching, practice implementing new concepts into your learning environments, collaborate with other inspiring educators, and receive group feedback from course facilitators and a coach.

How do you choose the course that’s right for you? In the video to the right, PZ Director Daniel Wilson explains the key themes of each course and what you can expect.

Making Learning Visible

September 20, 2021 to December 19, 2021
Learning is social. Every day, children and adults learn from and with others, encountering new perspectives, strategies, and ways of thinking. Together, groups can achieve greater perspective and understanding than any individual can alone, but we need tools for sharing thinking and making... Read more

Visible Thinking

September 20, 2021 to December 19, 2021
We all become more effective as learners when we become aware of our learning processes and learn to manage how we think and learn. Visible Thinking is an approach developed by Project Zero to deepen content learning and to cultivate students’ thinking skills and thinking dispositions. Used by... Read more

Teaching for Understanding

February 14, 2022 to May 15, 2022
As educators, we seek to prepare our students for the future — to equip them with the knowledge, skills, and dispositions that will help them become productive, reflective, responsible members of their communities as they move into adulthood. But none of us can predict the kind of future that... Read more

Creating Cultures of Thinking

September 2022
Cultures of Thinking will not be offered in the 2021 - 2022 academic year. If you are interested in similar offerings, we suggest you take a look at our micro practicums Cultures of Thinking in Action and The Power of Making Thinking Visible . Effective teaching takes more than good planning and... Read more

Project Zero conferences are 1-5 day learning experiences designed for educators to engage with PZ research and concepts in a variety of formats. Through the artful curating of plenaries, workshops and reflection/study periods, participants have the opportunity to learn about new research, deepen their understanding of PZ concepts, engage in thought-provoking dialogue with other participants from around the world and reflect on how their learnings apply to their own contexts. Conferences are suitable for educators with minimal to extensive experience with PZ ideas and for those coming from any type of learning environment. Certificates of professional learning will be awarded to participants that complete all conference activities. In-person conferences will return in 2022.

Education that Matters (Two-Day Conference)

March 19, 2022 to March 20, 2022
What and how should students learn to thrive in today’s complex world? What education will matter most to the lives they are likely to lead? Some schools aspire to develop learners who are active and empathetic citizens. Others encourage complex reasoning or creativity. Leading progressive visions... Read more