Leading Ambitious Teaching and Learning

Want to explore ambitious teaching and how collaboration between students and teachers can lead to deeper learning and the development of 21st-century skills? This course is developed in partnership with Microsoft as part of the Microsoft K-12 Education Leadership initiative, which aims to help K-12 school leaders drive the pursuit of ambitious instruction in classrooms. Beyond the straightforward transfer of facts and skills, ambitious instruction has teachers and students making meaning of rich academic content, engaging authentic practical and intellectual puzzles, and creating new knowledge and capabilities in themselves and others. Globally, ambitious instruction sits at the very center of policy-driven educational improvement efforts, with schools and systems pressed to engage students in “deeper learning” and the development of “21st-century skills.” This course is both for individual leaders and for teams of leaders from a school, district/region, or system who aim to improve educational opportunities and outcomes for students, especially those historically underserved by public schools. For these teams, the course will function as a platform both for initiating their joint practice and for collaborating on issues that arise in their joint practice. Students will explore: The meaning and practice of ambitious instruction. The use of technology in ambitious instruction. Systemic supports for ambitious instruction. The practice of leading transformative change. This course is part of the Leading Educational Innovation and Improvement MicroMasters program offered by MichiganX.