Workshops & Keynotes

Below, check out Jim’s offerings that are bespoke programming that are fit to your organisation, school or district’s needs.

Contact: skhooldesign@gmail.com @skhooldesign (Twitter)

Many of the organisations I have worked with.

UDL & Design Thinking Keynotes

This is an image that a muralist painted at the 2018 ECIS teachers conference and the mural is of my two-day workshop on universal design and design thinking.
ECIS Conference Luxembourg – Nov 2018

“Design Thinking — a Language for Educators” Handcrafted UDL For school professionals to work collaboratively on the big messy problems we all face when dealing with school improvement. Design Thinking is an excellent process to have a common method and language to tackle any large problem you face within your organisation. This keynote is thoughtful and implementable the next day.

“Educators are Designers” – Universal Design came directly out of the Americans with Disabilities act of 1990 and changed our designed world forever. The ideas within universal design and other design practices are easy to use when improving student experiences in your school. This Keynote applies Universal Design, Hostile Design, Affordances & Signifiers and more.

A picture of me in fall of 2019 presenting to a group of school leaders from ELMLE or European League of Middle Level Educators
ELMLE Leadership Retreat Sept 2019

“Students are the Greatest Consumer of Student Data” – Bring aggregated student data back to the students themselves in an, anonymous, meaningful and supportive way. Check out a class program design that aims to use lessons, projects and assessments that are designed to heighten students group and self-awareness to their progress, successes and their areas for further development.

UDL & Design Thinking Workshops

Assessment Design – Single or multi day workshop intended to carry through the work from the keynote “Educators are Designers” where teachers and leaders will evaluate assessments and design new assessments that build upon understandings of Universal Design, Hostile Design, Affordances & Signifiers and more.

Mastery Learning with Reflective use of Data – This workshop helps develop skills based learning classroom programs, assessments and an innovative use of the collected data with students. Individual teachers and teams of teachers use their time together to reshape their classroom programs and develop new uses of data. Teachers will also learn and practice how to have group data conversations with entire classes and as well as with individual students and families.

Access to Learning and Literacy – A new workshop I am proud to offer with Mark Overmeyer and am proud to partner with the wonderful folks of ECIS. Coming Soon!

Design Thinking Facilitation

Large Problem Facilitation – Your school site is dealing with a large and difficult problem/task such as changing over to standards based grading, creating a mission statement or redesigning your daily schedule. With motivation, time and skill, your team is ready to make that big change. Yet, for a school leader to both facilitate the process and to be a stakeholder can be less productive. I will come in as a seasoned educator and as a skilled outside facilitator to provide space for your school leaders to be the valued stakeholder.

ChatGPT and AI has Arrived in Education

Interactive Learning and Experience – Your life is already being impacted by the data trained and generative technology we call AI. The videos you are recommended on Facebook and the face scanning technology that unlocks your phone are examples of AI that you live with right now. But what you may not know is that AI is working in the background of many apps, plugins and tools you and your students are already using. Now, with ChatGPT and other similar tools, AI is coming out of the shadows and we can all directly interact with many of these powerful tool. Therefore, it is time for schools to get a strategy in place to know when and how to choose to use specific AI tools and when we want to leave them to the side. Covering three main topics, I offer sessions for teachers to approach AI student facing tools in elementary contexts, student facing tools in secondary and finally AI tools in educator professional use. All of this is done with a design thinking lens and with careful consideration of UDL experiences in mind. Contact me to learn more about how I can help your school take the first steps.

Here is a link to a digital choice board and to a presentation that I have made which provides you an idea about how these interactive experiences will look.

Where in the world have I been?

  • ECIS Leadership Conference ChatGPT & AI In Education Has Arrived (April 2023)
  • CAST.org Keynote Talk in Orlando Creating a Common Language: The Language of Design for UDL Educators (March 2023)
  • ELMLE Annual Conference, Porto “Micro Moments: Elevating UDL through language, actions and practice” (January 2023)
  • Texthelp Festival of Inclusion ” Micro Moments: Elevating UDL through language, actions and practice” (November 2022)
  • EICS MLC “Design Thinking – Leading Change“- (November 2022)
  • ECIS MLC “Design Thinking – Leading Change” – (October 2022)
  • Berlin Metropolitan School “School UDL as DEI Access” keynote – April 2022
  • ECIS MLC “Design Thinking – Leading Change” -(February 2022)
  • ECIS MLC “Design Thinking – Leading Change” – (November 2022)
  • St. Georges, Luxembourg “UDL as DEI Access“- November 2021
  • EdCollab Conference Presentation Access to Learning and Literacy (April 10th, 2021)
  • ECIS Leadership Conference Presenter Access to Learning and Literacy (April 8th-10th, 2021)
  • ELMLE – Webinar Differentiation vs. Universally Designed learning (April 19th 2021)
  • Access to Learning and Literacy Workshop (March 21st, 2021)
  • IS Luxembourg Learning Loft – “Designing for Students” (January 14th, 2021)
  • ECIS Webinar “Access to Learning and Literacy” November, 2020 [YouTube Video]
  • CEESA Conference – “Designing Accessible Assessments” October, 2020 [YouTube Video]
  • ECIS Webinar “Designing Solutions for Hard Problems” October 2020 [YouTube Video]
  • ECIS Digital Leadership Conference – Training – April 2020
  • Mumbai, India – Teacher Training & Building Project – March 2020
  • Frankfurt, Germany – Facilitation – November 2019
  • Zürich, Switzerland for ELMLE – Training – September 2019
  • Vienna, Austria – Facilitation – August 2019
  • Mormon Lake, Arizona USA – Teacher Training & Building Project – July 2019
  • Addis Ababa, Ethiopia – Facilitation & Training – May 2019
  • The Hague – Facilitation/Mapping – Dec 2018
  • Luxembourg, Luxembourg for ECIS – Training – November 2018

Images of Design Thinking Sessions and Projects

Internet flyer for a session I did for ECIS.org
Me presenting though Zoom and playing guitar.
Me presenting though Zoom at a leadership conference.
A flyer for Mark Overmeyer and Myself looking at intentional conversations with students.
Flyer for a session I did.
A Tuk-Tuk project i did with students in India, making a mobil library. It is painted bright yellow and green.
Spring 2020 and Beyond – COVID Era Consulting/Speaking
Jim thinking deeply while participants work through an activity
The Cast.org panel waving at the camera
Jim, Tesha and Hillary together
The cast.org panel discussing on stage.
Jim delivering a talk for CAST.org
After a day in a school, Jim and his family see the town.
at the ELMLE conference, educators consider the prompt about micro moments.
Jim at the Porto conference seeing the city
Jim working with students on a school visit
Jim with other speakers talking about inclusion with TextHelp
One of Many posters with sticky notes all over it, intentionally organised to tell a story about a problem that this school wanted to solve.
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia – 2019
One of Many posters with sticky notes all over it, intentionally organised to tell a story about a problem that this school wanted to solve.
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia – 2019
One of Many posters with sticky notes all over it, intentionally organised to tell a story about a problem that this school wanted to solve.
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia -2019
One of Many posters with sticky notes all over it, intentionally organised to tell a story about a problem that this school wanted to solve.
Frankfurt, Germany – 2019
One of Many posters with sticky notes all over it, intentionally organised to tell a story about a problem that this school wanted to solve.
Frankfurt, Germany – 2019
One of Many posters with sticky notes all over it, intentionally organised to tell a story about a problem that this school wanted to solve.
Frankfurt, Germany – 2019
One of Many posters with sticky notes all over it, intentionally organised to tell a story about a problem that this school wanted to solve.
Frankfurt, Germany – 2019
One of Many posters with sticky notes all over it, intentionally organised to tell a story about a problem that this school wanted to solve.
Luxembourg – 2018
One of Many posters with sticky notes all over it, intentionally organised to tell a story about a problem that this school wanted to solve.
Luxembourg – 2018
One of Many posters with sticky notes all over it, intentionally organised to tell a story about a problem that this school wanted to solve.
Luxembourg – 2018
ga-ga ball pit in progress
A ga-ga ball pit created with young teachers. Exciting project!
Mormon Lake – 2019
One of Many posters with sticky notes all over it, intentionally organised to tell a story about a problem that this school wanted to solve.
The Hague – 2018
Jim speaking at the US Embassy in Vienna on design thinking.
Vienna, Austria – 2019
Jim presenting in Austria to a group of teachers.
Vienna, Austria – 2019
Two teachers working together at a session I am leading.
Vienna, Austria – 2019
Four teachers in an overhead shot working at a session that I am leading.
Vienna, Austria -2019
Teacher-Leaders working at a session that I am giving
Zürich, Switzerland – 2019
A Large group of teachers working at a workshop that I am giving
Zürich, Switzerland – 2019
More sticky notes! they are telling a story of a problem that they are facing in their own school.
Zürich, Switzerland – 2019