Book Review: A Whole New Mind - why right brainers will rule the future by Daniel Pink

• Design - being able to make something beautiful - appealing to and engaging with people’s emotions. 
• Story - the art of storytelling is essential in all areas of life, from owning a business, to selling and marketing, to persuade, to communicate. 
• Symphony - being able to see the big picture and make connections, in order to innovate and problem solve. 
• Empathy - to be able to emotionally connect with others, forge relationships, to understand them and themselves. 
• Play - utilising the positive effects (physical and mental) of play and laughter in all areas of your life, how it can increase productivity and satisfaction. 
• Meaning - rather than focusing on materialistic desires, Pink advocates the importance of being able to attribute deeper meaning to all areas of life, including finding your purpose and passion, and spiritual fulfilment. 

• Utilise more of a project-based learning approach - having a ‘big question’ or real-life problem/ issue for students to investigate and ponder attributes more meaning to their work, especially if it is something that is relevant to them. In doing so, they are required to make connections and solve problems, putting pieces of the puzzle together to form new ideas (symphony). In communicating their new ideas, they may need to utilise their design skills and/ or storytelling skills. 
• Inject more play and humour into your teaching style. Try to make your students laugh as much as you can, and don’t be afraid to look a little bit silly in doing so. If you make a mistake, don’t brush it off or try to cover it up (they WILL know anyway), instead make sure you laugh about it and make fun of yourself to show them that making mistakes is OK. Bring positive energy to your classroom, and watch it spread like magic, uplifting your students spirits. Also incorporate more play into learning strategies or projects - for example, getting students to create and perform skits or impersonations can be hilarious, or play some fun group quiz games that get students engaged and competitive. The neuroscience that provides evidence for the positive effect of play and laughter on learning is really compelling.
• Develop your story-telling skills - frame new content within a story - students are much more likely to connect with it and remember it. For example, you could teach the topic of migration through the story of an immigrant. You could even include relevant stories from your past or experiences, which has the added benefit of allowing the students to have more of an insight into your life, which helps to develop better rapport. You could also require students to convey their understanding through stories so that they are developing their story-telling skills as well. 
• Use beautiful, well-designed products in your classroom. Don’t settle for hastily put together teaching resources - either invest time in creating something beautiful yourself, or purchase products that are clearly well-designed. Your students will appreciate this so much, as they will see that you believe that they are worthy of this effort. You are also setting the example for them, so that they are more likely to put effort into creating well-designed materials. 
• Design EXPERIENCES for your students, whether it be in or out of the classroom, in real life or online. Incorporate as many of the senses into the experience as you can. For example, if you are teaching WW1, have video showing life in the trenches or a battle, turn the lights off and put on loud gun fire and explosions, bake them some hardtack to eat, read to them 1st hand accounts, have them listen to a song about war, get them to close their eyes and really imagine what it would be like with a guided audio visualisation. Having an experience makes the learning more memorable and develops more empathy within students. 
• Develop empathy within your teaching - try to connect emotionally to your students, show that you see them and understand them. Building this kind of rapport is so important as it makes students so much more receptive. The evidence shows that students are much more likely to learn from someone that they know cares about them. Also try to include activities that help to develop empathy within and between your students, and for other people in general. 

• Try to make your surroundings as beautiful as you can, whether it be your office desk, your car, your classroom, your home. An uncluttered environment is essential for an uncluttered mind. Take into account all of the senses - as well as how things look, think about how they make you feel. Use smell (such as essential oils), sound (your favourite tunes), and touch (like quality textiles), to enhance the experience. 
• If you have to work at home (which let’s face it, all teacher do!), create a beautiful office desk area that you want to be in. Create a ritual of lighting a candle, diffusing some oil, putting some music on (if you need to focus then search for brain/ focus music on YouTube - it seriously works!) and making a cup of tea before sitting down to get stuck into whatever you need to get done. 
• Design beautiful experiences for yourself - for example, say you want to take a bath. Set the scene, clear the kids bath toys, light some candles, add some essential oils to the water, put some music on. 
• Take opportunities to be creative wherever you can - be it your home decor, your cooking, fashion, birthday gifts, etc. 
• If you want to take it even further, think about taking up a hobby that sparks your creativity - painting, drawing, pottery, writing, music, dancing, etc. 

• What is your story? Reflect on this - understanding the story of your life is essential to becoming more understanding of yourself, your beliefs, motivations, desires. 
• Often the way you operate in this world and react to situations is a result of a story that you tell yourself. What stories are you telling yourself, how are they limiting you, and how can you re-write them? 
• Write - reflecting and writing out your story, feelings, or past events can be therapeutic and can help you to process your feelings. 

• Take opportunities to step out of your bubble from time to time, both at school and in your personal life. Make connections with teachers from other departments, or other schools. Pick up a new hobby which gets you to mingle with a new group of people. Read books from a range of genres Join different groups on Facebook or follow different people on your social media. Watch different types of documentaries and listen to different types of podcasts. Whilst doing this, start looking for the connections - how can one area of your life enhance another? Look at a problem or issue in your life and think about it from a different perspective. Have new experiences, travel to different places to get new perspective. Take time off for reflection so that you can take a step back and look at the bigger picture of your life, your goals, your purpose, and what you really want to achieve, and what’s really important to you. 

• Take some time to nurture your relationships and to really listen to your loved ones. Also learn about how having the courage to be vulnerable (check out Brene Brown), can increase empathy and strengthen relationships. Have empathy for yourself as well - think about how you talk to yourself. Would you talk to your child or best friend in that way? A lot of the time we wouldn’t even talk to a stranger the same way we talk to ourselves. Sometimes we might have to do a lot of work on ourselves before we can truly be empathetic towards others. 
• Learn about your triggers - what can trigger negative reactions in you? Have you even noticed that one teacher can have a lot of problems with a particular student (we often call this a personality clash), whilst another teacher has none at all? Often it is because the  student is triggering something within the teacher that causes a negative reaction. If you can tame your triggers then you can approach the situation from a new perspective. Learn about your main emotions and how you can better control them. Often it is difficult to feel empathetic towards a ‘problem’ student because the situation has raised a trigger in us - we won’t be able to help this student until we have worked on ourselves first.

• Try to incorporate play and laughter into your everyday life in any way that you can. If you are spending time with your kids, be really present with them and involve yourself in their play, notice how much they laugh and laugh along with them. Be playful with your partner, your family, your friends. Rather than a date night at a restaurant, maybe try something different like an Escape Room or LaserTag. Try not to take everything so seriously - be a bit more light-hearted in your approach to life. Inject humour wherever possible. Smile at everyone that you come across. Do things and surround yourself with people that make you laugh. Go to a comedy show or watch a funny movie. 

• Take stock of your life and think about what is truly adding meaning to it. Identify your main beliefs and values - are you living in alignment with them? Do some goal setting and dream big - what would add more meaning to your life? Try not to place too much importance on material possessions and instead think about the important people in your life and how you can spend more quality time with them. How can you inject more meaning into your work? Read books that inspire you. 

Taking a Future Focused approach to your teaching practice will definitely help you to develop these capabilities in your students and in yourself. The first step is creating a teaching and learning program that utilises big-picture conceptual thinking, and emphasising the development of important 21st century skills. Learn more here.