In my reading last week,  I came across an article from the Disney Institute titled “Leadership Lessons From Walt Disney: Perfecting The Customer Experience“.  As a connected learner and leader, I am always interested in ideas for improving improving service. The interesting part is taking time to consider how new ideas can be applied to another setting – K12 education in this case.

Consider these two quotes from the article:

“At Disney Institute, we were recently reflecting on the phrase, “simple is the new smart,” and it reminded us of a leadership philosophy we share with our clients and training program attendees – keep it simple so that everyone understands.”

“Walt Disney was a master at this. One of the simplest, yet most powerful and timeless leadership lessons we have learned from Walt is: “You don’t build it for yourself. You know what the people want and you build it for them.”

     Photo by Stephanie Schmidt (my daughter)

If you consider education through the perspectives  of “simple” and “build it for them” (the students), what would be different in education?   My initial thoughts include:

• increase in play based learning
• more creating and making
• increase in choice
• more self directed
• multiple paths to experience learning, and a
• focus on making technology (and I mean the whole area – hardware, software, access, digital resources) easier to use

What would you add to the “K12 by Disney” list?  Please share your insights to this idea by leaving a comment or connecting on Twitter. 

Additional Resources: 
Read the full  Disney article: Perfecting the Customer Experience

~Mark