Future Learning Design Podcast

Tim Logan

We are stuck in an old paradigm, with institutional structures that were built for a world that no longer exists. Within education, passionate entrepreneurs & committed citizens are no longer waiting for these broken formal institutions to be reformed. All over the world, they're designing & building their own local responses with relationships at their core. These are the education ecosystems that our young people need and out of which new institutions will emerge. This podcast is an inquiry into these fundamental changes and an invitation to join the movement to help nurture positive change.

  1. 16 hr ago

    Exploring the Biological Roots of Cognition - A Conversation with Jinan KB

    Cognition is a strange word and not a very commonly used word by practicing educators.  It feels academic and detached from the act of a group of young people learning in the world.  But when you look at the dictionary definition of cognition – the "mental action or process of acquiring, storing, retrieving, and processing knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses" – this seems pretty fundamental to what we do as educators. But what if our understanding of what it means has been heavily biased by the Western modern scientific paradigm? For example, in the difference between learning the world and learning about the world via the linguistic labels and symbols that we create to represent aspects of it.  My guest this week Jinan KB is offering a radically different description of what natural cognition or the biological roots of cognition actually are.  I absolutely love these kinds of conversations as they challenge me right at the edge of my understanding given my own conditioning into particular ways of knowing about the world. It also feels like a really alive part of what we're being asked to do now more broadly, to explore more generously and expansively the space of what is possible in order to think differently about the educational and societal predicaments in which we find ourselves. Jinan is a researcher of natural cognition, cognitive autonomy, and the biological foundations of knowing. His work began with a simple but unsettling question: How do human beings naturally create knowledge? In 1991, Jinan stopped reading in order to investigate this question directly. For over four decades, he has explored this question through lived engagement with children, non-literate artisans, indigenous communities, design education, and everyday life. He is the author of Awakening Beauty and works with parents, educators, designers, researchers, and communities interested in recovering the conditions that allow human intelligence to flourish naturally. Website: https://www.jinankb.in/  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jinan-kb-5386676/  Impact of literacy on consequence: https://youtu.be/WG9uJN-UoSc?si=0sMtaGuwLe4sn9Py  How do Children Create knowledge? How teaching is detrimental to a child's learning: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3A-8iI4Py4  What is Knowledge? Implicit and explicit knowledge: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3IhVFs4b8wA  How schools and toys are damaging children? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z72rbcSpi7o  Storytelling and Reading are damaging for children: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4ZVLDpfzLI  Word and the World form two different Cognitive systems: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qHZNIEwio8&t=1s

    Exploring the Biological Roots of Cognition - A Conversation with Jinan KB

  2. 4 days ago

    Experiential Learning, Rural Systemic Development and the Hawkesbury Experience - A Conversation with Richard Bawden

    "How do we learn what we already know?" (Carlos Alvarez Pereira). A lot of so-called innovation is old ideas, tried in a different place at a different time, packaged up in new wrapping to seem like a "new" idea. Whether it's from 50 years ago or 10000 years ago, there is a huge amount, if we're open to it, that we can learn from the accumulated wisdom of fellow humans making their way and learning in the world. My guest is this week is Richard Bawden who led Hawkesbury Agricultural College in Richmond, Australia in the 1970s and 80s. At that time and in that place, they were doing some incredible work using systemic and complexity-informed approaches to agriculture as rural development. There is so much resonance between the work that Richard and his colleagues were doing then and the changes taking place in educational ecosystems around the world today. Richard was a Professor Emeritus of Western Sydney University (WSU, previously the University of Western Sydney [UWS]), and an honorary research fellow in the Office of Sustainability at WSU. He was one of the foundation professors (of Systemic Development) of WSU (in 1989) and its inaugural Dean of the Faculty of Agriculture and Rural Development. For the decade preceding that, he was Head of the School of Agriculture at Hawkesbury Agricultural College which was incorporated into the then UWS at its establishment.  Below you will find a range of Richard's, and other's, writings about Hawkesbury if you would like to find out more:1.  Bawden, R.J. (2016). Transforming systems: The Hawkesbury initiatives in systemic development. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/21528586.2015.1131192 2.  Bawden, R.J. (2005). The Hawkesbury Experience: Tales from a Road Less Travelled. In: Pretty, J. (ed.) The Earthscan Reader in Sustainable Agriculture. Earthscan, London. 3.  Bawden, R.J. and Packham, R.G. (1993). Systemic Praxis in the Education of the Agricultural Systems Practitioner. Systems Practice, 6(1): 7–19. [Paper first presented at the1991 annual meeting of the International Society for the Systems Sciences,Österund, Sweden] 4.  Bawden, R.J. and Packham, R.G. (2023). Agriculture and the Environment: Ethical Issues. Chapter 6 in: Zimdahl, R. (ed.) Agricultural Ethics. Burleigh Dodds, London. 5.  Bawden, R.J. and Packham, R.G. (undated). Soft Systems Thinking, Soft Systems Practice and the Evolution of Systemic Development. Unpublished manuscript.6.  Bawden, R.J. (various / collected). Hawkesbury Chapters. Collected chapters including'The Community Challenge: The Learning Response', originally published in NewHorizons in Education, 99 (1999): 40–59; republished in Blackmore, C.P. (ed.)(2010). 7.  Bawden, R.J. (2005). Systemic Development at Hawkesbury: Some Personal Lessons from Experience. Systems Research and Behavioural Science, 22: 151–164.

    Experiential Learning, Rural Systemic Development and the Hawkesbury Experience - A Conversation with Richard Bawden

  3. 18 Jul

    The Future of Schooling in the Age of AI - A Conversation with Nora Bateson, Dr. Zak Stein and Olli-Pekka Heinonen

    What are the questions we should be asking of the radically new and rapidly accelerating technologies that we are all living with now? Where are the possibilities? What are we hungry for? Where are the challenges and dangers? What are our responsibilities as care-givers, parents, educators and policy makers? How are we creating opportunities for our young people to really connect with themselves, with each other and with the world; to develop their own perceptual and relational capacities? This week’s episode is a wonderful reflective space exploring these profound questions with Nora Bateson, Zak Stein and Olli-Pekka Heinonen. This episode begins with a dialogue between Nora, Zak and Olli-Pekka, which was recorded as part of the Warm Data Lab Host training online earlier this year. The second part of this episode is then a dialogue that Nora, Zak and I shared on the way in which warm data is meeting many of the challenges being raised now by the ubiquitousness of advanced artificial intelligence in our young people’s lives and learning, as well as the very exciting ideas being shared by Nora, from her father Gregory Bateson’s work on ‘second order teaching’, being published in a new book edited by Phillip Guddemi, entitled Gregory Bateson's 'Ecology of Mind': The Course. Nora Bateson is the Founder and President of the International Bateson Institute (https://batesoninstitute.org/) and currently serves as President of the International Federation for Systems Research (IFSR). Nora is the author of Small Arcs of Larger Circles (2016), and Combining (2023), both published by Triarchy Press. Nora also wrote, directed and produced the award-winning documentary, An Ecology of Mind, a portrait of her father, Gregory Bateson: ⁠http://www.anecologyofmind.com/⁠. Nora’s new book Belly is launching the same day that this episode is released, July 19th 2026, at a special event in London! You can find out more here: https://www.warmdata.life/belly-book-launch-2026. And you can pre-order a copy of the book here: https://www.triarchypress.net/belly.html. You can also find out more about Warm Data Lab Host training here: https://www.warmdata.life/wdtraining  Also check out Ep116 'Warm Data in Education' (Sept '23).   ⁠Dr. Zak Stein (https://www.zakstein.org/)⁠ is a philosopher of education, psychologist, futurist, and author. He is a founding member of the AI Psychological Research Coalition, The Civilization Research Institute and the ⁠The Consilience Project⁠ (a publication of the CRI), with Daniel Schmachtenberger. Zak is also co-founder of ⁠Lectica, Inc.⁠ (with Dr. Theo Dawson), and the Center for World Philosophy and Religion. Zak is the author of ⁠Social Justice and Educational Measurement⁠ and ⁠Education in a Time Between Worlds: Essays on the Future of Schools, Technology, and Society⁠. Also check out Ep106 'The Philosopher and the Neuroscientist (with Mary Helen Immordino-Yang)' (May '23). Olli-Pekka Heinonen is a Finnish political leader, educator, and Director General of the International Baccalaureate (IB). He served as Finland’s Minister of Education and Science and later as State Secretary to the Prime Minister, before becoming Director General of the Finnish National Agency for Education. At the IB, he leads a global education organisation that reaches 2 million students annually in more than 160 countries. It is known for its rigorous programmes and its mission to develop inquiring, knowledgeable and caring young people. He is the author of the recently published and very popular book: Learning as If Life Depended on It: Why We Must See the World Anew, and Figure Out What Follows, published by Perspectiva Press (find out more here: https://www.opheinonen.com/) Also check out Ep41 'On Leading a Learning System' (March 2021) and Ep212 ‘Learning as If Life Depended on It’ (October 2025).

    The Future of Schooling in the Age of AI - A Conversation with Nora Bateson, Dr. Zak Stein and Olli-Pekka Heinonen

  4. 11 Jul

    A New Kind of CAMPUS where Young People can Build, Learn, Connect and Grow - A Conversation with Munguzo Kapera

    There are amazing people building innovative and responsive educational alternatives all over the world right now. They are seeing challenges in their communities and not waiting for others to act, or waiting for systems to change, but creating, connecting and building themselves. Today's episode is with one such person who is doing this incredible work in some of the most resource constrained environments in Nakivale Refugee Settlement. Munguzo Kapera is a refugee systems builder and educational entrepreneur, removing barriers to information, skills, and opportunity for displaced people. He is the founder of the CAMPUS Digital Hub (https://campusdigitalhub.org/) and creator of the ConnectRefugee app (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.connectrefugee.userug&hl=en_GB). Munguzo is also an alumnus of the International Training Centre of the International Labour Organization (ITCILO) (https://www.itcilo.org/) and an advisory board member of Kiron (https://www.kiron.ngo/). LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/munguzo-jean/

    A New Kind of CAMPUS where Young People can Build, Learn, Connect and Grow - A Conversation with Munguzo Kapera

  5. 4 Jul

    Podcasters Unite! Thinking about systemic change with Nathalie Nahai, Amit Paul, and Manda Scott

    What are we learning about systemic change? There are lots of people talking about why we need it, climate and nature emergencies, exponential tech youth mental health crises etc. but how much is it actually happening? By definition, it’s not something that just happens in the education system, so I was really happy to gather together this week with three amazing podcasters and beautiful people who are coming at these same questions from many lenses, business, Thrutopian novel-writing, psychology, technology, economics, regenerative farming, political changemaking, architecture. Like me, they get to speak to some of the most amazing and insightful people in all of these fields and more, so I thought it would be a great idea to get together to see what we are learning collectively. Manda Scott is the host of the Accidental Gods podcast and has appeared on this channel a couple of times previously, Nathalie Nahai hosts her eponymous In Conversation podcast, and Amit Paul hosts the fabulous World of Wisdom podcast.                                                  Amit Paul is a former popstar and CEO of green chemicals company Paxymer AB turned systems dancer. No, he's co-founder of Innrwrks and host of World of Wisdom podcast, exploring how business can create a future we want for our kids. Amit hosts explorative conversations, facilitates group work and advices and supports companies navigating the current ecological, social and technological paradigm shifts.  Nathalie Nahai is an author, keynote speaker and host of the Nathalie Nahai in Conversation podcast enquires into our relationship with one another, with technology and with the living world. She’s author of the international best-sellers Webs Of Influence: The Psychology of Online Persuasion and, more recently, Business Unusual: Values, Uncertainty and the Psychology of Brand Resilience which has been described as “One of the defining business books of our times”. She’s a consultant, artist and the founder of Flourishing Futures Salon, a project that offers curated gastronomical gatherings that explore how we can thrive in times of turbulence and change. Manda Scott - https://mandascott.co.uk/ ; https://www.linkedin.com/in/mandascottauthor/  Born in Scotland at 318ppm CO2, Manda was once a veterinary surgeon and is now a novelist, smallholder, contemporary shamanic trainer and podcaster. Her debut novel, Hen’s Teeth, was shortlisted for the Orange Prize. Subsequent works were shortlisted for the Edgar and Saltire Awards and won the McIlvanney Prize, but it is for her Boudica: Dreaming series that she is best known. More recently, Manda read for a Masters in Regenerative Economics at Schumacher College, the experience of which led her to set up Accidental Gods podcast (https://accidentalgods.life) and Membership Programme. In 2024 she published her sixteenth novel, Any Human Power, a ‘visionary’ contemporary political thriller that maps fictional – but plausible and workable – routes toward a future we’d all be proud to leave to the generations that come after us: human and more-than-human. And together, we are Podcasters United, at least for this episode - exploring systems change, what it means and how we can bring it about at scale and in time. Enjoy!

    Podcasters Unite! Thinking about systemic change with Nathalie Nahai, Amit Paul, and Manda Scott

  6. 27 Jun

    Sports as Sites of Learning & Contestation - A Conversation with Prof. Frank Andre Guridy

    We often overlook sports as a site of learning, but it’s a massive part of so many people’s lives, whether playing, supporting, watching or teaching. And simultaneously, all of life happens in and around the sports arena. It is humanity in our most beautiful and, sometimes, ugliest manifestations. With all of the global sporting events happening right now, I wanted to bring this into our podcast conversations and there are few people better to do that with than player, coach, friend, and also pre-eminent scholar of the history and political economy of sports around the world, Professor Frank Andre Guridy. Frank is the Dr. Kenneth and Kareitha Forde Professor of African American and African Diaspora Studies. He is also Professor of History and the Executive Director of the Eric H. Holder Initiative for Civil and Political Rights at Columbia. He is an award-winning historian whose recent research has focused on sport history, urban history, and the history of American social movements. His most recent book, ‘The Stadium: An American History of Politics, Protest, and Play’ tells the story of the American stadium as an institution that has played a central role in American civic and political life and in the struggles for social justice from the 19th century until the present.  His previous book, ‘The Sports Revolution: How Texas Changed the Culture of American Athletics’ explored how Texas-based sports entrepreneurs and athletes from marginalized backgrounds transformed American sporting culture during the 1960s and 1970s, the highpoint of the Black Freedom and Second-Wave feminist movements.  Frank is also a leading scholar of the Black Freedom Movement in the United States and the Caribbean. His first book, Forging Diaspora: Afro-Cubans and African Americans in a World of Empire and Jim Crow (University of North Carolina Press, 2010), won the Elsa Goveia Book Prize from the Association of Caribbean Historians and the Wesley-Logan Book Prize, conferred by the American Historical Association. He is also the co-editor of Beyond el Barrio: Everyday Life in Latino/a America (NYU Press, 2010), with Gina Pérez and Adrian Burgos, Jr.  He has also won awards for his teaching and service at multiple institutions, receiving the Regents’ Outstanding Teaching Award from the University of Texas at Austin in 2010, the Mark Van Doren Award for Teaching at Columbia in 2019, and the Faculty Service Award at Columbia in 2023. Frank’s books The Stadium: An American History of Politics, Protest, and Play (Basic Books, 2024) The Sports Revolution: How Texas Changed the Culture of American Athletics (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2021) Forging Diaspora: Afro-Cubans and African Americans in a World of Empire and Jim Crow (The University of North Carolina Press, 2010) Beyond El Barrio: Everyday Life in Latina/o America (NYU Press, 2010) Other links https://history.columbia.edu/person/guridy-frank/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/frank-guridy-401b87230/

    Sports as Sites of Learning & Contestation - A Conversation with Prof. Frank Andre Guridy

  7. 20 Jun

    Learning with Living Labs - A Conversation with Heleen Geerts, Anja Overdiek, Sam Rye, Dinda Ciptaviana & Lotte Troost

    There is a lot of discussions happening these days about the future of university and higher education in general. How does it keep pace with rapidly changing and disruptive technologies? How does it meet the needs of young people and become responsive and flexible enough to generate much needed transformations in research and development, knowledge creation, and capability building? And how does it adapt to the increasing volatility in all aspects of social, political, economic and ecological life that we are seeing everywhere? In October last year Monash University published a report called 'Advancing University Living Labs' (https://www.monash.edu/__data/assets/pdf_file/0010/4137481/Monash-University-Advancing-University-Living-Labs-Report-October-2025.pdf) on a fascinating new approach that universities and other communities and multi-stakeholder environments are taking in response to some of these fundamental questions. As I learned more about Living Labs I was introduced to more of the inspiring community of practitioners around the world who are using it. So this week it's my great pleasure to bring together a number of these Living Labs experts. If you're new to this approach, hopefully this episode will give you an overview, as well as some examples and use cases. And if you want to go deeper there are loads of links below. A big thank you to Lars Fuhrmann (https://www.linkedin.com/in/larsthimof/) for coordinating and bringing everyone together! Anja Overdiek: https://www.linkedin.com/in/overdiek12345/www.lulu.com/search?sortBy=RELEVANCE&page=1&q=Anja+overdiek&pageSize=10&adult_audience_rating=00 Sam Rye: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samrye/ Advancing University Living Labs (Report) ENoLL Origins, Developments & Future Perspectives  Landscape Typology of Living Labs (fieldnote article) Dinda Ciptaviana: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anastasia-dinda-ciptaviana/ Kampung Kollektief: https://www.instagram.com/kampung_kollektief/  Linktree of projects from Kampung Kollektief including the 'What if Lab' and Living Lab:  https://linktr.ee/kampung_kollektief  Lotte Troost: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lottetroost/ NL Knowledge House Living Lab with Kampung Kollektief  NL Knowledge House Living Labs  Heleen Geerts: https://www.linkedin.com/in/heleen-geerts-911b354/ www.lulu.com/search?sortBy=RELEVANCE&page=1&q=Anja+overdiek&pageSize=10&adult_audience_rating=00 European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL): https://enoll.org/ OpenLivingLab Days 2026 coming up in September: https://enoll.org/events/openlivinglab-days-2026/

    Learning with Living Labs - A Conversation with Heleen Geerts, Anja Overdiek, Sam Rye, Dinda Ciptaviana & Lotte Troost

  8. 6 Jun

    Learning Not to Save the World - A Conversation with Anthea Lawson

    A big part of where I see shifts happening in education systems is encouraging young people to get out into the world, into their communities and make a difference to issues that they care about. There is so much learning that can happen in this process. I have shared a few episodes in the past with fantastic people like Cathrine Berger-Kaye, Daniela Papi-Thornton and Zoe Weil, supporting young people and educators in this kind of work. But there are also some fascinating and important considerations to be aware of when we step into this work, so that we really have the impact that we are hoping to, and don’t replicate past harms and unhelpful patterns. My guest this week, Anthea Lawson, has been working on the front line of this kind of work for decades and has learned through her own experience just how complex and entangled these issues are that we care about doing something about. And she has been sharing her gathered wisdom on it in her previous book The Entangled Activist, and very excitingly her new book, out this week, ‘How Not to Save the World: Doing good without annoying everyone’. George Monbiot has described it as a wise, rich and crucial book! And I can certainly recommend it myself.  As a journalist, campaigner and writer, Anthea Lawson has fought for many issues over three decades including controls on the arms trade and an end to the financial secrecy offered by tax havens. She helped launch a campaign for transparency over company ownership which resulted in changes to the law in dozens of countries. After training as a journalist at The Times, she worked for campaign groups including Global Witness and Amnesty International. Her writing helps people who want to change the world think about the psychological, spiritual and philosophical foundations of what they’re doing, what’s getting in the way, and how they can be more effective. Links Anthea's website: https://www.anthealawson.uk/ 'How Not to Save the World' Book: https://www.anthealawson.uk/how-not-to-save-the-world 'The Entangled Activist' Book: https://www.anthealawson.uk/the-entangled-activist LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthea-lawson/ Don't Talk About Politics: How to Change 21st-Century Minds by Sarah Stein Lubrano: https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/dont-talk-about-politics-9781399413916/ More info about the Antidebate: https://systems-souls-society.com/praxis/antidebate/

    Learning Not to Save the World - A Conversation with Anthea Lawson
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We are stuck in an old paradigm, with institutional structures that were built for a world that no longer exists. Within education, passionate entrepreneurs & committed citizens are no longer waiting for these broken formal institutions to be reformed. All over the world, they're designing & building their own local responses with relationships at their core. These are the education ecosystems that our young people need and out of which new institutions will emerge. This podcast is an inquiry into these fundamental changes and an invitation to join the movement to help nurture positive change.

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