Back in Action: I’ve been on holiday for most of the last two weeks; my wife and I had a great time in Fuengirola, walking around, enjoying the sunshine, catching up on some reading (more on that in a paragraph or two) and just generally relaxing. The next few months are going to be busy (which is a good thing!), not least because between now and the end of June I am involved in five GRADschools, including directing three of them.

Out of our Minds: My first piece of holiday reading was the updated version of this book by Sir Ken Robinson. I used a lot of Post-It notes as I went through. The thing that rang most clearly and eloquently from it all was the statement that education is an investment: rather than constantly try to save money, we need to frankly take onboard the investment being made both in the person and in society. Education starts with children but needs to go on through an entire life, and it needs to be done in a way that it resonates with people: people need to be allowed to find their passion, and then enabled to take it further. Lots of food for thought.

Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman: I have been meaning to learn more about Feynman recently, having been completely captivated by the Feynman Series of videos (and also the Sagan Series). This book did not disappoint, and made me want to learn even more about the man. It also gave me a real hankering to start looking at things from a different perspective.

Manchester GRADschool: Once I’m all caught up on email, admin and the like, I’ll be turning my attention to the GRADschool that I’m facilitating on next week. I’m also leading on (and have designed) some collaboration exercises, and so I’m interested to see how they go and what people make of them.

I’ve had lots of little ideas sparked during my holiday time, so I’ll be exploring those over the coming weeks. I’ll write any stray thoughts I have on here.