In this groundbreaking book, education expert Tony Wagner provides a powerful rationale for developing an innovation-driven economy. He explores what parents, teachers, and employers must do to develop the capacities of young people to become innovators.

 

In profiling compelling young American innovators such as Kirk Phelps, product manager for Apple’s first iPhone, and Jodie Wu, who founded a company that builds bicycle-powered maize shelters in Tanzania, Wagner reveals how the adults in their lives nurtured their creativity and sparked their imaginations, while teaching them to learn from failures and persevere.

 

The author identifies a pattern—a childhood of creative play leads to deep-seated interests, which in adolescence and adulthood blossom into a deeper purpose for career and life goals. Play, passion, and purpose are the forces that drive young innovators, a concept that should be used by educators and parents alike. The book also takes readers into forward-thinking schools, colleges, and workplaces where teachers and employers are developing cultures of innovation based on collaboration, interdisciplinary problem-solving, and intrinsic motivation. The result is a

timely, provocative, and inspiring manifesto that will change how we look at our schools and workplaces, and provide a road map for creating the change makers of tomorrow. Published by Simon & Schuster, Inc., 2012.

 

Tony Wagner serves as an Expert In Residence at Harvard University’s Innovation Lab. He has worked as a high school teacher, K-8 principal, university professor, and founding executive director of Educators for Social Responsibility. He is a frequent speaker at national and international conferences and is also the author of "The Global Achievement Gap.”