As an educator, you know the value of reflecting on your current practices with an eye to adapting your strategies for more effective teaching and learning. "Re: thinking education" is an opportunity to listen to organic conversations between colleagues and partners from The Critical Thinking Consortium as they grapple with important pedagogical issues. Each episode will pull back the curtain on their critical, creative, and collaborative thinking and provide an opportunity for listeners to learn and reflect on their own practices.
Back-to-school 2026: Beginning the year with courage
“How do we bring that courage to the surface in challenging moments?” In her back-to-school message, TC² Executive Director Usha James reflects on the courage we bring to teaching and learning, and what that might mean for the year ahead. A new school year can feel like a fresh start. But none of us arrives as a blank slate. We bring with us our experiences, our learning, our relationships, our hopes and fears, and everything else happening in our lives. Usha reminds us that courageous ...
24 Aug 2026
Creating Thinking Systems Part 7: A conversation with senior leaders from Renfrew County District School Board
For the seventh episode of Creating Thinking Systems, our OPSOA (Ontario Public Supervisory Officers’ Association) sponsored series, TC² Executive Director, Usha James speaks with CEO Kristen Niemi and Superintendent of Education Jenny Smith from Renfrew County District School Board about the importance of deep data analysis, consistent guidance frameworks, and maintaining system-level commitment to support student success. Credits: Host: Usha James Guests: Kristen Niemi (CEO, Renfrew...
11 Feb 2026
Creating Thinking Systems Part 6-2: A conversation with senior leaders from Trillium Lakelands DSB, Waterloo Region DSB, and Hastings Prince Edward DSB
In part two of our sixth Creating Thinking Systems episode, sponsored by OPSOA (Ontario Public Supervisory Officers’ Association), TC² Executive Director, Usha James, continues the conversation with Superintendents Tina Jones, Jay MacJanet, and Vida Collis, about taking the lessons and revelations from part one, and creating effective school visits through purpose, intention, and trust. Credits: Host: Usha James Guests: Jay MacJanet (Formerly Superintendent of Education with Trillium L...
28 Jan 2026
Creating Thinking Systems Part 6-1: A conversation with senior leaders from Trillium Lakelands DSB, Waterloo Region DSB, and Hastings Prince Edward DSB
In our sixth Creating Thinking Systems episode, sponsored by OPSOA (Ontario Public Supervisory Officers’ Association), TC² Executive Director, Usha James, begins the first of a two-part conversation on school visits with three Ontario superintendents, each in a different phase of their careers. In this episode we meet Superintendents Jay MacJanet, Tina Jones, and Vida Collis, and reflect with them on how they learned that school visits may not be what they seem on the surface, setting the sta...
2 Dec 2025
Creating Thinking Systems Part 5: A conversation with senior leaders from Toronto DSB and Hastings and Prince Edward DSB
For our fifth episode of Creating Thinking Systems, our OPSOA (Ontario Public Supervisory Officers’ Association) sponsored series, TC² Executive Director, Usha James, joins Toronto DSB Executive Superintendent, Nandy Palmer, and Hastings and Prince Edward DSB Superintendent, Ken Dostaler, in examining strategies and challenges in building and ensuring the capacity to not only support students with special education needs, but improve outcomes for all students. Credits: Host: Usha James Guest...
28 Oct 2025
Creating Thinking Systems Part 4: A conversation with Wes Hahn from Trillium Lakelands DSB
In our fourth instalment of our OPSOA (Ontario Public Supervisory Officers’ Association) sponsored series, Creating Thinking Systems, TC² Executive Director, Usha James, welcomes Director of Education, Wes Hahn, from the Trillium Lakelands District School Board. Usha and Wes explore how TLDSB drives “alignment” — using inventive ways to spark authentic student feedback, and ensuring everyone from the director, to coaches and consultants, to I/T staff, spend time out in the community schools,...
3 Sept 2025
Back-to-school 2025
How will you start the school year in a good way? In her back-to-school message, Usha James invites us to reflect on our shared purpose and reminds us that academic achievement and well-being are deeply connected. She highlights our revitalized framework, dedicated to nurturing quality thinking that inspires action for a flourishing world, and focuses on one dimension that feels especially important at this time of year: growing communities of quality thinkers. In this message, Us...
5 Aug 2025
Creating Thinking Systems Part 3: A conversation with senior leaders from Greater Essex County DSB
In the third episode of our OPSOA (Ontario Public Supervisory Officers’ Association) sponsored series, Creating Thinking Systems, TC² Executive Director, Usha James, welcomes Director of Education, Vicki Houston, and Superintendent of Education, Kari Bryant, from the Greater Essex County District School Board in Ontario. Having both recently embarked on new leadership roles, Vicki and Kari reflect on their experiences of intentionality while navigating significant system-wide change, ...
4 Jul 2025
Creating Thinking Systems Part 2: A conversation with senior leaders from Bluewater DSB
Usha James interviews Lori Wilder and Wendy Louwerse about their experiences developing a thinking system across the Bluewater District School Board, offering insights into district-wide educational strategies.
24 Jun 2025
Creating Thinking Systems Part 1: A conversation with senior leaders from Limestone DSB
Krishna Burra and Jess Silver discuss Limestone District School Board's journey to promote critical and collaborative thinking using data-driven inquiry, in an interview with Usha James.
4 Sept 2024
Back to School 2024
As we begin the 2024-2025 school year, Usha James, Executive Director of TC², reflects on recent challenges in education, from mental health strains to the impacts of remote learning. She acknowledges that, while we are doing many good things, we may not be reaching everyone as effectively as we wish. Usha encourages educators to focus on one or two impactful practices that can make a significant difference, particularly for those learners hardest to reach. She highlights the importance of sl...
5 Sept 2023
Back-to-school 2023 - A message from Usha James, Executive Director TC2
What are the environments in school and outside of school that we hope to foster, and how might high-quality thinking help us advance our goals? What are the relationships between thinking, learning, and living a beautiful, fulfilling, and good life?
6 Sept 2022
Back to School 2022
In this back to school message, Usha James, Executive Director of The Critical Thinking Consortium, asks the question, "How will we start the year in a good way?"
17 Dec 2021
Season's Greetings 2021
Season's Greetings from The Critical Thinking Consortium!
1 Sept 2021
Episode 2: What really matters when teaching for deep learning?
In this episode, Warren Woytuck, TC² Director, interviews Usha James, TC² Executive Director, and poses the question, “What really matters when teaching for deep learning?” In the first part of their conversation, Usha provides practical ideas for teachers about how they might identify and distinguish deep learning from other forms of learning. Then, Warren and Usha explore aspects of practice that support deep learning, and identify three principles that could be applied in any learning situ...
16 Jun 2021
Episode 1: Can assessment actually be a source of inspiration?
In our first episode, we explore assessment and the idea that it can be much more than something that's imposed on students. Usha James, TC² Executive Director, interviews Garfield Gini-Newman, TC² Senior National Consultant, about the ways that assessment can actually be used to inspire. Rather than prompting feelings of anxiousness and trepidation, assessment can be designed to inspire further learning and curiosity. Usha and Garfield explore practical and powerful ways to re-think assessme...
16 Jun 2021
About The Critical Thinking Consortium (TC²)
The Critical Thinking Consortium, or TC², is a non-profit organization of partner groups and individual members dedicated to supporting critical, creative, and collaborative thinking.
Who has been a guest on Re: thinking education
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Lori Wilder
Wendy Louwerse
Usha James
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