Why Teach?

At the beginning of the HIP Learning Camp, Beijing, Professor Yong Zhao posed the students and educators present a series of questions to bring with them through the week. Top of the list was "What is worth learning in the age of AI?" After a week of interviewing a rich cross section of those involved, Dr Sam Franzway, Michael Jacobsen and Carrie Phillips were able to sit with Professor Zhao...

In many ways, Li Tianze typifies a contemporary approach to organising and designing education. Tianze talks about his complex methods of considering and carrying out the huge range of student-focused experiences during and around the HIP Learning Camp for Beijing 2025. This podcast is from a series of six special episodes of Why Teach? recorded over the course of a week-long learning camp held in...

Sometimes you have to get these chats on tape. Or MicroSD. In what began as one of those free-floating ideas chats during a student workshop, Dr Trina Emler talks with University Senior College's Michael Jacobsen and Dr Sam Franzway, and Pulteney Grammar School's Dan Clift about her research and experience of the process of reconsidering what learning means in the age of AI. This podcast is from a...

Sarah, Rose, Riya and Lyla speak about their experience of being Teaching Assistants (or "Coaches") in the Human Interdependence Project learning camp, held in Beijing. They discuss and reflect on the joys and challenges of teaching Year 7s not only what AI is (in both English and Chinese), but how it connects with what learning and teaching will come to mean in 2025 and beyond. This podcast is fr...

Sam and Michael share their experiences of the HIP Camp held in Chongqing, China in 2024 and how the camp developed into Beijing 2025, especially around the use of AI. This podcast is from a series of six special episodes of Why Teach? recorded over the course of a week-long learning camp held in No. 80 High School, Beijing, China (17-23 August, 2025). The festival focused around the Human Interde...

Pulteney Grammar teachers Carrie Phillips and Dan Clift talk with Michael Jacobsen and Sam Franzway about their experiences of the Human Interdependence Project and the ways that AI and self-located learning is becoming part of contemporary teaching and learning. This podcast is from a series of six special episodes of Why Teach? recorded over the course of a week-long learning camp held in No. 80...

In this very special episode, Professor Yong Zhao joins Michael Jacobsen and Sam Franzway on the fifth day of the HIP Learning Festival in Chongqing, China, to talk about the inception of the concept of human interdependency, and the ways in which it has informed the development of approaches to international education in the 21st century. This podcast is from a series of five special episodes of...

Mark McCormick joins Michael Jacobsen and Sam Franzway to talk about the origins of his teaching and how he came to be standing in the Human Interdependency Project classroom in Chongqing. The pathways of teachers are both varied and similar, and Mark puts some strong questions to Michael and Sam about their experiences of teaching, and of using AI, in the HIP learning festival classroom. This pod...

Dr Trina Emler shares the experience of bringing a high-level, multi-country learning festival together, and the impetus behind moving towards an interdependence model of teaching in the classroom. We also share the experience of travelling internationally to go and teach in a different country. This podcast is from a series of five special episodes of Why Teach? recorded over the course of a week...

Teacher Amy talks with Michael Jacobsen and Sam Franzway about teaching in the HIP program, and the work of conveying complex ideas across the language barrier, while still keeping the content relevant and engaging for a class of Year 7 Chinese students on the first day of their first week of high school. This podcast is from a series of five special episodes of Why Teach? recorded over the course...

Day 1: University Senior College colleagues, Vanessa Grave (USC Director of Marketing and Community Relations), Michael Jacobsen and Sam Franzway discuss their first impressions of China, Chongqing, and teaching in Chongqing No.8 Secondary School. This podcast is from a series of five special episodes of Why Teach? recorded over the course of a week-long learning festival held in Chongqing, China...

This podcast usually looks at the backgrounds of the teachers who come on; what inspired them to get into teaching, and what keeps them inspired. On this very special episode, previous guest and absolute legend, Michael Jacobsen, talks with host, Sam Franzway, about a collaborative teaching project called the Human Interdependency Project that keeps them inspired every day. It might even start to...

If you've ever wondered what goes on in the massive minds of Maths teachers, this is the podcast for you. On this incredible episode of Why Teach? we go deep into the philosophy of Maths, and take a bird's eye view of the purest of sciences, and what it means to be able to pass this knowledge on to students who are starting to grapple with some literally universal truths. Hosted on Acast. See acas...

On this first in-depth interview of 2024, Sam speaks with Research Project teacher, Year Level Dean, Steve Todd. We talk about the interesting pathways of life that lead people to become teachers, and our plans for bringing interest in and engagement with the outside world to the classroom. If you're an early-career teacher with a passion for politics and history, Steve discusses a range of ways t...

On this special episode of Why Teach? Sam and frequent-podcast guest, Michael Jacobsen, talk with Ethan and Jeremy, two University Senior College graduates, about their experiences during Year 12, and their plans for what follows in 2024 and beyond. Join us as we discuss extra-curricular opportunities, taking risks, learning the bass, and, of course, the finer points of van construction. What does...

Welcome to the new year of teaching in 2024. In this exciting introduction to the new year's teaching challenges, Sam interviews previous Why Teach? hero, Michael Jacobsen about their shared project conducted in Semester 2, 2023. A co-teaching, cross-class lesson, Michael and Sam combined their Year 11 Business Innovation and Year 10 Society and Culture classes through the international Human Inte...

It could be argued that all teaching is about learning how to think. On this episode of Why Teach? philosophy teacher, and philosopher, Elly Pfitzner talks about the fascinating experience of pushing young people to consider, and re-imagine, the ways in which they think, and the structures of thought itself. Elly and Sam talk about the privilege of holding someone's first wrestling with entirely n...

What happens when an artist becomes a teacher? On this episode of Why Teach? , English teacher and former TV writer, Simon Butters, shares his fascinating pathway from university drama productions, to writing, and earning a living writing for Australian TV shows in Melbourne, and to the English classrooms today. We talk about the role of creativity in the classroom, and the strength it can give to...

Anita Zocchi is the Principal of University Senior College, and joins the Why Teach? podcast to talk about the thread of resilience and drive that fuels all teachers. We discuss the Stoics, and how a focus on philosophical practice can strengthen the teacher you see in the classroom. Anita also shares her extensive experience and knowledge on how to approach some of the most challenging moments in...

Musician, surfer, father, teacher. Michael Jacobsen is all this and more. On this episode, Michael talks about his own beginnings as a teacher abroad in London, before he moved sideways into the business world, where, like most guests on this podcast, he found the instinct to teach welling up even then. Michael and Sam discuss how teaching and art share similar instincts, implications and skillset...

On this episode of Why Teach? we are so fortunate to be joined by Judith Mohan, an English Literature of great experience and deep knowledge. Judith talks about the huge range of topics and techniques she has used for inspiring her students across a teaching career that included letters, learning and a green tree snake. We talk about the value of culture and how moving away from the canon in the E...

If you about to listen to this episode, you might be familiar with Tyson Wood's journey. Tyson speaks about a passion for learning, and the feeling that it should be shared, and shared for the wider benefit of young people who deserve educators for whom teaching and learning is a calling that can't really be ignored. On this episode, Sam and Tyson delve into the reason for this podcast: what kind...

On this episode of Why Teach? , English teacher Lesley Day further explores - and answers - that always-tricky question from students: "Yeah, but what are we learning this for ?" Lesley talks about how the process of building and applying skills training and drills in PE class can be brought across to other classes, demonstrating for students their longer-term learning goals. We talk about 'Black...

Olivia Saunders, an early-career maths teacher, talks about how her enthusiasm for education and people lead her to teaching mathematics first at an all-girls private school in Western Australia, before coming to Adelaide, South Australia, teaching seniors at University Senior College. Olivia talks about arriving at teaching after that common experience of feeling like her office job in HR and fun...

Ryan Jackson, the Head of English, talks about his hopeful beginnings in Virginia as he points his talents towards the search for fusion and science, and the subsequent turn towards teaching (care of an honest guidance counsellor). First time English teachers will hear about exactly why you should very carefully consider your class texts, but especially Apocalypse Now. We discover that Ryan also d...