Wide Walls

What if the biggest problem in education isn’t teaching children to read, but helping them believe they’re readers? I had the pleasure of welcoming Julia Rivard Dexter , entrepreneur, Olympian, and CEO of Shoelace Learning , to Wide Walls to explore exactly that question. What started as a conversation about adolescent literacy quickly became a much broader discussion about confidence, gaming as a...

What if we’ve been thinking about learning, children, and AI all wrong? That’s exactly what this latest Wide Walls episode explores. I had the pleasure of speaking with José Antonio Gordillo Martorell . José is a design strategist and education innovator, Founder and CEO of Cultural Inquiry , and author of the recent book Children’s Boards in Museums . He has spent years working alongside research...

On this episode of Wide Walls , I’m joined by Dr. Gary Stager — educator, author, jazz lover, and one of the most outspoken champions of constructionism and learning-by-doing in classrooms. Gary has spent decades reimagining how children learn, championing hands-on, creative, and learner-driven approaches inspired by the work of Seymour Papert and Reggio Emilia philosophy. In this episode, we disc...

In this episode, I discuss with the fantastic Dr. Tessa Forshaw, a cognitive scientist, educator, and innovation leader researching and shaping how we learn and work in an age of rapid change. Tessa is the co-founder and research lead at Harvard’s Next Level Lab, where she explores learning transfer, creative cognition, and how humans and AI can work together. She also teaches design thinking and...

In this episode of Wide Walls, I’m particularly excited to welcome Dr. Jody LeVos , a true champion for early childhood and play-based learning. Jody currently serves as Chief Learning Officer at BEGiN , where she leads curriculum design and pedagogy across a family of beloved learning products, including HOMER, codeSpark, Little Passports, and Learn with Sesame Street. With over a decade of exper...

Welcome to my conversation with Suzie Hicks — an award-winning filmmaker, author, and television host whose work sits at the crossroads of entertainment, education, environmental justice, and community activism . Their latest project, the amazing YouTube series “Suzie Hicks the Climate Chick & Sprout,” pairs Suzie with their puppet sidekick Sprout on a seven-episode adventure through climate scien...

In this episode, I am thrilled to discuss with Dr. Colleen Kelley — a fantastic science educator, and the creator and founder of Kids’ Chemical Solutions , a comic-book based curriculum designed to make chemistry accessible and exciting for learners of all ages. Colleen’s journey began with a love for chemistry and research, leading her to earn a Ph. D. in chemistry from Penn State University by t...

In this Wide Walls episode, I’m honored to welcome Ken Kahn — a true pioneer in using technology to support creative learning. Ken has spent over 30 years as a researcher in programming languages, computer animation, and programming systems for children. After completing his doctoral thesis on creating computer animation from story descriptions, Ken taught at MIT, Stockholm University and Uppsala...

In this new episode of Wide Walls, I’m thrilled to welcome Merve Cerit, a PhD Candidate from Stanford University working at the intersection of artificial intelligence, learning sciences, and mental health. Merve’s work explores how we can better understand the impact of digital media on individual well-being , using innovative person-specific and computational methods. She studies how people’s sm...

For today’s episode, I’m thrilled to welcome our first-ever professional musician guest on Wide Walls: Jerome Rossen ! Jerome is a composer, songwriter, and professional musician whose work spans TV, film, video games, advertising, theater, and more. You’ve likely heard his music in hit TV shows like The Bachelor, Temptation Island, Extreme Makeover —and my personal favorite, Happy Tree Friends !...

For the first time on Wide Walls, we welcome not one, but two incredible guests— Emma Callow and Tom Doust ! Emma and Tom serve as the Creative Content Lead and Associate Director at the Institute of Imagination in London, a wonderful organization dedicated to designing and championing creative learning experiences across arts, science, and digital technologies. In this episode, we dive into: ✅ T...

I am excited to share this new episode of Wide Walls on a very special day for my wonderful guest, Isabelle Hau, as her first book, Love to Learn , is released today! Isabelle is the Executive Director of the Stanford Accelerator for Learning, and a passionate advocate for young children’s development and well-being, rooted in educational research and deep empathy. At the Stanford Accelerator for...

A conversation with Sedinam Worlanyo is always packed with joyful stories, unexpected reflection, and actionable insights! Once you start this episode, I bet her contagious energy will keep you on! Sedinam is a Senior UX Researcher at Coursera , focusing on learner experience, as well as international expansion efforts, to make learning accessible to everyone across the globe. She also leads the C...

Let’s start 2025 with a wonderful conversation with Dr. Maggie Broderick about social-emotional learning and the similitudes between music and language learning! Maggie is an Associate Professor and Dissertation Chair in the Department of Teacher Education at National University in San Diego. With over 20 years of experience in education, both in higher education and K-12, she is a leader in curri...

Scott is an inspiring Product Leader in the Toys and EdTech industries with more than 20 years of experience in the field and a wealth of knowledge and insights. In this episode, Scott explains the importance of spatial cognition to predict success in STEM fields along with insightful stories and research on the topic. He also shares his thoughts on the evolution of the toys and EdTech landscape o...

Andy is a Group Product Manager for ChromeOS Education at Google - reaching more than 50 million children - and co-creator of the award-winning Toontastic app designed to help kids easily create and share their own animated stories. In this episode, Andy shares his entrepreneurial journey building Toontastic and his design approach to support children’s creativity. We also discuss his role at Goog...

Ryan Jenkins defines himself as a constructionist educator, a term we will define further in our conversation. After working for more than 10 years at the Exploratorium, the fantastic science museum in San Francisco, he co-founded Wonderful Idea Co. with Nicole Catrett to support the exploration of art, science, and technology through making and tinkering. For many years, Ryan has been advocating...

Elaine Chung is the Founder and Chief Play Officer of My Play Type, a company she launched in 2020 to educate and inspire organizations on how to integrate a Playful Practice as a foundational approach to work and life, leveraging play neuroscience to create cultures with strong cross-collaboration, innovative solutions, and even happier, more fulfilled employees. I’ve known Elaine for a few years...

Danny Joe LaBrecque is a preschool teacher, early childhood specialist, and the creator and host of the amazing children's show Danny Joe's Tree House. Danny Joe uses play-based therapies including puppetry to help children, teachers and parents process complex social issues. He created Danny Joe’s Tree House to invite families to slow down and engage with characters and stories that provide valua...

Evren Yiğit is a renowned author and expert in children’s content and storytelling, with a background in child development studies, media creation, and creative writing, and over 15 years of experience in the industry. She co-founded Mako Kids in 2017, a children-first media, production, and consultancy company that specializes in creating quality content for kids of all ages. She also recently co...

Janella Watson is an educational and organizational strategist and champion of inclusion, equity, and authentic representation in Children’s Media. She is an executive leader, brand manager, experiential learning specialist, and researcher whose transformative approach to advising inspires and guides clients to create curriculum, experiences, and media content that spark family engagement, learnin...

Mathilde Cerioli owns a PhD in Cognitive Neurosciences from the University of Montreal with a focus on cognitive training for adolescents. After a few years conducting research in neuroscience, she embraced the world of entrepreneurship by co-founding Fly Little Dragon to connect parents with experts in children’s development and learning. She is currently the Chief Scientist at Everyone. AI , a n...

Dr. Sonia Tiwari is a fantastic Learning Experience Researcher and Designer whose current research explores the ethical design of virtual influencers for children. She is, in fact, the creator of the world’s first virtual influencer designed for children’s education! Sonia started her career in the gaming industry as a character design artist before pursuing a PhD in Learning, Design, and Technolo...

This episode is the first part of my conversation with Josh Mason. Click here to listen to the second part on Josh’s podcast "Loops and Lifecycles". Josh Mason is a former Air Force pilot who now provides strategic guidance and technical expertise in cybersecurity and risk management to startups and large companies worldwide. As a cyber instructor and courseware developer, we discussed how he leve...

Chris Bennett is an affiliate at the Stanford Graduate School of Education. He currently studies and practices ways to apply Game Design Thinking, an approach that combines game design, behavior design and neuroscience to help companies innovate, motivate and grow beyond simply using gamification. In this episode, we explore the concept of Game Design Thinking and how to apply it when designing le...