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A discussion with author Daniel Pink on curiosity, passion and the politics of school reform in the global marketplace
In 1492, Christopher Columbus set out to demonstrate that the world was round. Five hundred plus years later, Thomas Friedman set his sights on explaining that the real new world had a different shape. In his book The World Is Flat, Friedman describes how 10 forces are "flattening" the 21st century - making it easier for people in India, China and around the world to compete with Americans and others who had triumphed the century before.
The book has become a huge best-seller in the United States and abroad. And a phrase that once suggested cluelessness - the world is flat - became a marker of sophistication. Educators across America read the work, discussed its arguments and reflected on what it meant for their schools. Meanwhile, Friedman, whose day job is penning a foreign affairs column for The New York Times, began hearing from readers who urged him to expand the book. And what readers most wanted to hear about was education, something that Friedman, whose wife is a long-time public school teacher in suburban Maryland and whose daughter is a first-year teacher in Washington, D.C, was all too happy to explore.
Version 2.0, as he calls it, came out in 2006. The paperback edition, Version 3.0, was published in the past year. Today, even as Friedman works on a new book - about environmental technology, economics and geopolitics - The World Is Flat continues to reverberate in education circles. It remains a staple in the bedside reading piles of many superintendents.
We sent Daniel Pink - himself the author of another best-selling book that's been embraced by educators, A Whole New Mind - to talk with Friedman in his office at the Times' Washington bureau. What followed was a wide-ranging conversation about schools, parents, mashups, horizontal thinking and the value of "yes, but" teaching.
DANIEL PINK: Tom, in the newest editions of The World Is Flat, most of the additions have to do with education. Why is that?
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: That's the question I was asked the most. "Okay, Tom. I'll buy that the world is flat. What do I tell my kids?"
PINK:...