“We should develop a culture of inserting a ‘thoughtful pause’ between an enthusiastic idea and its execution.”
He had jobs shoveling snow, delivering newspapers, clerking at a grocery, swabbing throats in a clinic, helping a veterinary, hauling milk, building barns, babysitting, setting type, and operating a press. He played sports and music. He rode his bicycle to the pond or the woods. In a small town, nobody knew exactly where the kids were until they came home for supper. They were out learning about the world. He hopes kids and parents can regain that place, respect, safety, comfort, and freedom. He wants to create public alternatives to schooling. Paul has been a lifelong educator in homes, public parks, streets of cities, and other opportune places of learning. He was a Head Start field worker, an elementary teacher or principal in six public and private, rural, urban and tribal reservation schools. He taught for four colleges and universities and was director of science centers in Colorado, Connecticut and New Mexico. He now helps museums and educators in North and Central America try out new ideas.
A sampling of Paul’s writings
Paul has been thinking very deeply about informal learning, and how to set up environments that are educative. We find his writings to be very enlightening, and so we offer here a selection of PDFs, in chronological order:- The meaning is the use
- Excerpt from Experience and Education by John Dewey, NY: Collier, 1963 pp. 20-43
- Experiencia y educación John Dewey, NY: Collier, 1963 pp. 20-43
- Science Center Educational Philosophy Science Center, Children's Museum of Denver, 1991
- Characteristics of Environments for Thinking and Learning Science Museum of Minnesota, 1993
- The Role of Esthetic Processes in Cognition ASTC Conference, October 19, 1998
- Inquiry Spiral, 1999
- Inquiry, 1999
- Experience and Analog New Mexico Academy of Science, November 16, 2002
- Experiencia y analogía New Mexico Academy of Science, 16 Noviembre, 2002
- As Happy as Can Be: Fostering Inclusiveness at Explora ASTC Dimensions: On Becoming an Inclusive Science Center, November 2004
- Tan feliz como puedo ser: Fomentando la inclusión en Explora ASTC Dimensions: On Becoming an Inclusive Science Center, Noviembre 2004
- A Summary of Ideas About Transactivity at Explora (up to this point) Explora, Albuquerque, May 9, 2008
- Coherence, Notes for the ASTC session, October, 2009
- Notes for a conversation about learning, making and imagination Exploratorium, San Francisco, June 17, 2011
- Notas para una conversación sobre aprendizaje, el hacer y la imaginación Exploratorium, San Francisco, 17 de junio de 2011
- Thoughts for Working the Exhibit Floor Science Center of Eastern Connecticut, 1997 rev. 2012
- No hablar de ciencia sino hacer ciencia Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Cartago, 11 de setiembre del 2012
- The Continuum of Means and Ends Museum of Life and Science, Durham, September 10, 2013
- Are science centers really life-long learning organizations? October 21, 2013
- A Home for Ideas You Can Touch Notes for ASTC Session: What's Up with Walls?, October 2013
- A Need for a New Education Albuquerque, July 2010, December 7, 2014
- Letter to Ashley on a New Education, July 21, 2016
- Letter to Francisco on a New Education, October 7, 2016
- New Education, Democracy, and Personal Social Growth, March 7, 2019
