Last week I shared that I’ve been yanked out of retirement by the extraordinary Sydney Schaef.
Together we’ve written Wired for Brilliance: The Power of Learning About Learning—For Students, Schools, and You. If you haven’t met her — she’s a force of nature. A creative one.Working with Sydney has stretched my thinking, sharpened my ideas, and reminded me how much better work becomes when it is truly shared.
So what is our goal? To put the learning sciences into the hands of everyone. One early reviewer captured our hope perfectly: “You don’t just tell us about the research — we experience it alongside you.”
Over the past two decades, remarkable books have helped us understand pieces of how learning works — memory, mindset, motivation, perseverance. But the research has largely lived in separate conversations. We wanted to bring it together and translate it into ideas that are sticky, human, and usable.
We begin with Head, Heart, and Heat — the interwoven domains that shape how learning actually happens: cognition, emotion, and motivation. Too often these are treated as separate lanes. In reality, learning lives in their interaction — how we think, how we feel, and what fuels our effort. Which means we have to hold all three. We help readers do just that.
You’ll also meet the Dream Team, our cast of executive-function characters who help readers reflect on how they plan, focus, regulate emotions, persist, and adapt. These are not just school skills. Strong executive functions are linked to better health, greater financial stability, and more successful careers across a lifetime. They are life skills. Everyone deserves access to them.
And get read to enter the Learning Zone — that just-right space where challenge and support meet (what researchers call the zone of proximal development). Too much challenge without support leads to frustration. Support without challenge leads to boredom or compliance. Too little of either produces very little growth.
Creating Learning Zones consistently is one of the hardest things for schools given that systems are often built around coverage, pacing, and ranking. But given where learning comes alive, it’s time we redesign, right?
Finally, we bring the research together into what we call the ABCs of Learning: Agency. Belonging. Competence. These are the conditions that maximize learning. These ideas won’t surprise those working in competency-based education. They know that these three design principles offer a powerful, research-grounded way to think about design, culture, and decision-making — in schools and far beyond them.
We’re still some distance from publication. Early readers have offered both rave reviews and thoughtful critiques that are making the book stronger. But we didn’t want to wait to begin sharing the ideas. The need feels too urgent and the possibilities too hopeful.
For too long, we’ve waited for the educational ecosystem to catch up with what research has been telling us for decades — waited for policy, accountability systems, and new initiatives to trickle down.
But the science of learning doesn’t belong only to researchers or system leaders.
It belongs to people. Parents. Teachers. Principals. School board members. Coaches. Learners of every age.
Yes — you know the song — Power to the People.
Our aim with Wired for Brilliance is to make the research genuinely accessible. An auto repair shop owner introducing a new computer system should be able to use it. A busy school board member should be able to use it to consider plans for building a new school. A parent can use it….well, every day. A new principal might pause and ask before making a decision, How might the science of learning shape this decision?
Before I close, I want to say a word about my co-author. Sydney Schaef brings a rare blend of deep knowledge, design sensibility, and experience building innovative schools and powerful learning environments. Working alongside her has already made me a better thinker and writer — and I suspect the learning has only just begun.
For example, I’ve been thinking a lot about how we can turn that titanic education ecosystem.
Stay tuned.
