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Seeing the System, Leading Change: A Practical Field Guide for District, School and Teacher Leaders
The challenges facing education will continue to change. The way we approach them can too.
Artificial intelligence. Student engagement. School culture. Portraits of a Graduate. Assessment. New initiatives. Changing leadership. Evolving student needs.
Education isn't running out of challenges—or opportunities. The question isn't whether something new will get your attention. The question is how you'll respond when it does.
Seeing the System, Leading Change is a practical field guide for educators who want to move beyond reacting to problems and begin leading thoughtful, lasting improvement.
Rather than offering another program or quick fix, this guide introduces a simple four-step process grounded in systems thinking, design thinking and improvement science for:
- understanding challenges and opportunities before rushing to solutions and roll-outs
- learning alongside the people experiencing the systems connected to the issue(s)
- improving the work through thoughtful action and small tests of change
- continuing to learn as implementation unfolds
More importantly, it helps educators develop something every school increasingly needs: the capacity to navigate uncertainty with curiosity, confidence, and continuous learning.
Because our goal isn't simply to solve today's challenges. It's to prepare ourselves and our students for challenges and opportunities that don't yet exist.
Designed to be read in an afternoon and used throughout the year, this concise field guide includes practical reflection questions, companion field tools (downloads), discussion guides, and real-world examples for individuals, leadership teams, book studies, and professional learning communities.
Field Tools
These Field Tools are designed to help you put the ideas in Seeing the System, Leading Change into practice. While they can be used on their own, they will be most useful after reading through Chapter 3 of the Field Guide.
Not sure when to use each Field Tool? Click here for recommendations.
Field Tools & Resources
(Book purchased separately.)
Try It — Complimentary
5 Field Tools to get started.
Go Deeper —
Choose the collection that fits your work:
- $9.99 Leadership/Learning Team Collection — Tools for building a team that learns and improves together.
- $14.99 Improvement Collection — Tools for understanding challenges, gathering perspectives, testing ideas, and learning from results.
Get Everything — $19.99
Complete Field Tool Collection — Includes all Field Tools, and study Guide.
Make the tools work for you.
Write on them, adapt them, move to chart paper or a shared document, and adjust the questions or format to fit your context. The tools are a starting point, not a limit on the work.
If you see an issue with a Field Tool, please contact us
Want to Share the Field Tools?
Choose the license that fits your use.
School License — $89
District License, up to 5 schools — $249
District License, 6–15 schools — $399
16+ schools, organizations, consultants & facilitators — Contact Us
Complimentary Field Tools
$0.00
Examples included! Four-step protocol-study a challenge or opportunity before jumping to solutions. Add to cart to download.
$0.00
Explore a challenge through student, classroom, school, and district lenses. Add to cart to download.
$0.00
Plan and learn from a small test before scaling. Add to cart to download.
$0.00
Map the factors and connections influencing what you're seeing. Add to cart to download.
$0.00
Follow one school’s journey as a team explores complex, interconnected challenges and learns its way toward thoughtful improvement. Add to cart to download.
Individual-use license
Purchase orders are accepted for Field Tool purchases of $50 or more.
Orders under $50 may be purchased directly online.
Choose the Collection That Fits Your Work:
$19.99
Includes ALL Field Tool downloads (including Study Guide and Complimentary downloads) Price per person.
$14.99
Includes: 7 downloads - Student Voice Toolkit, What Do We Actually Know Protocol, Map Priorities to the System, Scale and Readiness Check, Where Should We Start: Choosing a Challenge, Design Thinking Check, Competing Needs Map (and Challenge-Opportunity Study Protocol)
$9.99
Includes: 4 downloads: Leadership Team Makeover, Learning Team Purpose, Sample Learning Team Agenda, and Learning Team Launch Guide (and Challenge-Opportunity Study Protocol)
Ordering the Field Guide or Field Tools for a
School, District, or Organization?
How Large Quantity Ordering Works
1. Submit the request form below.
2. connectingEd sends a quote — including books and/or digital Field Tools, shipping (if applicable), and any applicable discounts or charges.
3. Complete the purchase — Submit a purchase order if required, or make payment using the instructions provided.
4. connectingEd fulfills the order — Once payment or an approved PO is received, books are ordered and shipped and/or digital Field Tools are delivered electronically. Customers using a PO are invoiced according to the PO terms.
connectingEd is not responsible for incorrect shipping information
Large Quantity Book & Field Tools Order Request
Purchase orders are accepted for orders of 10+ books, $50+ in Field Tools, or qualifying combined orders.
The Field Tools are organized below in the order of how they are most commonly used in the process.
To purchase an individual Field Tool see below.
1. See the System
Understanding the challenge, identifying patterns, and exploring system influences
- Where Should We Start? Choosing a Challenge
- Challenge Study Protocol for Teams and Individuals
- Systems Mapping Tool
- Lens Mapping Protocol
- Mapping Priorities to the System
- What Do We Actually Know? (Testing Assumptions)
2. Understand Needs and Experiences
Understanding how people experience the challenge and identifying missing perspectives
- Challenge Study Protocol for Teams and Individuals
- Design Thinking Check
- Student Voice Toolkit
- Competing Needs Map
3. Improve the Work
Testing ideas, planning improvements, and supporting implementation
- Challenge Study Protocol for Teams and Individuals
- Small Tests of Change Planner
- Scale and Readiness Check
- Learning Team Launch First 90 Days Guide
4. Reflect and Repeat
Reflecting, adapting, and building organizational learning
- Challenge Study Protocol for Teams and Individuals
- When the Learning Isn't Clear
- Scale and Readiness Check
5. Building Team Capacity
Resources for creating the conditions for ongoing improvement
- Challenge Study Protocol for Teams and Individuals
- Learning Team Purpose
- Sample Learning Team Agenda
- Leadership Team Makeover
- Learning Team Launch First 90 Days Guide
- When the Challenge Feels Too Big Case Study
Individual Field Tools
Single Downloads listed in alphabetical order. Complimentary ones and collections are listed above.
Also see the pricing tables and forms above for school, district, and facilitator licensing.
$2.99
Uncover the needs behind competing perspectives.
$2.99
Consider how people may experience a change before implementing it.
$6.99
Includes three pathways: a 30-day self-guided journey, a 90-day team learning cycle, and a semester-long learning-team pathway, with suggested steps, reflection questions, and resources. Study Guide only. Optional Field Tools referenced in the guide are available separately.
$2.99
Shift leadership meetings from managing work to learning about it.
$2.99
Build strong Learning Team habits in the first 90 days.
$2.99
Clarify your team's purpose, role, and ways of working.
$2.99
Map priorities across (teaching and learning in this example) systems, spot connections, and make better decisions about where to focus.
$2.99
Structure meetings around learning, not just logistics.
$2.99
Check what you've learned—and what's missing—before scaling.
$2.99
Gather student perspectives through interviews, focus groups, and shadowing.
$2.99
Separate evidence, observations, and assumptions before defining a challenge.
$2.99
Make sense of mixed results and decide what to learn next.
$2.99
Sort competing concerns and choose what to study first.
Too often, however, learning is expected primarily of students. Adults plan. Students comply. New initiatives are implemented. Existing practices are repeated.
Success is sometimes measured more by how faithfully people follow directions than by how thoughtfully people learn together.
The future calls us to something more. Learning cannot simply be something we teach. It must become something we model.
