One of the most missed pieces in education right now is having fun.

One of the most missed pieces in education right now is having fun.

Yes, I said it. Fun.

Not as a reward. Not as a Friday thing. Not as something you do after the “real learning” is done. I’m talking about fun being part of the actual learning process.

I have to give credit to Mark Covelle for this. He has said it over and over. Have fun in your work. And the more I’ve sat with that, the more it has stuck. Because when learning is fun, students lean in. They engage. They remember. They care.

And if you look closely, CTE has been doing this for a long time.

The whole CTE boom we are seeing right now… it’s not new. It’s just finally being noticed. CTE teachers have always been a little different. We are not sitting back. We are not relying on content alone. We are not protected by some idea of tenure where things just stay the same.

We are scrappy. We are innovative. We build.

We bring in people from the outside. We connect students to professionals. We create experiences where students actually have to do the work, not just memorize it. That’s the difference. That’s why it works.

Over the last 10 years of cohosting the Disrupt Education Podcast, one thing has become very clear to me. The best educators are not the ones who hold all the knowledge.

They are the ones who build the environment.

They build with their community. They design learning around real challenges. They create spaces where they are not the center of attention. The work is. The experience is. The reflection is.

And in those spaces, something different happens.

Students network. They communicate. They struggle. They figure things out. They start to see how what they are doing actually matters.

Now, does this take more time to set up? Yes.

Does it fail sometimes? Yes.

Good.

That’s where the magic happens.

Not when everything is perfect. Not when every lesson goes exactly as planned. The magic is in the mess. It’s in the adjustment. It’s in the reflection after something didn’t go right.

That’s real learning.

The shift that needs to happen is a mindset shift.

As educators, we have to be willing to be humble. To admit we are not the only source of knowledge in the room. To bring in people who know more than we do in certain areas. To learn alongside our students.

And we have to be honest with each other about it. In our departments. In our schools. Real conversations about what learning should look like.

Because when you start building learning with your community instead of inside your four walls, everything changes.

Students feel it.

And when students feel it, they show up.

More students will take your course. Not because it’s easy. But because it’s real.

No fluff.

Just real learning. Real experiences. Real failure. Real growth.

And yeah… it should be fun.

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