Field Tools Resource Series 1
These download resources support the entire Field Guide and will be most understandable after reading through Chapter 3 of the Field Guide.
They are organized below in the order of how they are most commonly used in the process.
They are available for download on the right-hand side of this page or on mobile view as you continue scrolling.
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
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
Scroll For Field Tool Downloads
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.
Coming Soon
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.
Complimentary Field Tools
$0.00
Examples included! Use the four-step protocol to study real challenges and opportunities, then learn from completed examples showing the process in action. Add to cart to download.
$0.00
Systems help us understand what may be producing a challenge. Lenses help us understand how people experience it. This protocol helps ensure important perspectives are informing the work. Use this protocol alongside the Challenge-Opportunity Study Protocol when you need a deeper understanding of how people are experiencing a challenge. The goal is not to hear every voice every time. The goal is to ensure important perspectives are informing the work. Add to cart to download.
$0.00
A Practical Tool to Help You Test Small Changes and Learn What Works-- Use to design and reflect on small tests of change before scaling larger improvements. The goal is not to prove an idea works. The goal is to learn what is most effective for your students, staff, and organization. Add to cart to download.
$0.00
A practical tool to help individuals and teams identify the systems that may be influencing a challenge, opportunity or change effort before deciding what to do next. Educational challenge, opportunity or change efforts are rarely caused by a single factor. This tools helps identify the systems connected to an issue, so you can better understand what may be producing current results before deciding what to do next. Add to cart to download.
$0.00
Field Tool Series 1 Bundles
Downloads have AI upload and prompt recommendations
Single Downloads listed in alphabetical order
$19.99
Pack 1 2026 -16 tools from Seeing the System, Leading Change. Includes ALL Field Tool downloads Price per person. For quantities of 10 packs or more, please reach out. Download Pack 1
$5.99
Bundle- 5 Downloads to support leaders in getting started with leading change
Individual Field Tools Series 1
Downloads have AI upload and prompt recommendations
Single Downloads listed in alphabetical order
$1.99
A practical tool to help teams understand competing needs before designing solutions. Disagreement between stakeholders is not a sign you asked the wrong people. It is often a sign you have found the real design problem. This tool helps a team name what each side actually needs, instead of arguing about who is right.
$1.99
Use this tool before implementing a new initiative, strategy, policy, program, assessment, schedule change, technology tool, or improvement effort. The goal is to better understand how different people may experience the change and identify unintended consequences before they occur.
$1.99
A practical guide for launching a Learning Team and building the habits of learning, reflection, and continuous improvement.
$1.99
A Practical Tool to Help Leadership Teams Spend Less Time Managing and More Time Learning- Many leadership teams spend the majority of time managing the work. This resource helps teams create space to study challenges, opportunities, and change efforts, understand systems and perspectives, and learn their way toward improvement.
$1.99
A practical tool to help teams clarify the purpose of their work before getting started -- Many teams begin meeting before they are clear about why they exist. A Learning Team is not another committee, initiative team, or implementation group. Its purpose is to better understand challenges, opportunities, or change efforts, gather perspectives, study the system, and learn its way toward improvement.
$1.99
A sample meeting structure that helps teams study challenges, opportunities, or change efforts, understand systems and perspectives, and learn their way toward improvement.
$1.99
Teams often want to scale a promising test before they've learned enough. This checklist slows that decision down just enough to ask a few honest questions first. It is not a gatekeeper that blocks scaling, it’s a way to know what you don't know yet.
$4.99
Implementation Study Guide options for individuals and team - 3 Options. Discussion questions and suggested study outline provided- Recommended downloads sold separately.
$1.99
Student Voice Tool Kit Students experience the impact of every system, practice, and decision. This toolkit provides practical strategies for gathering student perspectives and using those insights to better understand challenges, opportunities, or change efforts and improve learning experiences.
$1.99
Not every small test resolves cleanly. Sometimes a team finishes a test and still isn't sure what to think. This tool normalizes ambiguous outcomes and helps a team learn from them anyway, instead of treating an unclear result as a failed test.
$1.99
When multiple concerns are competing for attention, teams often struggle to decide where to begin. This tool helps individuals and teams organize what they are noticing, look for connections, and identify one challenge, opportunity or change effort worth studying more deeply.