These are the things I know about imagination, trust, and the worlds people build when you stop correcting them, at eight or at eighty.
There is a remarkable absence at the centre of the vast apparatus of education research, policy, and intervention. The child.
Every child who is struggling has a story that explains the struggle. The question that rarely gets asked and why its absence costs children so much.
Boys are behind girls in reading by age 15. Two thirds of the bottom 10% are boys. The seven systemic mistakes schools make when trying to close the gap.
465 children across nine schools. The question is not why won't boys write. The question is why we demand compliance instead of inviting creation.
Build a world together, and trust follows.
Your people are being asked to trust each other across distance, across generations and through constant change. Most have never been shown how.
Kate Markland has. For a time she had one hour a week with her son Gabriel, on a FaceTime call. They spent it building a world. She asked one question, wrote down everything he said and corrected nothing. That world became three books and a method tested in nine UK schools.
In her keynote, Create the World You Want, Kate shows your audience how trust is really built, and gives them a method they can use the same evening.
For leadership, education and family audiences.
Even the kids who don’t like writing didn’t want to leave.

Even the kids who don’t like writing didn’t want to leave.
StoryQuest gives children the freedom to imagine, speak and be heard without being corrected, guided or rushed. It begins with a story. But what families create together is something much bigger: connection.
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