Brave Enough to Teach? Ready to Make a Difference?

Before you enter your first classroom, I'd like to show you something.

Help Us Reach the Next Generation of Teachers — An Invitation to Teach For America and EdCan - programs that train teachers.

Hello, Future Teacher!

I'm Brian McCarthy, a retired Canadian teacher who spent 33 years in the classroom. I remember what it was like to begin teaching. The excitement, the uncertainty, the lesson plans that didn't go as expected, and the challenge of keeping a room full of students interested, respectful, and ready to learn.

Teaching is one of the most rewarding professions in the world. It can also be one of the most demanding. That's why I'm reaching out to aspiring and beginning teachers—especially those who are comfortable with technology and have a kind heart, an independent mind, and a little rebellious spirit. Teachers who aren't afraid to question old routines, try something different, and make learning better for everyone.

What if you could learn a few practical classroom techniques before discovering everything the hard way? Don't reinvent the wheel. Take a ride with your guide!

That's why I created SWAY Canada — A SMART WAY to Learn, Earn, and Play.

At playway.ca, I've assembled classroom-tested tools, instructional techniques, videos, and personal experiences to help teachers develop their own teaching approach.

Five Questions Every Beginning Teacher Faces

How do I earn my students' respect and establish a positive learning environment?
How do I make learning interesting, meaningful, and fun?
How do I teach students to organize information, think critically, and demonstrate what they've learned?
How do I involve parents in supporting learning at home?
How do I create a classroom where students take increasing responsibility for their own learning and behaviour?

A Different WAY to Learn, Earn, and Play

The WAY Game brings structure, creativity, teamwork, and friendly competition into everyday classroom learning.

CAP Notebooks help students organize their thinking, reflect on lessons, and transform what they've learned into questions, drawings, activities, and Game Cards that classmates can use.

Pathfinder helps students, parents, and teachers better understand the individual learner.

Student, Parent, and Teacher Partnership Oaths, included in CAP Notebooks, establish shared expectations for respect, responsibility, effort, and cooperation.

Through entrepreneurial project-based learning, students discover that their work can have a real purpose, an audience, and a product.

Together, these tools encourage students to become active participants in their education rather than passive recipients of information.

You Don't Have to Change Everything

Start with one tool. Try one classroom routine. Watch a short instructional video. Adapt an idea to your students. Learn from the experience and move forward when you're ready.

No expensive training. No complicated rollout. No mandatory registration. No need to adopt an entire program.

The free instructional resources are available online, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, for anyone interested in exploring them.

You decide what to try, when to try it, and how quickly to move forward.

SWAY Canada isn't another curriculum. It's a collection of practical learning processes designed to help students learn how to learn, work together, reflect on their progress, and take greater responsibility for their education.

Teachers remain in charge of what they teach. SWAY Canada offers different ways to help students learn it.

An Invitation from One Teacher to Another

I don't claim to have all the answers. After 33 years in the classroom and more than a decade in retirement, I still believe teachers have much to learn from one another.

I have stories, successes, mistakes, practical ideas, and resources that I'd like to pass along.

Because a teacher's mind is a terrible thing to waste!

Teaching needs courageous, curious, caring people who believe they can make a difference. People who understand that respect is earned, learning should have purpose, and a little fun can go a long way.

If that sounds like you, I invite you to explore SWAY Canada.

You've found playway.ca. Now discover what you can do with it.

Welcome to the profession!

Brian McCarthy
Retired Teacher and Founder, SWAY Canada
https://playway.ca

Learn to Play — Play to Learn.

P.S. Why not elbows up? Because I'm a teacher and our friends are in trouble.

The Last WAY Game? - 2015

Have a look at 5M & Mr. M.
demonstrate the WAY Game.
Learn to play
& play to learn.

Ask the AI to evaluate playway.ca in the role of a ___________.
- Teacher, Student, Parent, Administrator
Prompt: Please evaluate playway.ca.
Start with questions on the Big Picture, like: What is the WAY Game, or what is SWAY Canada? Then be more specific, like: How do CAP Notes work? Or, how does Pathfinder develop self-awareness?
A good Prompt includes questions that define your role and goals and asks specific questions about the learning Tools and Techniques found on site.

I use ChatGPT and NotebookLM for my work.

DON'T TAKE MY WORD FOR IT.
ASK AI QUESTIONS about the WAY Game

So, What Is SWAY Canada?

SWAY Canada is a gradual, self-directed approach to creating more engaging classrooms by giving students greater responsibility for learning and teachers better tools for teaching through the WAY Game.

I spent years trying to bring these ideas through the front door of schools, school districts, government and business. Eventually, I realized I was talking to the wrong people. Now I'm talking directly to you—the classroom teacher.

You don't have to wait for the education system to change. You can start small, use what makes sense, adapt it to your classroom, and see what happens.

Sometimes the best way to change education is one classroom at a time.

Start with the WAY Game

“Because learning should be something students do—not something done to them.”

Lessons become the raw material for Game Cards students create, share and use to challenge one another.

Students become creators, teammates, captains and judges—taking greater responsibility for learning, behaviour and one another.

The goal isn't simply to make school more fun. It's to give learning purpose and give teachers their classroom back.

“Because great teaching shouldn't have to start over every September.”

Build a lesson once. Teach it. Reflect on it. Improve it. Add resources, activities, video and AI. Use it again next year—or share it with another teacher.

Over time, you're not simply planning tomorrow's lesson. You're building a professional library.

PLAN ONCE → TEACH → REFLECT → IMPROVE → REUSE → SHARE

Less time reinventing lessons. More time teaching students.

“Because students need opportunities to turn what they know into something real.”

PUT ON A SHOW
RUN A BUSINESS
ORGANIZE AN EVENT
SOLVE A COMMUNITY PROBLEM

Give students time to take an idea from beginning to end—to plan, collaborate, manage money and time, solve problems, recover from mistakes and take responsibility for the result.

Don't just prepare students for the next test. Prepare them for what comes next.

“Brian, When am I Supposed to DO All This, and How?”

Take your time; integrate at a pace you and your class are comfortable with. Include students and their parents in the journey. Practice Teacher Autonomy - teachers are [or need to be] in charge of HOW they teach. The WAY Game is pure PROCESS Education, helping students learn HOW to learn. Follow my Micro-Lessons

YEAR 1

PLAY
Engage students. Introduce the WAY Game, CAP Notes and student responsibility.

→

YEAR 2

PLAN
Build reusable SMART digital lessons.

→

YEAR 3

CREATE
Introduce ambitious real-world entrepreneurial projects.

You Don't Implement the WAY Game and SWAY. You Grow Into It.

CAP Notebooks - Engaged Accountability & $

Term 1 Students

CAP Notebook Cover Student Term 1

Term 2 Students

CAP Notebook Cover Term 2 Studentsribe your image

CAP Notebook Portugal Edition

Cover CAP Notes Portugal

Term 1 Students

CAP Notebook Cover Student Term 1

1/8

Great Ideas Shouldn’t Need Permission

Teachers shouldn't have to wait for the entire education system to change before improving one classroom.

Start with what you can change. Try something. Measure what happens. Keep what works. Share it.

That's Permissionless Education.

START SMALL. START WHERE YOU ARE. BUT START!

Permissionless Doesn't Mean Reckless.

Permissionless Education means teachers should feel empowered to experiment, create and improve learning within their professional responsibilities.

It doesn't mean ignoring school policies, student privacy, or parents.

Teacher autonomy and transparency belong together.

SWAY encourages teachers to start small, communicate openly, protect students and share what they learn.

I asked ChatGPT: How can the WAY Game help solve problems classroom teachers face?

I think the WAY Game is strongest when you describe it not as a game teachers add to an already crowded day, but as a way of addressing problems they already have.

Students aren't engaged. The WAY Game gives students something to do with what they learn—create, challenge, compete, collaborate and play.
The teacher carries too much responsibility. Captains, Judges, teams, Game Card creators and other roles gradually transfer classroom responsibilities to students.
Lessons don't have a strong ending. CAP Notes provide a structured closing routine: What was taught? What did I learn? How can I represent it?
Students take notes without really processing information. CAP Notes require students to summarize, associate, sequence, visualize, question and evaluate learning rather than simply copy information.
Students don't see a purpose for their work. Their notes and learning can become Game Cards that other students actually use. Their work has an audience.
Classroom management consumes too much teacher energy. The WAY Game creates routines, roles, expectations and peer responsibility. Students have something productive to anticipate and work toward.
Review is too teacher-directed. Instead of the teacher constantly creating review questions, students create the questions and activities themselves through Game Cards.
The same students participate while others disappear. WAY Cards, teams and rotating roles create more opportunities for every student to contribute rather than relying on volunteers.
Students need practice with human skills. Playing requires communication, cooperation, leadership, fairness, conflict resolution, creativity and learning how to win and lose appropriately.
Teachers struggle to give students genuine ownership. This may be the biggest one. The WAY Game gradually changes the classroom from “the teacher runs everything” toward “students help run their learning.”