Educator & Activity Guides
Videos
The Noisy Puddle — Get Activity Guide
Monument Maker - Activity Guide
When the Wind Blows - Activity Guide
Connected Wisdom -- Activity Guide
Apart, Together — Get Educator Guide
Do Bees Pee? — Coming 2026
Videos
-
Systems Change Summit for Teens
-
The Carbon Bathtub
-
Tapped In: Art-Science Installation (Partner: Umbrella Arts Center)
-
Think Like a Bathtub - youth-narrated video created for COP26 (Co-produced with Eric Handler)*
-
Carbon Bathtub Animation - I created the original bathtub animation for SEED (Schlumberger Excellence in Educational Development) with Andrew Jones and Simone Amber. (Narrated by Peter Carter)
-
-
How Can Storytelling Nuture Children to Become Systems Thinkers?
-
"What the most important thing we can teach young children now?"
-
History Shapes Our Lives, and What We Do With our Lives Can Shape History:
-
MONUMENT MAKER Book Talk for U.S. National Archives: Young Learners Children’s Book Program
-
Animations
-
Donella Meadows - co-created with David Macauley. “In A World of Systems”
Extended Reality (Virtual + Augmented Reality)
-
When You Can Walk Inside a System: How VR Fuels Systems Thinking
(Presented in Toggle Labs VR environment for the Buckminster Fuller Institute’s Living Systems Collaboratory)
Fun Stuff (coloring pages, games and more)
A game designed to help people (ages 8-88) to “connect the dots” and think deliberately about living systems in a farm setting. The playkit includes a game, wikki stiks, systems glossary, systems maps, and more. A free curriculum guide is available, and an article about the play kit. Contact me if you are interested these or a customized playkit.
I worked with WGBH to integrate systems concepts into an interactive farm game for middle school students. Players learn about sustainable practices by growing crops, protecting them against unforeseen problems, and determining how best to conserve resources. The game is so realistic. Check it out!
Dive into the enchanting world of ‘Apart, Together’ and it’s delightful children’s coloring pages. Let your little ones bring these magical moments to life with their vibrant colors, fostering creativity and connection. ‘Apart, Together’ coloring pages create a canvas of joy for kids to express themselves and embrace the magic of togetherness.
Color with excitement! Unleash your imagination with ‘The Noisy Puddle’ coloring pages. Join the characters in a symphony of colors and let the adventure unfold on each page. Dive in and make a splash of your own artistic magic!
Books for Kids
When The Wind Blows
When The Snow Falls
Connected Wisdom
Announcement
NEW BOOK COMING SOON
Do Bees Pee?
Do Bees Pee? (Harper Collins, June 2026 What I tell my friends: “It about the clever things species do with their feces.” :)
The official description: Through laugh-out-loud questions, vibrant illustrations and fascinating facts, this book shows how every poop and pee has a purpose—helping plants grow, spreading seeds, and keeping nature healthy and waste-free! This one is a playful, slightly mischievous dive into sustainability and the circular economy.
Purchase an advance copy today,
and we will send you a signed copy!.
Microlearnings
Short, practice-based tools to put systems thinking into action. Downloadable now, with short videos coming soon.
Videos
Newsletter Archive
Browse past issues for insights, tools, and stories about systems-smart leadership.
Media Kit
Linda Booth Sweeney, EdD —
Systems Strategist | Author | Speaker
Dr. Linda Booth Sweeney helps leaders, educators and learners "see systems" and meet complexity with confidence. A Harvard- and MIT-trained researcher, she leads Toggle Labs, and its Systems Leadership labs, advising clients such as Cargill, General Mills as well as leaders at numerous universities and foundations.
Through Toggle Labs for Kids, she brings these same insights to children's media and publishing writing books like award-winning The Noisy Puddle (Owl Kids) and Do Bees Pee? (Harper Collins) which introduce systems thinking through stories, science and humour.
WHAT IF...
complexity wasn't a barrier,
but a doorway to smarter, more humanized growth?
SUBSCRIBE TO THE TOGGLE LABS KIDS NEWSLETTER
Tom Lowery, SVP,
Chief Transformation Officer,
YMCA
"Linda’s ability to turn complex systems theory into understandable, relevant concepts, and then bring them to life through practical and engaging activities, is a gift, and we were the beneficiaries."
Jill Riorden
Sr. Director Transformation, Org Strategy & Culture Nike
“I loved working with Linda to expand our systems thinking capabilities! Linda’s system thinking session with our global business leaders brought systems thinking from an intellectual concept to a practical and critical competency in our leaders.”
Alisa Berger
Harvard
Graduate School of Education,
Deeper Learning Dozen
"Not only do the participants rave about how much they learn and how much she pushes their thinking, but it is evident in the more thoughtful work they are able to produce afterwards. All educators, from every level of the system, should have a systems thinking orientation and Linda is able to provide an introduction to the ideas in a fun, provocative way that makes everyone want to learn more. I could not recommend her more highly as a workshop facilitator."
Jeri Eckhart Queenan
Senior Advisor,
The Bridgespan Group
"Linda helped us at Bridgespan think through "nonprofit starvation" as a systems issue with many component parts, contributing to recent progress published in the Chronicle of Philanthropy. A coalition of foundations and intermediaries played a key role, an insight that followed directly from Linda's work."
Trusted by Leaders Across Sectors
Tom Lowery,
SVP,
Chief Transformation Officer, YMCA
"Linda’s ability to turn complex systems theory into understandable, relevant concepts, and then bring them to life through practical and engaging activities, is a gift, and we were the beneficiaries."
Jill Riorden
Sr. Director Transformation,
Org Strategy & Culture Nike
“I loved working with Linda to expand our systems thinking capabilities! Linda’s system thinking session with our global business leaders brought systems thinking from an intellectual concept to a practical and critical competency in our leaders.”
Alisa Berger
Harvard
Graduate School of Education, Deeper Learning Dozen
"Not only do the participants rave about how much they learn and how much she pushes their thinking, but it is evident in the more thoughtful work they are able to produce afterwards. All educators, from every level of the system, should have a systems thinking orientation and Linda is able to provide an introduction to the ideas in a fun, provocative way that makes everyone want to learn more. I could not recommend her more highly as a workshop facilitator."
Jeri Eckhart Queenan
Senior Advisor,
The Bridgespan Group
"Linda helped us at Bridgespan think through "nonprofit starvation" as a systems issue with many component parts, contributing to recent progress published in the Chronicle of Philanthropy. A coalition of foundations and intermediaries played a key role, an insight that followed directly from Linda's work."
Linda by the Numbers
14,824 Copies of The Systems Thinking Playbook sold
8,280 Academic papers that reference Linda's research.
10 Books authored (4 for adults, 6 for children)
5 Number of years Linda has been a
top-rated systems leadership faculty
2 (soon to be 3!) curated community-wide art events
74 Countries where people have read her papers
46 Years Linda has been driving her beloved
yellow VW (yes, it still runs!)
10 Languages Connected Wisdom has been translated
into—including French, Portuguese, Mandarin, and Arabic
Labs
Linda’s systems leadership labs created a rare space for our healthcare fellows to think differently —
and systemically —
about emerging health crises.” –
Columbia
REACH director, faculty
Susan Micheals-Strasser
.jpeg)
At Toggle Labs, we help people and
organizations become more systems-smart,
and able to work with the complexity
rather than against it.
We provide strategic support through coaching, visualization, decision-making and capacity-building for leading in complexity across boundaries.g for leading in complexity across boundaries.
Note to senior leaders navigating complexity >
Here's what that looks like in real life.>
Don't Fight Forces Use Them.
R.Buckminster Fuller
Top-Rated Systems Faculty for Numerous Universities—and Beyond
In today's world, we can find ourselves focused on parts. Food. Soil. Water. Climate. Labor. Consumption. Health. Climate.
Yet food, like all of life, is interrelated in a web of mutual influence.
In nature, these interrelationships can produce breathtaking synergy, and in human society, they often present some of the most perplexing and persistent challenges we face.
When we go the extra step of making causal relationships visible, we're able to help the parts see themselves as part of a larger whole.
When we understand the pattern-or set of interrelationships-that keeps
a system operating as it does, then we can collectively work to change that pattern.
Meet Linda
Systems Strategist & Storyteller
Linda is a systems strategist and award-winning writer who helps Fortune 500 companies and mission-driven organizations turn complexity into innovation—for performance,
people, and planet.
She also creates books and games that invite children and their adults to see the interconnections that shape their world Across her work, Linda offers everyday ways to put systems thinking into action—helping people of all ages meet complexity with confidence and transform uncertainty into opportunities for positive change.
Book Ideas Mock Up for Home Page
SERVICE NAME
Describe the key features of the service and how users can benefit from it.
SERVICE NAME
Describe the key features of the service and how users can benefit from it.
SERVICE NAME
Describe the key features of the service and how users can benefit from it.
Video
Systems Thinking Video
Leadership Development
for Emerging and Established Leaders
United Arab Emirates Book Festival:
Making Big Ideas Simple
Linda the Strategist
Linda the Storyteller
Making Big Ideas Simple
Linda writes award-winning books, games, and media that make big ideas—like systems thinking—simple, meaningful, and accessible. Her work invites people of all ages to be curious and explore the connections that shape our lives. She is the author of The Systems Thinking Playbook (more than 15,000 copies sold) and other widely used resources that bring systems thinking into real-world practice. Her children’s books—including the award-winning Noisy Puddle—help young readers laugh, wonder, and explore their place in the larger web of life.
From Complexity to Clarity
Speaker, author, and trusted advisor to Fortune 500 leaders and social innovators, Linda Booth Sweeney makes systems thinking actionable—for people, planet, and performance.
Through Toggle Labs, she creates immersive experiences that help leaders and teams think differently, break out of silos, and shift from quick fixes to coordinated, lasting change.
Check out Linda’s award-winning book, The Noisy Puddle, a beautifully told tale
that sparks curiosity and wonder in young readers.
