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Last week we had a staff meeting led by a small group of us who have the role of looking at the change issues. The purpose of our time together as a staff was to begin discussing some aspects of educational change.
One of our first questions was “What might a 21st Century learner require?” It is a good question to ask and has several underlying ideas. The first is that education is about children and their needs, not about simply maintaining the status quo and perpetuation of the established educational intuitions.
Secondly it acknowledges that times have changed and that we can’t assume that the skills we needed growing up are necessarily the same as today’s children need. And thirdly there is an implication that the imperative is to find out some answers if what we do in our schools is actually going to be of value to the children we work with day by day.
A recognised sociological life stage is where individuals come to the point where they want to know that all the effort, energy and hard work they do counts for something, and has made some positive change in the world. How great it would be as teachers to get to the end of our career and conclude that all the hours of preparation, all the bits of paper, the meetings, the marking, the conferences, the professional development and study was worth it because we see that the children we have taught are thriving in the world. How sad it would be if they weren’t. So the answering of the question is important for all those involved.
While there may be some simplistic answers to the question such as “Be able to use computers and other technology”, the answers have to encompass much more. What sort of attitudes, values and skills will your child need in 10 years time. And given the increasing pace of change in what we term the Information Age, Digital Age or the Information Society, what will our world be like in a decade from now? This is uncharted territory.
You are welcome to add your ideas and views on our class Blog.
One of our first questions was “What might a 21st Century learner require?” It is a good question to ask and has several underlying ideas. The first is that education is about children and their needs, not about simply maintaining the status quo and perpetuation of the established educational intuitions.
Secondly it acknowledges that times have changed and that we can’t assume that the skills we needed growing up are necessarily the same as today’s children need. And thirdly there is an implication that the imperative is to find out some answers if what we do in our schools is actually going to be of value to the children we work with day by day.
A recognised sociological life stage is where individuals come to the point where they want to know that all the effort, energy and hard work they do counts for something, and has made some positive change in the world. How great it would be as teachers to get to the end of our career and conclude that all the hours of preparation, all the bits of paper, the meetings, the marking, the conferences, the professional development and study was worth it because we see that the children we have taught are thriving in the world. How sad it would be if they weren’t. So the answering of the question is important for all those involved.
While there may be some simplistic answers to the question such as “Be able to use computers and other technology”, the answers have to encompass much more. What sort of attitudes, values and skills will your child need in 10 years time. And given the increasing pace of change in what we term the Information Age, Digital Age or the Information Society, what will our world be like in a decade from now? This is uncharted territory.
You are welcome to add your ideas and views on our class Blog.
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