Last week, I looked at practical technologies that I could introduce into my classroom in order to foster the development of some of these 21st century skills. I even managed to brainstorm ways that I could create specific resources using some of these different technologies.
This will be my final post concerning 21st-century learning, but in many ways it is the beginning of my journey as an educator. Even though that is a cliche, I think it poignantly describes my feelings at the end of researching and exploring the questions that have come up in examining 21st-century learning. Looking back at the first one that I asked: is there a point to which inquiry has moved so far into the realms of the abstract and theoretical that it loses its pragmatic relevancy in this brave new world? And if that's true, are our current educators trained sufficiently to make that kind of distinction for their students? The answer: Probably to the first, and probably not for the second. While it's great to think that we are on the frontier of some great new idea that has never been explored in education, the reality is that the skills involved in 21st-century learning have been around for a long, long time. And in some parts of the world (specifically, impoverished nations), the idea of reading and writing are still to be widely adopted. It would be irresponsible as educators to assume that everyone will benefit equally from the same pedagogical approach. Just as all students in the classroom require different scaffolding and adaptations to be successful in the classroom, schools and even entire countries need to approach education in such a way that makes sense for the people involved. Because the macro-view of education is meant to gear students up for taking on practical roles within society, I would argue that there is indeed a point where going "too deep" and into the heavily philosophical would not be conducive to that goal most of the time. That being said, these are skills that students are deeply lacking, and incorporating time into the classroom to examine deeper questions can be an exercise in critical thinking. My attitude towards 21st-century learning is that it can have different meanings for different educators. For some, it is a set of tools that can be used to steer the pedagogical ship. For others, it's an ideal for what we can achieve in our profession, and ideals have value for keeping us motivated and generating ideas. True, for some, it is their gospel, and I personally view this as problematic for all the reasons I've explored in this blog. But just because some are fanatical about the latest trends does not mean that there is no value in them when tempered with a personal view on what one wants to achieve as an educator. From all that I have discovered from talking to my older colleagues in the profession, the trend will shift, and school curriculum will start to focus on knowledge and facts again and put less of an emphasis on the process. With technology going the direction it is, and Google bringing into question the need for such a shift, I'm not sure what to believe. What I do know is that the only thing I can bet on is that things will change in this profession again and again, and it's important to take what you can from different trends in education and make them relevant for you and your classroom.
1 Comment
Jessica Bast
3/12/2021 05:10:18 pm
Hello Tim,
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AuthorTim Raposo is a teacher of grades 3 & 4 at Cawston Primary School in BC. With a firm grasp of burgeoning technologies. he seeks to introduce students to new ideas and skills to produce a passion for 21st century learning as early as possible in their educational careers. ArchivesCategories |