Wednesday, March 26, 2014

Evaluating 21st Century Skills




I also find the website to be extremely helpful in simplifying the understanding of the 21st century stands.  It provides a brief overs of the framework and address the core subject areas and themes that are essential for students to master.  The website also briefly describes the different components that are necessary to educators to address in education.

·      The interdisciplinary themes: 
o   Global Awareness, Financial, Economic, Business and Entrepreneurial Literacy, and Civic Literacy.
·      Learning and Innovation Skills:
o   Creativity and Innovation, Critical Thinking and Problem Solving, Communication and Collaboration.
·      Information, Media, and Technology Skills: 
o   Information Literacy, Media Literacy, Information, Communication, and Technology (ICT) Literacy
·      Life and Career Skills: 
o   Flexibility and Adaptability, Initiative and Self-direction, Social and Cross-cultural Skills, Productivity and Accountability, Leadership and Responsibility.

I find this website to be extremely helpful in many ways by providing me with new ideas and suggestions of how to implement these standards into my classroom.  It provides an interdisciplinary theme along with samples of how to implement it in your classroom.  I found that to be the extremely useful because it provides teachers with ideas of how the standards and skills can be address in each subject.  I also find it helpful that the site provides skill maps for all core subjects that have been created through professional develop and feedback from other educators across the nation. 

This website provides a variety of different resources to help teachers become acquainted with the 21st century standards.  The website also has a blog where questions are posted to better explain these standards or questions people may have.  In addition there are a variety of other different blog topics that are also available on this site. The website also provides short video segments that can help explain how the 21st century standards can impact students learning.  It demonstrates how students collaborate to create a project.  It is usefully because it addresses different components that should be address in all educational lessons of the 21st century.  The website provides a variety of resources that are extremely beneficial to educators to help them begin implementing these standards.

I do not disagree with the information on this page because I think it is very user friendly and informational.  The information on this page can help improve teaching strategies to help make students better prepared for their future work place.  Educations today should no longer be teacher centered learning but student’s collaboration and project-based learning.  In order for students to be successful in their future educators needs to start preparing students for their future.  They need to encourage students collaboration with other to problem solve and use real world technology and experiences to help enhance their learning.  However, I do believe that parent’s support is necessary to effectively implement these strategies and standards.  Teachers can help introduce these skills to students but parents need to be onboard with these skills as well. 

References: 
Partnership for 21st Century Skills. (n.d.). Parntership for 21st century skills. Washington DC: Author. Retrieved from http://www.p21.org/

2 comments:

  1. Nicole,

    I agree with you that teachers must move away from outdated teaching practices and instead transform their lessons to better serve the skills that students will need to be successful in the 21st century. Now more than ever, students need to become more active learners and not just simply copy down the notes that are provided for them by their teacher. That being said, I think that project-based learning is an educational practice that teachers should consider implementing in their classroom. Project-based learning is a powerful way for students to be presented with authentic problems and work with one another to seek out solutions to the tasks at hand. As a result, students will have more control in their learning and practice applying their prior knowledge to new situations. Unfortunately, there is no guarantee that the transition from traditional models of teaching to new teaching practices will be very easy. It is certain that not only will teachers and students have to adapt to these new teaching methodologies, but parents as well. As a result, it is imperative that teachers communicate with parents on a regular basis so that the parents are aware of what is expected of their student. Parents will have to become accustomed to the fact that students will not be given the answer but instead must research the correct answer themselves. To fully give students the opportunity to develop their 21st century skills, both parents and teachers will have to diminish the control and allow for their students to become more independent (Partnership for 21st Century Skills, n.d.).

    -Irene

    References

    Partnership for 21st Century Skills. (n.d.). A report and mile guide for 21st century skills. Washington DC: Author. Retrieved from http://www.p21.org/storage/documents/P21_Report.pdf

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  2. Irene,

    I agree that parents must actively be involved in their child’s learning. I am looking forward this year to incorporate a group project based assignment this year. I have assigned projects in the past that students created and presented to the class. However, I have never created a group based project like that before that requires students to critically think and problem solve. I am hoping I will be able to learn from this experience and identify effective and ineffective strategies to help implement more lessons that are project based next year.

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