Group items tagged

"Just adding more technology into a 19th century classroom doesn't make it a 21st century learning experience."

This article highlights 9 essential characteristics of 21st Century Learning. Diagram shows the sphere of influence of each of them.

The role technology can play in expanding the time during which learning can take place.

Another article about "expanded learning time" both online and via community-based "brick and mortar" locations like libraries, YMCA, and Boys & Girls Clubs. "Out-of-school programs can be strong partners for schools who want to leverage expanded learning time to help their students achieve global competence. Youth-serving organizations share the broad mission to promote student success in work and life in the 21st century. Out-of-school program organization and management is often based on an asset model that values diversity. In order to attract and retain participants, out-of-school programs are centered around youth engagement through hands-on and experiential learning, often with a focus on 21st century skills, service learning, science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education, and others."

I wonder what Helen Haste would think of this organization . . .

Technology literacy is projected to arrive in k-12 schools in 2012.

ARTLAB+ is a digital media studio that gives local teens the opportunity to become integral members of a design team. They create new visitor experiences at the Hirshhorn, taking their inspiration from its permanent collection and temporary exhibitions. ARTLAB+ designers hone crucial twenty-first century skills as they make videos, animations, wikis, games, podcasts, and more. By the end of every project session, the design team has created a unique product that enriches the museum experiences of other visitors and showcases each teen's creative growth. After-school, weekend, and weeklong ARTLAB+ workshops are held year-round to accommodate a wide variety of schedules. We welcome all teens, regardless of experience. Looks like a great way to help introduce twenty-first century skills- BB

This is really cool- combining mobile, situated learning in the real world, with creative group projects, and letting kids direct their own active, learning 'flow'.. Can this scale up to schools (or after-school programs), without access to museum artifacts and mobile devices?

White paper outlines the existing structures that constrict the development of 21st century skills, various tools, e.g. through including badging, personalization, adult learning, etc.

You have to sign in to Edutopia to download the PDF, but it's free and its a great resource.

Great video about the 21st century student!

That was an interesting video, though I'm a little skeptical about all the "qualities" they promote about digital native students. It made me feel like students just want connectivity to the internet 24/7 ("when I can Google the best place to buy shoes, I will also be able to Google where to get the best education" really?)...which to me, doesn't speak much to how technology will help them learn or master content better? It's like some of the other articles people have posted that talk about how introducing technology into the classroom doesn't really help learning--giving kids access to the internet may not be enough. I do think technology has a great role to play, but I feel like the video really glosses over the topic and presents it in a "marketing" way...

Yet another story about the magic device. I had not realized that interactive whiteboards automatically communicate 21st century skills.

An interesting article that debunks certain myths like administrators and teachers having a shared understanding of technology and 21st century skills and that teachers feel prepared to use technology or teach 21st century skills after their preservice training.

Good principles to spark your own thinking.

Interesting look at mapping 21st Century Skills to Montessori .

I am a fan of the Motessori approach and am encouraged to see that they are mapping the new technology skills to the tenets of what has been working so well for them already.

Interesting, real-time, questions about the topics we are covering in T561. Illuminates some of the key pieces (and challenges there within) of the scaling process... "Wissahickon School District (WSD) board members are divided on how to meet educational technology goals that bridge the "digital divide" and foster 21st Century Learning skills for students. A "1:1" plan presented to board members calls for giving every secondary student a computer to bridge the digital divide for students who do not have a computer, and enhance learning for all."

Ed Murphy, vice president of business development at Learn360. "The recent adoption of both sets of new Standards affords Learn360 boundless opportunities to provide even more resources and tools to help students think critically, make informed decisions and ultimately make larger social contributions in a heavily wired world." Additionally, the 21st Century Learning Skills focus on helping students master the multi-dimensional abilities required of them in the future by blending specific skills, content-knowledge, expertise and literacy with innovative support systems"

Boston area Landmark High School received a Lemelson-MIT InvenTeam grant, which seeks to foster innovation and focus on STEM fields. These students will work on creating a water desalination system for countries with low rainfall. This type of project has a lot of potential to develop 21st century skills and teach complex problem solving skills.

A history class created Facebook Timelines for Magellan's voyage, fashion 1950-present, and 20th century inventions.

If you are not familiar with the 21st Century Fluency project, have a look. When I received this week's newsletter, there was a lot of alignment with the conversation we had in Monday's lecture.

http://www.fluency21.com/perspectives/LNE_perspective.pdf This is a great intro to the thinking these guys are doing. Their breakdown of the 5 fluencies is probably one of the most actionable representations of what everyone is calling 21st century skills.

"he obstacles to code literacy are getting smaller every day, while the liabilities for ignorance are only getting more profound."

Truly great discussion with some great minds all focused on not simply how to reform education, but how to look at a real transformation of what it means to educate in the 21st Century.

3D printers making innovative toys possible