Flash Forward!: Rethinking Learning

Will You Teach Me?

Will you teach me how to sail through space

upon a comet’s tail?

Will you teach me how to fly, to sail the

skies on wings untried?

Will you teach me how to soar, to see things

never seen before?

But most important of all, will you teach

me how to fall?

Will you teach me how to cry, to release

feelings deep inside?

Will you teach me how to laugh and travel

off the beaten path?

Will you teach me how to dream, to face

the future sight unseen?

Will you teach me how to be, the only thing

I can be.....me?

By: Anonymous Middle School Student© 2011 Karen, Grose and Jim Strachan

Distributed by Lantern Resources

www.lanternresources.com

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means electornic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information without permission in writing from the authors and/or publisher.

ISBN 978-0-9865968-2-7

Printed and bound in Canada.

CHAPTER 01 A CALL TO ACTION

Close your eyes and imagine yourself back in school. Can you feel the warm breeze and the sunshine stream through the open window? Can you picture yourself at your desk? Your classmates as they sit at their desks around you? The teacher standing at the front of the room explaining whole numbers, quantum physics or the stages of the water cycle, illustrated with a chalk diagram on the blackboard?

Now open your eyes and picture many schools around the world today. The windows are still open to catch a breeze, there are still desks set up in some type of configuration around the room and the teacher is probably still teaching the stages of the water cycle except, in this second decade of the 21st century, the diagram is more likely on an interactive white board.

Our global community has experienced a rapid evolution from a traditional, industrial base dependent on factories and physical labour, to a new knowledge economy where thinking, innovation, collaboration and adaptability are taking central stage. Yet despite the infusion of technology into most classrooms, a firmer understanding of the requirements of 21st century learning, and reforms intended to increase accountability, improve teacher effectiveness and reach higher standards, education has not gone through the large-scale reinvention or disruptive changes that many other sectors have experienced over the past 50 years.

Today many children are still learning within a conventional school model. They are taught with a curriculum made up of distinct subject areas, in physical spaces representative of traditional disciplines, and with the expectation that they proceed in linear, age-appropriate placements for some 15 years. It is important to acknowledge that there are a number of inspiring pockets of excellence that reflect a new approach to supporting 21st century learning, and that some progress has been made to steepen both the trajectory of student engagement and the ultimate success for all students. However, much still remains to be done to support large scale educational transformation that brings all schools out of the factory model.

A child entering Kindergarten in Fall 2012 will graduate near the end of the third decade of the 21st century. With open source information accessible to everyone, no matter one’s geography or time zone, large scale educational transformation must result in moving every classroom away from traditional, content-driven learning and towards the way students are presently engaged in defining their own learning. If education as a whole cannot adapt to how students are currently learning outside of school in their daily lives, not only will students leave teachers behind, there is also great risk of increasing dropout rates. This will not be because students can’t learn, but because they don’t want to learn within existing traditional school structures that place them as passive receivers of knowledge in a world where they are now active consumers, explorers and producers of their own content.

A Vision For 21st Century Learning

It is time to bring student learning in line with the requirements of the 21st century. Strengthening our collective capacity for bold, forward-thinking action that genuinely impacts and changes learning for every child in our global community requires a significant shift in the learning paradigm. This shift starts with placing student needs and abilities at the centre of all learning. Student learning must then be supported by a significant cultural shift in both the learning environment and the role of the teacher. This critical cultural shift is a mandatory prerequisite to truly achieve the desired transformation needed to occur in today’s classrooms. Four key learning themes can then work alongside each other in an integrated fashion to assist teachers in driving the changes integral to the successful implementation of 21st century learning.

This shift in the learning paradigm ensures that learning becomes personalized and reflects each student’s skills, interests and passions. Researchers like Elmore and Marzano want to create learning environments where students will become authentically engaged in the co-construction of their own learning process, which in turn will ignite their desire for continuous improvement and their understanding of the relevance of lifelong learning and relearning. Ultimately, each student’s voice will become activated so that every student is empowered to take action and responsibility for others, and to contribute to the sustainability of their world.

A Framework For Implementation – Making It Happen

This paradigm shift can be achieved with a simple, yet effective implementation strategy that involves three key steps: Awareness, Action, and Alignment and Assessment.

When these A’s are leveraged and deployed to work together in an integrated and systematic way, education can be transformed so that all students are supported in an engaging, relevant and top-performing environment, that ultimately ensures success for every child.

We are clearly at the cusp of an exciting opportunity to transform learning and to support the daily developmental growth of each child no matter where they live and learn. Flash Forward! Rethinking Learning aims to support teachers and school leaders in their collective efforts to implement an engaging learning environment so that equity and excellence for every child is achieved. It provides a context and rationale for conversations regarding the required changes needed to support 21st century learners so that all students across our global community have the knowledge and skills to succeed