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04/18/2017

What do schools need to do to prepare students for the 21st century?

Introduction

Given the nature of lifestyle that most parents are involved in, schools have remained the only place where our children should be taught both academic and life skills that will enable them to face the challenges that are posed by the fast changing society.

Hence schools need to do the following to prepare them for the 21 century:

  1. apply content to real-world applications that call for students to solve problems, think creatively and learn to work in a team get solutions;
  2. lead student to deeper understanding of the content through a carefully selected/crafted set of questions that demand answers that are based on evidence from the texts;
  3. involve/engage students in collaborative groups to conduct investigations, discuss and share learning, and create products that demonstrate what was learnt;
  4. ask students to think metacognitively about what have learnt and the process they used to learn it;
  5. use technology as a tool for learning and for connecting students globally to develop deep understanding of key ideas and concepts;
  6. require students to wrestle with complex problems that engage them in higher-order thinking skills;
  7. give students the license and responsibility to craft their own learning path and direct their own learning;
  8. help students make sense of their own world by connecting what they have learn and what they know, with other content areas and with other ideas; and
  9. focus instruction away from ‘knowing’ to being able to apply and use information in relevant way.

In conclusion, being involved in process of solving problems builds a culture of inquiry in which asking and answering one’s own question becomes the centre of instruction.

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