I’m sitting in my room after the first day of the CASA Conference on 21st Century Learning contemplating today’s sessions that I attended. It has been an interesting day on a number of different levels. As a beginning user of Twitter, I began the day with only 7 tweets. Throughout the day I have made it to 24 tweets and followed a number of participants at the conference. That may not seem consequential to most technology gurus but to a newophyte like me, I’m pretty happy.
Although still a little tired from the travelling, I am invigorated with the learning that I am engaged in right now! It’s not that the information received today is all new, in fact much is common to our leaders in Holy Spirit. But, the information that I heard today either (a) pushed me to want to learn and lead more or (b) reaffirmed that we are doing many of the right things in Holy Spirit.
My morning sessions were spent with Ian Jukes. I have listened to Ian on a number of occasions including the opportunity when we brought him via videoconferencing to work with our Learning Leadership Team (LLT) and Tech Leads last year. Often he makes you uncomfortable because he pushes you to places where quite honestly you may not be ready to go. However, in the end, the education system has to continue to be transformed and that transformation sometimes requires a push. We need to remember that as educators, we have been in the “schooling” system since we have been 6 years of age and sometimes it is difficult to see outside the box when it is still sitting on our heads.
It is hard to imagine what the world is going to be like in 20 years. Yet, in education we must prepare our students for their future! So what are some core competencies/skills that we must teach our students so they can lead a future that is vastly unknown. The list that Jukes provided is probably very similar to those that most of us would create: problem solving; creativity; think analytically; collaborate; communicate; ethics, action, accountability. If these are the agreed skills that need to be cultivated in our schools, what are we doing to instill these skills in our classrooms? That is the question to be addressed by all educators! This type of transformation will come only with a shift from teaching to learning, memorizing to understanding, evaluation to assessment, passive to active and isolated to connected learning. As leaders in education, we must drive that change.
A great example of that change in process was presented by Tom D’Amico, Superintendent of Student Success- Learning Technologies of Ottawa Catholic School Board. They began their journey in 2010 from the board level and senior administration. Their document, Towards 2020, Connecting with our Students, http://bit.ly/ptEgxE is an outstanding example of system visionary leadership by looking at grade 2 students and what they want for them when they get to grade 12.
Every division needs to start to define what our students need to prepare them for the future and then DO IT! I will guarantee it will be “just in time” learning and not “just in case” learning. We also need to anticipate and accept that becoming a 21st century division is a messy process; it is not a linear process, it is dynamic! And as leaders in our systems or our schools, we need to recognize it is not for the faint of heart.
But isn’t that why we got into education… to change the world.
