21st Century Thinking

"The capacity to learn is a gift; the ability to learn is a skill; the willingness to learn is a choice."
-Brian Herbert

In our current day and age technology is everywhere we look. It has become a means for shopping, entertainment, and most of all education. Since we are entering this new culture, students, now more than ever need to be prepared for the future. In the U.S. the amount of people going into the workforce is decreasing while technological change is rapidly increasing. And due to our current situation countries who are keeping up are filling the need and adding to the competition.

With this said, I believe that it all starts in the classroom. I have experienced many a different teachers and classroom settings in which all were not good experiences. The teachers that received the most negative feedback from me were, in a nutshell, very closed minded and did not teach in a fashion that allowed you to think about information and apply the knowledge to other subjects of learning. It seemed as if the didn't really care so much about incorporating anything other than context. However the teachers that I enjoyed and learning the most from all ways connected information and urged me to see past the context and apply what I learned and put to other areas of learning. This not only allowed me to think differently, but to begin to critically analyze the processed information in my head.

The whole point of learning is to build upon knowledge to understand and move forward and I think that that is exactly what 21st century thinking skills are doing. Because children have grown up in the era of technology they take in information in different ways. Without a change in approach nothing is going to change and we would be teaching a generation that they aren't good enough. Each and every person is different and goes through different circumstances and these differences can lead to different ways in which learning occurs. Albert Einstein said "Everybody is a genius but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid." So I am willing to learn and take the time to  learn and understand a new way of teaching. Even if it is technology, tech promotes creativity, innovation, communication, collaboration, research and literacy. As teachers we have a job that ultimately makes a way for generation and paves the future. Invest in learning.


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