Tuesday, April 10, 2012

It's About - Authentic Learning - 'Dancing with Change'



What do we REALLY want for our students - how much have our classrooms and our teaching styles REALLY changed over the past few years?  What conscious changes in your practice are you making today, knowing that they are the best for teaching and learning in your classroom?  Or are you making changes because they are being forced on you - these are the changes that can't be sustained.  The changes that can and will be sustained are those that we believe passionately in, they are the changes that we want and need for our students and they are the changes that students demand in order to live - not just exist - in a 21st Century learning environment.

We continue to block these innovations and changes rather than to embrace them.  If we are to be educators in the 21st Century, it is imperative that we learn alongside and with our students - that we embrace the technology and integrate it into what we do on a minute-by-minute basis.  Why are there still schools out there that run ICT units / programmes - where is the integration, the flat classroom, the classroom without walls that links to the real world?  We need to start questioning whether we are meeting the needs of 21st Century learners in the current teaching and learning environments we are providing.

Listen to the students - they are wise.

So - what changes are you making to meet the needs of your 21st Century Learners?  Is what we're providing in the classroom authentic and does it make explicit links to the students lives outside the classroom?

What are we doing to 'Dance with change?'