21st Century Learning
Today students have more opportunities than their parents to have exceedingly good knowledge of the subjects they are studying.
This is because thirty years ago knowledge was obtained from print mainly whereas today with the internet there are countless videos on YouTube on all subjects and also search engines such as Google to search for what is required.
To help the students schools can show on their websites the schemes of work that the teachers are following so that students know what they are meant to have done and what they are going to do.
Because these schemes of work are kept by the teachers as files on their computers it is the click of a mouse to transfer them to the school website for display to the world.
Communication between students these days is enormously more than what it was sixty years ago. While it can be face to face they are also in contact with their peers at all hours by means of their phones, computers or tablets. If they have a problem they can seek help on where to find the solution via a text, phone call or conference call.
The Internet has websites devoted to explaining the science topics relevant to students. Looking at videos made so that they are attention keeping and visually appealing has huge advantages over a teacher standing before a whiteboard.
Naturally some students will not succeed without having a teacher to prod them along. Some will not succeed even with prodding. Such students would need to attend school to gain an education but those more able to learn online could proceed at their own rate with a mixture of methods.
The Family of All Life Alliance says Education Departments need to go further and embrace the opportunities presented by the 21st century and update their methods of the way children learn.
Education 21st century
The future of education has to be online with the teachers tutoring students who all proceed at their own rate.
Students should have the option of being in class or elsewhere. They will be online wherever they are.
Students working primarily at home will still need to attend school regularly to participate in sport and social activities.
All students will have their personal computer with necessary software installed.
Classrooms will be small enclaves within larger halls with adjacent buildings for physical activities, food halls, music, art, theatre, dance.
Students working remotely but not succeeding in their schoolwork need to have a personal tracker to supervise their behaviour and ensure they spend an appropriate amount of time studying. If they aren’t a message will be sent to their class monitor who has them attend classes physically until they have reached the necessary level for each subject.
There will be no more education with one individual teaching the whole group at somewhere in the middle of their ability.
Students need to proceed at their own rate but that is not possible with one teacher and twenty students in a class.
Online, however, you have individual teaching because you have twenty teachers and one floating teacher who is the tutor to help anyone with problems.
Obviously the current online resources are inadequate. The future will get here soon.
The programs will be produced by professionals and include games, videos, music and other interactive resources to promote engagement.
Universities, Education Departments, businesses will be producing online lessons for schools because the whole world will be using this system soon.
If you Google this “businesses providing online lessons for schools” this was probably top of the list.
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/04/coronavirus-education-global-covid19-online-digital-learning/
The article reinforces the above comments and indicates the relevance of the ones below.
A most important aspect of online learning is to have it in a format that kids love, which is games, so follow that with “businesses producing online games lessons for schools”.
Kids love games.
They will be part of the online education mix of the future.
Obviously this is going to be the province of experts in both the content of the material being taught and producing online games and the other aspects of online learning so for the whole curriculum to be adequately covered with online learning is going to take a while.
It also means that online lessons on those areas of the curriculum that are independent of location such as mathematics will find a home anywhere in the world.
No doubt experts in China, USA, UK, France, and all other countries are hard at work.
Relevant Australian research
This Australian research on this subject does not identify teaching as a rapidly declining job prospect but you will see that will be the outcome of making the proposed changes.
Subjects
Curriculum implementation, Curriculum development, Student assessment, Educational assessment, Teaching skills, Student centred learning, Reporting (Student achievement)
Abstract
Many students in our schools are not learning as well as they could because they are not being given learning opportunities at an appropriate level of challenge. Instead, students are grouped by year level (age) and teachers deliver curricula assumed to be appropriate for all students in the same year of school. However, the most advanced ten per cent of students in any year of school are five to six years ahead of the least advanced ten per cent. For less advanced students, the year-level curriculum is often too far ahead. Many are judged to be underperforming year after year, even though they may be making good personal year-on-year progress. For more advanced students, the year-level curriculum is often not sufficiently challenging. Many receive high grades on year-level expectations, sometimes with limited effort and lower rates of year-on-year progress. Rather than defining success in terms of year-level expectations, we need to define success in terms of the progress that individuals make, regardless of their starting points. Our high expectation should be that every student will make excellent progress every year.
Recommended Citation
Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER). (2017). Lifting achievement levels and improving the return on Australia’s investment in schooling : Submission to the Review to Achieve Educational Excellence in Australian Schools (chair: Mr David Gonski). Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER). https://research.acer.edu.au/policy_analysis_misc/27
READ THE WHOLE REPORT HERE
https://research.acer.edu.au/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1027&context=policy_analysis_misc
COMMENT
This report assumes teachers will still be the prime educators. This is a mistake as soon there will be suitable online programs to teach all subjects at all levels.
Some more items relevant to Education
Education forum in China
This Education forum in China explores the prospect of learning through play which agrees with my proposition of future learning.
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202211/18/WS63772abca31049175432a942.html
Booze
A successful student centred approach fifty years ago.
An example is the online periodic table for science students. See it here.
1989 SCIENCE TEXT ON DISK