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Why Technology is Inevitable in the Vision of a 21st Century School?

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Published on 25 November 2013 

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WHY TECHNOLOGY IS INEVITABLE IN THE VISION OF A 21ST CENTURY SCHOOL

When we compare our current education system with the traditional one, we hardly find few changes in it. But in the near future, the situation will never be the same. 21^st Century education system will be experiencing tremendous changes in it.

Students, parents, educators, administrators, principals, policy makers, education leaders and everyone who is involved in the education system have recognized the need of switching our old education system to the new upgraded version (21^st Century Education). We live in a world which changes rapidly with time to time. In such a fast paced world, our traditional educational methods won’t be effective anymore. For example, students spend so much of their free time on mobile devices such as smartphones, laptops and tablets playing games, using different apps, listening to music, etc. If they’re confined to their seats the whole day listening to the long lectures of educators, they won’t be able to concentrate much, they’ll count time and wait for the bell to ring. This is just a basic example why our old education system fails to engage students in their learning. It’s not the failure of teachers, students or parents; it’s a failure of the education system which is still being continued even if it is out-of-date. Let’s have a look at these statistics:

Take US education as an example, which is in deep trouble:

Student test scores are dismal and dropout rates are astronomical.

In K-12 education, out of 30 developed nations around the world, US ranking is 25 for Math and 21 for Science.

1.2 Million High-Schoolers drop out every year.

What reforms US Schools made to overcome this unrest?

An infographic about how tech (especially Apple Technologies) is helping US Education to grow again. Look at the following improvements that have happened due to introducing technology into education.

Through multimedia learning, including digital platforms: Student interest and retention increases by 25%.

In 2001, Maine passed an initiative to provide free laptops to every 7th grader in the state. By the year 2010, interestingly there is a significant increase in 8th Graders passing Math exams from 50% to 91%.

An Inner-City high school in Euclid, Ohio gave one classroom 24 iPads and tested the students: Results showed are 6% improvement in reading and 8% improvement in writing.

It is now a known fact that technology can enhance the learning when used effectively. In fact, you’re reading this guide means you’re using a technological device to acquire knowledge. Using technology inclassroom and teaching with technology in classroom are two different statements. There is nothingpowerful than the technology in the hands of an efficient teacher who is able to adopt latest practices of teaching. There is no doubt that technology is essential but I’d like to focus on its importance in the vision of 21^stcentury education. Let’s learn about the vision and the role of technology in 21^st Century Education.

21^st Century Education:

The main aim of 21^st Century Schools is to help students become independent learners.

21^st Century Education is an approach of training students for their future professions right from their early schooling days. As we know, many of the top jobs in 2012 such as Social media strategist, User experience specialist, Telework manager, Elder care coordinator, Sustainability manager, etc., hadn’t existed in 2002. Similarly, many of the jobs students will have in the near future don’t even exist yet. They’re about to use technologies that haven’t been invented yet.  

21^st Century Education has realized its responsibility to develop students with not just good grades but also with good technical, collaborative, innovative, creative, leadership, problem solving, etc., skills to become  good employers, entrepreneurs, leaders, innovators, etc., in nearby future. 

It’s not about teaching something to help them learn, it’s about developing them to utilize what they’ve learnt in schooling throughout the life.

In addition to the above mentioned goals, 21^st Century Schools also include a creative curriculum to develop students to have a set of 21^st Century Skills. Let’s learn about how technology enables educators to help students have 21^stcentury skills.

21^st Century Skills and the Role of Technology:

Creativity, Cultural Awareness, Problem solving, Innovation, Civic engagement, Communication, Productivity, Collaboration, Accountability, Exploration, Initiative, Responsibility, Leadership, Critical thinking, etc.,are the set of 21^stcentury skills that our new education system helps students to acquire.

Creativity:

Neuroscience research has proved that all the children are born with innate creative powers and as they grow up some of them keep their creativity active while others unconsciously keep it dormant. Technology enables educators to help students improve their creativity. Social Networks such as Facebook, Twitter, etc., help students to think creatively to write artistic expressions. They also improve students’ social as well as communication skills.

There are thousands of apps and games available on web that improve student creativity. For example,Spy tool is an awesome app to improve creativity in kids. It has several existing functioning tools like disguise kit, identification kit, fingerprint scanner, voice changer, and night vision goggles.

Communication & Collaboration:

Collaboration in education is an approach that involves a group of students learning together or working together to solve a problem, complete a task, or create a product. Technology helps students and educators collaborate globally. It provides them with platforms where they can collaborate from anywhere and anytime, also beyond the classroom. Social Networks, Blogs, Wikis, etc., are great tools to collaborate with students, parents and educators. In addition to the above tools, Skype, Google+ Hangouts, etc., offer video conferencing to make collaborations much effective.

Critical thinking & Problem Solving:

Critical thinking is defined as the thinking employed to form meaningful, unbiased decisions or judgments based on the use of interpretation, analysis, evaluation, inferences, and explanations of information as it relates to the evidence applied to a specific discipline. Critical thinking differs from student to student as they have different interpretations. Problem solving is the ability to find solutions to problems, overcome challenges, complete difficult tasks through techniques, etc. Both critical thinking and problem solving are similar as their design is to approach and tackle different challenges. Technology makes it easy for educators to improve these kinds of skills in students.

For example, Mystery Skype is an educational game, invented by teachers and played by two classrooms on Skype. The aim of the game is to guess the location of the other classroom by asking each other questions. It's suitable for all age groups and can be used to teach subjects like Geography, History, Languages, Mathematics and Science. There is no doubt that this kind of tool increases critical thinking, problem solving and collaborative skills.

Teaching students how to code is a great way to inculcate 21^st century skills in them.

In addition to the above mentioned tools, there are numerous technological approaches to enhance every skill. Every tech tool has its own importance in developing all the 21^st century skills.  We hope this information helped you to know the importance of technology in the vision of 21^stcentury education. I have few questions for you:

What according to you is “A 21^st Century School”?

Do you agree that technology is essential in the vision of “21^st Century Education”? Please feel free to comment your answer with explanation.

The comment box awaits you.

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Michigan Schools Rating System Legislation Ignore's Deepened Understanding & Relevance

Local commentary

Rating system won’t make schools better or solve their problems

By Robert D. Livernois and Michael F. Rice

   Recently, the Michigan Department of Education unveiled a new color-coded scorecard rating system for schools. Like most big and complicated projects, its first moment in the sun was met with some confusion and criticism. Efforts to improve it began immediately and are ongoing.

   But rather than work with MDE and schools to improve the scorecards, some Lansing legislators have chosen to add to the confusion by proposing yet another new rating system. This new system, would have a tortured rating process with separate ratings systems for schools serving grades K-8 and 9-12, with each having a clumsy 800-point scale, a bell curve and letter grades.

   The basic premise of any rating system for schools must be rooted in what parents and community members need to be able to gauge school performance and determine the experiences their children are, or will be, having at a school.

   Parents are our partners in our schools. We speak with parents constantly regarding student achievement, plans to improve, as well as our challenges and successes.

   Neither of us has heard a parent ask for a complicated 800-point scale, bell curves or a success formula centered around a single high-stakes test. In fact, many want less testing.

   Parents across our respective regions want to know that their children are in safe and nurturing environments where they are learning daily. They want to know relevant things about student success in pre-K-12 and postsecondary education.

   They want to know that our districts are financially responsible and have reasonable student-teacher ratios.

   They want experienced and well-qualified teachers to provide student opportunities in pre-kindergarten, math, science, social studies, language arts, the fine and performing arts, athletics and technology.

   Parents want to make sure their sons and daughters are getting a strong education with cultural and global awareness and a readiness to pursue higher education and 21st-Century jobs.

   All of this is routinely reflected in public polling data, which consistently demonstrates that parents largely believe that their children’s schools are doing a good job, despite school funding cuts and constant micromanagement by some legislators.

   If our elected officials really want to do something to improve student achievement, they should stop re-creating rating systems every few months and start addressing the devastating effects of poverty, hunger, homelessness and underfunding on schoolchildren and schools in every corner of the state.

   Robert D. Livernois is president of the Tri-County Alliance for Public Education and superintendent of Warren Consolidated Schools. Michael F. Rice is president of Middle Cities Education Association and superintendent of Kalamazoo Public Schools.

Robert D. Livernois

Michael

   F. Rice

Education Achievement Authority (Update)

Educators urge EMU: Cut ties with state district; teaching concerns cited

By David Jesse Detroit Free Press Education Writer

   Teachers unions and faculty members are applying pressure on Eastern Michigan University, hoping to force it from its role in the statewide Educational Achievement Authority school district, created to take over low-performing schools in the state.

   Several Washtenaw County teachers unions have asked members to stop accepting student teachers from EMU, and the faculty of EMU’s College of Education has sent a letter to the university’s Board of Regents asking it to drop out of the partnership with Detroit Public Schools and State of Michigan.

   On Wednesday, EMU’s full faculty Senate approved a resolution calling for EMU to withdraw from the EAA.

   The faculty and unions are upset with how the EAA staffs its schools. They say that when the EAA takes over, every teacher is fired and then has to reapply.

   The faculty also is upset that EAA schools are run by an appointed board and taken away from local school boards, and, they say, the reform district’s teaching methods are flawed. That all adds up, the EMU faculty says, to harming the university’s reputation.

   “These negative impacts on our reputation, our local relationships, our students and programs, the clear effect on enrollments and thus revenue to the university are a repudiation of EMU’s legacy as a champion of public education and a leader in the preparation of educational professionals,” the letter to the EMU board says. “We implore you to remedy this situation as quickly as possible by unanimously voting to withdraw from the contract creating the EAA.”

   EMU has no plans to drop out, said Leigh Greden, vice president of government and community relations.

   Under the agreement, EMU could withdraw now only if it found another university to take its place. After Dec. 30, 2014, it can withdraw on the next June 30th, as long as it has given at least 180 days notice.

   An EAA spokesman said the initiative is working well.

   How EAA benefits

   The EAA was formed in July 2011. It took control of 15 low-performing Detroit public schools, with the intent to eventually become a statewide district for the state’s lowest performing schools.

   EMU was given two seats on the 11-member board of directors, but College of Education faculty members said they’ve been frozen out since the EAA began, learning only of EMU’s participation when the new school district was announced.

   “We really have nothing to do with the EAA,” said Steve Camron, a special-education professor. “They don’t want anything to do with EMU’s faculty.

   “The EAA went out to a private firm to evaluate special education. They could have gotten that for free from EMU.”

   Camron said EMU professors have had EAA teachers and principals in classes and are trying to help informally. He said the EAA is trying to use EMU’s reputation, but not its resources.

   EAA spokesman Terry Abbott declined to comment on the EMU faculty’s protest but said the district’s “student-centered approach is working.”

   “In its first year of operation, the Education Achievement Authority saw very significant academic improvement throughout its schools,” Abbott said in an e-mail to the Free Press. “Students who had been in failing schools are making strong improvements. That’s what the EAA was created to do, and the effort thus far has been a substantial success.”

   The EAA has operated schools for only one year, so it is too early for MEAP scores to measure its impact. EAA officials measured student progress internally with a test called the Performance Series, a Web-based assessment that is not aligned with the MEAP test but allows teachers to measure student growth.

   Firings and training

   Also trying to push EMU out of the EAA is the Washtenaw County Education Association, which is made up of teachers unions from the Chelsea, Dexter, Lincoln, Manchester, Saline, Whitmore Lake and Ypsilanti school districts.

   The group has advised its teacher members not to take student teachers from EMU this year.

   “EMU is the only public university in partnership with the EAA,” said Tim Heim, a Saline teacher and association president. “The EAA feels school improvement means: ‘Fire all the teachers.’ EMU’s involvement gives us pause.”

   In a letter to teachers this year, Heim said that by firing teachers, EMU and the EAA are saying those teachers are poor teachers, but are then asking some of the same teachers to train EMU students.

   The number of student teachers from EMU who haven’t been able to get into Washtenaw County schools is not known. EMU said the boycott move could hurt its students.

   “This concerns us deeply, as the welfare and career path of our students is our primary concern,” Greden said. “We agree with many in our state and community who do not think it is appropriate for an organization to take actions that could potentially affect the careers of our high-quality teaching students, and the education of young people in our state.”

   Greden said a majority of EMU’s teaching students are from Michigan, and most plan to stay and teach in Michigan.Having a roadblock in their career development, he said, could lead them to look for opportunities outside Michigan.

   Contact David Jesse: 313-222-8851or djesse@freepress.com  .

   Free Press education writer Chastity Pratt Dawsey contributed to this report.

Michigan Teacher Professional Readiness Examination (Update: Test Scores)

State’s would-be teachers’ scores plunge on new test

26% pass rigorous certification exam

By Lori Higgins Detroit Free Press Education Writer

   The pass rates for would-be teachers on the state’s certification exams in math and writing took a nosedive this year after the state replaced its basic skills tests with tougher exams that are harder to pass.

   Just 45% of those who took the math portion of the new Professional Readiness Examination (PRE) passed it. In writing, 31% passed. The overall pass rate was 26%.

   In the 2012-13 school year, pass rates on the older test were 90% and above.

   The scores, released by the Michigan Department of Education, are sobering, illustrating that teacher preparation programs will have some work to do to ensure their students are prepared for a more demanding classroom.

   “We were expecting a more rigorous test but are still surprised,” said Jann Joseph, dean of the College of Education at Eastern Michigan University. “Anytime you change the content of a test, the scores tend to dip right away, but correct themselves over time.”

   The pass rates can’t be directly compared with last year because the tests are completely different. For in- stance, the math test changed from just covering fundamental math, algebra, operations, geometry and reasoning to also include trigonometry, probability and statistics, Joseph said.

   Also, the results compare pass rates for 615 students who took the PRE Oct. 5 against pass rates for 6,450 who took the basic skills test during the 2012-13 school year.

   But the fact that so few students passed the new test is a concern. State law requires students to pass the PRE beforethey can do their student teaching. Some colleges still allow students to complete their student-teaching without passing the exams; however, no one can be certified without passing them .

   The exams are part of the Michigan Test for Teacher Certification, which also includes tests in teaching specialties. Those tests also have been made more rigorous.

   The drop in scores mirrors what happened when the state made it tougher to pass state exams students must take in grades 3-8. Since then, far fewer students have passed them.

   The impact for teachers is unclear, however, given this was the first group of students to take the exam. Teacher preparation programs in Michigan typically produce far more teacher candidates than there are jobs in Michigan, prompting many to seek employment outside the state and leading the State Board of Education to issue a moratorium on allowing new preparation programs to operate.

   The board will discuss the results during its monthly meeting Tuesday.

   State officials said the test was toughened as part of a push for more effective teachers.

   “We want the best and brightest teachers in Michigan classrooms,” State Superintendent Mike Flanagan said in a news release.

   Susan Dalebout, assistant dean for student affairs at the College of Education at Michigan State University, said she applauds the increased rigor. There, unlike at most institutions, students must pass the PRE before they can be admitted to the program.

   “I would be sad to see a student who wanted to be a teacher turned away. On the other hand, I really think that we have — and the public has — every right to expect that teachers will be very well trained, and have deep subject matter preparation, and I think this is the move in the right direction,” Dalebout said.

   Deborah Ball, the dean of the College of Education at the University of Michigan, said that while it is important to tighten up the requirements to teach children, she said the devil is in the details. Just being rigorous isn’t enough.

   “There has to be rigor around the academic content they actually have to explain to children.”

   Ball said that there also has to be focus on ensuring would-be teachers are competent in the practice of teaching, meaning they can’t just know the subject matter but know how to teach.

Global Economy: Chinese Service Sector (Update: Gaining STEAM!)

Service Sector Gaining Steam in Chinese Economy

By BETTINA WASSENER

Published: November 10, 2013

HONG KONG — China, long the world’s factory, is becoming more service-oriented.

Sports apparel retailers like Li Ning, Anta Sports Products and 361 Degrees International have thousands of stores around the country. The Alibaba Group, founded in 1999, has swelled into an e-commerce giant, with more than 20,000 employees and sales of $1.7 billion in the second quarter of this year. And Tencent, which runs Web portals and chat services, has a market value of nearly $100 billion.

This is China’s economy growing up, maturing into a state where services play an increasing role as the population grows richer. China’s services sector has been growing steadily, and nonmanufacturing activity now accounts for about as large a percentage of the economy as the manufacturing sector – about 45 percent. (The remainder is agriculture.)

The development is being encouraged by the policy makers who are gathering in Beijing this week for a four-day meeting on how to overhaul China’s economy. Their goal is to reduce the dominance of heavy industry, manufacturing and investment in infrastructure, which for decades were the driving forces of China’s sizzling growth.

They have aimed to diversify the economy and foster more productive growth by raising the share of activity generated by the service sector, which spans areas as diverse as logistics, tourism, engineering, health care and information technology.

“The direction is pretty clear,” said Jian Chang, the China economist at the British bank Barclays. “They want to invigorate the service sector, which they see as a key source of future growth.”

China’s service sector is still small, in percentage terms, compared with those of Britain and the United States, where a vast array of services makes up almost 80 percent of the economy. But the sector has about doubled its share of the Chinese economy since 1980, according to the World Bank.

“The rebalancing of the economy,” Ms. Chang said, “is already underway.”

The swing has been driven largely by three decades of rapid economic growth that have left many of China’s 1.3 billion inhabitants able to spend more money well beyond necessities. Much of this extra spending power has gone into cars and refrigerators. But it has also fanned demand for movies, better health care, meals at fast-food restaurants, education and tutoring.

“Manufacturing will remain a key pillar of the economy, but at the margin, future growth will come from the services industry,” said Wang Tao, the economist for China at UBS. “As people get richer, they want more quality of life.”

More recently, the economic turmoil in the West has accentuated the shift by undermining demand for the toys, shoes, machinery and other goods that are churned out by the country’s export-dependent manufacturing sector. At the same time, the new leadership’s eagerness to rein in the excess capacities that plague parts of the Chinese economy has hit sectors like steel making.

Business surveys produced by the national statistics bureau have highlighted this divergence in recent months. While the index measuring activity in the manufacturing sector has been languishing for the past year, the nonmanufacturing index has held up relatively well.

The October reading, released this month, came in at 56.3. A reading above 50 signals expansion.

One of the biggest beneficiaries of this spending power is the tourism sector, which has exploded as China’s middle class has embraced domestic and foreign travel. Visitor numbers at the Great Wall, the karst mountains around Guilin and the seaside resorts of the island of Hainan have soared in recent years, as have the flights, hotels and bars that cater to travelers.

Air China, one of the country’s largest airlines, now carries more than twice as many passengers per month than it did five years ago.

Other areas have also grown.

International Sunshine Home, a day care center for children, which opened in the southeastern city of Xiamen in 2010, recently opened a second branch and is aiming to add one new branch a year over the next few years.

“The education sector is fairly recession-resistant,” said David Powell, principal of the daycare center. “Our customers think of education as an essential service.”

The flurry of activity is positive, not just from the point of view of rebalancing the economy, but also from the perspective of job creation, economists say.

Already, service sector companies employ more people in China than manufacturers. And the jobs generated by logistics centers, hotels, software companies and airlines tend to be not just numerous but also generally more suited to the millions who graduate from high schools and universities every year and who are reluctant to take jobs on factory assembly lines.

What is unclear, analysts say, is how fast the growth of the services sector will continue to be.

JOBS (Update: Knowledge-Based Economic Sector @The Shape of Things to Come)

State needs knowledge based jobs

Study says that will help improve Mich. economy

By John Gallagher Detroit Free Press Business Writer

   Michigan needs to shift its economy more toward the high-paying knowledge-based services if it hopes to improve its long-term economy, a new study has said.

   The nonprofit Michigan Future has published its latest report by the think tank’s president Lou Glazer and University of Michigan economic researcher Don Grimes of U-M’s Institute for Research on Labor, Employment and the Economy.

   The report, “The New Path to Prosperity,” compares economic data from 1990 and 2011 in Michigan, Minnesota, and the U.S. in general. Its conclusions: Knowledge-based industries such as science, technology, engineering and other backgrounds will produce more prosperity in years to come than traditional manufacturing.

   “What we are confident of is that, primarily due to the ongoing force of globalization and technology, the American economy will become more and more service, rather than goods-producing, based,” the authors wrote. “And in that economy, knowledge-based services are almost certain to be where job growth is the strongest and average wages are the highest.”

   Throughout the U.S., the manufacturing sector shed more than 5.7 million jobs between 1990 and 2011, while knowledge-based services gained more than 16 million jobs during that same period, the report said.

   In the same way, private sector earnings per capita declined during that same period while employment earnings per capita in knowledge-based service grew by 52%.

   Comparing the economies of manufacturing-based Michigan and knowledge-based Minnesota, the report noted that “Minnesota far outperformed Michigan in growth in employment, personal income and private sector employment earnings per capita over the two decades.”

   Among specific statistics: From 1990-2011, employment grew in Minnesota by 29% compared with 7% in Michigan. Also, per capita income adjusted for inflation grew by $11,300 in Minnesota over the two decades compared to growth of $4,712 in Michigan.

   “Knowledge-based services now are the center of mass middle-class American jobs,” the authors wrote. “The lesson Michigan needs to learn is also clear: The places that are doing best today and almost certainly will do the best in the future are those states and regions that are concentrated in knowledge-based services, not factories or any other sectors of the economy.”

   Contact John Gallagher: 313-222-5173 or gallagher@freepress.com  .