By: The Common Core Team
Are abilities like creativity, collaboration, communication, problem solving, and critical thinking unique to the 21st century workforce, or are they skills that have always been defining characteristics of well-educated citizens and successful employees?
Recently, The Partnership for 21st Century Skills was formed to develop a “unified, collective vision for 21st century learning that can be used to strengthen American education.” Fair enough, but as the “P21 framework” is slowly rolling out in seven states, we fear that the states might be riding a dangerous pendulum swing back to an embrace of amorphous skills at the expense of real content.
In its September, 2008 report the partnership insists that:
Our ability to compete as a nation-and for states, regions and communities to attract growth industries and create jobs-demands a fresh approach to public education. We need to recognize that a 21st century education is the bedrock of competitiveness-the engine, not simply an input, of the economy.
And we need to act accordingly: Every aspect of our education system-pre K-12, postsecondary and adult education, after-school and youth development, workforce development and training, and teacher preparation programs-must be aligned to prepare citizens with the 21st century skills they need to compete.
Preparing students to compete in increasingly sophisticated workplaces is a laudable goal, but is “work-readiness” the sole purpose of education? Does it really make sense to create “life skills” standards and require that they be taught and assessed as part of the academic curriculum in schools? Or “employability” standards, as Iowa has done that include standards on information processing; goal setting; understanding organizational models; and use of self-management, leadership, and entrepreneurial skills? Presently, there are eight other states developing 21st century skills standards and assessments: Kansas, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey, North Carolina, South Dakota, West Virginia, and Wisconsin.
In October, Michael Lind of the New America Foundation joined Common Core co-chair, Diane Ravitch, at the Grantmakers for Education (GFE) conference where they discussed their concern about the diminished emphasis on liberal arts education in U.S. elementary and secondary schools. Ravitch cautioned against business-driven education reform and lamented the growth of curricula that are exclusively pre-professional. Lind pointed out that creativity and innovation have always set the U.S. apart and that the U.S. still ranks first in the world for patent filings. “While we want to be globally competitive,” he said, “We do not want to be “globally identical.” An audience member said that “the whole GFE conference program” was about work-readiness, and Lind suggested that perhaps the U.S. is due for a re-assessment of the purpose of education.
We think that skills such as creativity, communication, critical thinking, and others should not be in competition with content; instead they should be integrated into a comprehensive, rigorous curriculum. After all students who can speak a foreign language, who can read Dostoyevsky, who know calculus, and who understand the periodic table of elements are also going to be able to process information, set goals, and think critically.
As a young engineer out of CMU working at the world’s most complex engineering project, I quickly found that school and life had not given me the skills I needed on the collaboration and communication fronts. True, I was a more prepared writer than my fellow graduates–mostly thanks to lots of time for reading growing up in Appalachia. Yet, for a long time after graduation, I agreed that schools, churches, and other organizations were failing young people when it came to ensuring “people skills”, goal setting, and “self help”.
That was a different time.
Since then, the sixties generation has run the schools and self esteem and self empowerment have ruled in most districts. Today’s youth are extremely confident, self-assured, and yet aware of all the buzzwords for collaborative work and openness. They are also certainly masters of critical something.
What they are not given so much of is something like soul. Christina Hoff-Summers wrote of this years back; she wrote that in many ways her students are so much nicer than their parents generation. Many of us would agree. Yet, she suggested, the youth are “morally clueless”. The “its whatever each person feels is right” mentality goes much to far with them.
In the Wall Street Journal this week, Harry Markowitz, the father of Portfolio theory, explains how financial engineers ignored both his well crafted theory and the age old common sense wisdom: ‘don’t put all your eggs in one basket’. Should every college grad know portfolio theory? In simple terms, yes. Yet it shouldn’t take Mr. Markowitz’ math to realize that $800 shares of Google stock and $150 barrels of oil were out of the realm of reality, not to mention mortgages with “no money down.” Some things just make sense if you have a well balanced framework running between your ears.
For those who don’t know the stats, US engineering and science graduates are steadily falling in number. Meanwhile, Indian and Chinese grads, as well as non-native grads here in the US, are rising exponentially. This can’t bode well for our economic and material future.
Not unless we buckle down and master more of the hard stuff.
Mike Petrelli in Sept. made a great observation about the extracurricular activities American students enjoy. They are, he said, the stuff of leadership and creativity and teamwork. Indeed. And they can free up the school day for the important stuff – geometry, protein awareness, the precursor studies to understanding nanotechnology and dynamic systems modeling.
We need all these things, and Michelangelo too. We need more efficient learning.
One of the recurring themes on the 21st century skills paper is that information tech jobs are the future. Are they? Or are these writers fighting the last war? Info tech is nearly free and ubiquitous.
What we do not have is bridges sufficiently maintained to carry us into the coming decades. We do not have a road and highway system that makes sense into the future. We lack an Army big enough to secure us, or partners with the moral fortitude and economic strength to join with us in Afghanistan and the troublesome places of Africa and the world. We don’t do enough for our brothers about malaria and the much too common practices of genocide.
We do not have enough of the engineers spirit and the Catechism of the Catholic church.
We need less stars in LA, and more masons in Pittsburgh.
Recently, Oprah picked The Pillars of the Earth as a book club selection. I was shocked; I hate her picks, yet this was an old favorite. Maybe she is on to something.
Maybe I’ll see you in DC Monday.
The Partnership for 21st Century Skills agrees that critical thinking, problem solving, communication, collaboration and the “soft SCANS” skills have been present for some time, especially in well-educated citizens and successful workers. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean that obtaining these skills was a requirement for all students. Rather attaining this kind of success was reserved for gifted students, while, at the same time, gifted students weren’t required to look at the inherently important life and career skills (SCANS) that currently all students need. Today, quite simply, it must be the education system’s goal that all students possess a full range of skills if they are to succeed.
In addition, the Partnership for 21st Century Skills does not see 21st century skills and core competencies in a competition. Rather, we advocate for the integration of 21st century skills into core subjects, like social studies, English Language Arts, math, etc.
In fact, we have worked with the content groups to create 21st Century Skills and core subject maps. In conjunction with the National Council for the Social Studies we released the 21st Century Skills and Social Studies Map, which provides educators with teacher-created models of how 21st century skills can be infused into daily practice and highlights the critical connections between social studies and 21st century skills. It is available on our Web site. We plan on releasing the English Language Arts Map, in collaboration with the National Council of Teachers of English, this month and geography, math and science maps in 2009.
Also, it is not quite true that simply understanding the periodic table of elements means someone can process information, set goals and critically think. Those skills need to be the intentional and purposeful goals of education as well as the mastery of the periodic table and memorization of important facts.
This may sound like a dumb question, but is it even possible to teach critical thinking skills? It seems to me they’re built in.
Doesn’t critical thinking happen, almost automatically, when the mind has lots of relevant facts at its fingertips (so to speak)? Of course a nudge from the teacher could help, but is that truly “teaching critical thinking skills”?
It seems to me the most fruitful thing a teacher could do to promote critical thinking is to furnish young minds with the rich matter WITH WHICH to think critically.
Ben, Ben, Ben. What are you saying?! You don’t love the children.
Actually, I have long said much of the same thing. I’ve heard too many educators say that we live in a post-factual world, that facts can be learned from the internet on a just-in-time basis, but critical thinking skills cannot. To which I reply that much of my best thinking comes from assembling (previously collected ) facts whilst driving, mowing, cleaning, walking.
That said, I have come recently to understand something of the other side’s beef. As an engineer/MBA, I have taken too much for granted the problem solving portions of my education. We solved problems all the time. We had to-or get tossed.
Many grads are no where near so lucky.
I still disagree with much of what is proposed as “critical thinking” skills, tools, and exercises. Yet I also realize that math and science have their limitations when it comes to giving young minds confidence.
What I am now thinking about is a huge expansion in the use of the “Case Method” of education. As you may know, this is associated with the Harvard Business School, and has long been a major part of many B-school experiences.
The Case Method should probably be a much larger portion of every undergrad’s regimen. Problem solving, to include looking at economic, financial, thermodynamic, and other issues could be common in the colleges of liberal arts and education.
Don’t entirely know how this should then push down into the K-12 curriculum. I still vociferously support memorization in the grade 2-9 area. Multiplication, poetry, speeches, countries of the world. These are all things to bear permanently in mind.
Yet this problem might solve itself if the majority of a teacher’s education used rigorous cases. These teachers would then be so used to the process that they would automatically fit it in as needed with their students.
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