There are lots of motivating videos about 21st Century Learning, such as “Engage Me.”  There are certainly more flashy ones, but I like this one because it features elementary-aged students.

I am now on a quest to discover the answer to my question.  My first step is to think about some key ingredients in a  21st Century Learning environment.  Here are 5 that I’ve adopted so far.

1) NETS: All curriculum should be framed by the National Educational Technology Standards.  The 6 strands are: Creativity and Innovation; Communication and Collaboration; Research and Information Literacy; Critical Thinking, Problem Solving, and Decision Making; Digital Citizenship; and Technology Operations and Concepts.  All content areas should be taught within the context of these standards.  The NETS-S 2007 Implementation Wiki contains some great resources for the application of these standards.

2) Student-centered learning: Teachers need to gain a new vision of their role in the classroom as they shift their focus from “teaching” to becoming  “facilitators of learning.”  Students need to take greater responsibility for their learning and become more self-directed.  This will only happen as they have greater freedom to make choices within their learning environment.

3) Differentiation: This is really just an extension of student-centered learning.  We have long known that students learn at different rates in different ways.  The use of technology tools is a fabulous way to provide differentiation.  Tracey Hall’s research about Differentiated Instruction provides a very informative overview, including a diagram of the learning/planning cycle.

4) Problem-based learning: In this type of learning, students explore possible solutions to “real” problems and work collaboratively to determine the best solution.  Through this process students learn “how to learn” by focusing on authentic issues.  This approach is very student-centered and open-ended.  IMSA’s PBLNetwork is a fabulous resource.

5) Online collaboration: To establish a 21st Century learning model, it’s important to base it on the foundational understanding that classrooms today are not contained within 4 walls or even within a single building.  Today our classroom is the entire world, and we can learn from and with people around the globe.  Cultivating collaborative partners from various corners of the world will broaden our educational resources and will help our students learn what it means to be a global citizen.

I’m still searching for a road map! Obviously Alan November has done ground-breaking work in this area, but his resources are all commercial products.  By far the best “grass roots” resource that I have seen is Kim Cofino’s work at the International School Bangkok.  The ISB 21st Century Literacy wiki sets forth a clear vision of the 21st Century Learner and a framework for planning instruction.  An ability to translate theory into practice is crucial!  I hope that as my district moves further into this ambitious technology roll-out plan, that our leaders will develop a similar framework that will provide structure and guidance in empowering our teachers to make the pedagogical shift necessary to prepare our students for the unknown world that awaits them.  These are exciting times to be an educator!

9 Reasons to Twitter in Schools (Tech & Learning)

Tech Crunch: Impact of Twitter on the world

Times article: Great Britain considers Twitter for the  primary curriculum

Twitter as a District Communication Tool: School district in New Zealand uses Twitter to disseminate information to parents, students, and staff (Chris Dawson)

Teaching with Twitter: 10 great instructional ideas for the classroom from Steve Wheeler

Best Practices in a Twitter-enhanced High School Classroom: Practical explanation of how to manage Twitter use in a classroom along with ideas for using Twitter as an instructional tool from Teaching Paperless.

Can We Use Twitter for Educational Activites?: Presentation by Gabriella Grosseck and Carmen Holotescu

A Twitter Code of Conduct: An article from BusinessWeek about Twitter’s impact on the business world

My own 2 blog posts about Twitter:

Changing the World, Can Twitter Change Education?

Twittering Teachers and PLN

Here’s a link to all of my DIIgo bookmarks about Twitter.  The list includes Twitter apps, news articles about Twitter, lists of Twittering teachers, and Twitter in education.  This doesn’t even scratch the surface!

Worldwide visitors to Twitter.com increased 95 percent in the month of March from 9.8 million to 19.1 million.

Businesses use Twitter as a source for free advertising.  Politicians use Twitter for campaigning.  Celebrities use Twitter to increase their celebrity status. (Can anyone explain why Oprah felt a need for this?)  Twitter is having such an impact on the corporate world that according to  BusinessWeek,  some companies are developing social media codes of conduct for employees:

To prevent sensitive information leaks, blemishes on a reputation, and other potential liabilities of a Twittering workforce, companies are drafting new employee codes of conduct and educating workers about what they should and shouldn’t say on the site. The basic rule: Don’t be stupid.

Why is Twitter taking the world by storm?  Clive Thompson sums it up:

Individually, most Twitter messages are stupefyingly trivial. But the true value of Twitter … is cumulative. The power is in the surprising effects that come from receiving thousands of pings from your posse. And this, as it turns out, suggests where the Web is heading.

So why has Twitter been so misunderstood? Because it’s experiential. Scrolling through random Twitter messages can’t explain the appeal. You have to do it — and, more important, do it with friends… It’s practically collectivist — you’re creating a shared understanding larger than yourself.

I love the phrase, “creating a shared understanding larger than yourself.” I have been Twittering for about a year and a half, and I only follow educators.  My primary purpose is personal professional learning.  Twitter is my best source for professional development.  I’ve been slow and selective about choosing people to follow, but I have developed a wonderful network of like-minded professionals around the world.  As I interact with these people in ongoing short phrases, we have a shared understanding of what it means to be passionate about the role of technology in education.  We share great ideas, our successes, our frustrations, and things we’ve learned in the midst of the sprinkled tidbits of our personal lives.  Teacher collaboration has been identified as a key factor in raising student achievement, and through social networking tools like Twitter, I can collaborate and learn from the best around the world.

So my question is this: since Twitter is such a powerful learning tool, how do we go about harnessing that collective learning energy for use in schools? Great Britain is considering recommendations for updating the primary curriculum,  suggesting that children should be familiar with blogging, podcasts, Wikipedia and Twitter by the time they go to secondary school.  They may consider dropping traditional content in favor of emphasizing informational technology, according to the Times.  Although my district is very proactive in the area of providing technology equipment for schools, it still has a very conservative stance on blocking many useful social networking tools like Twitter that enhance learning.

Imagine a classroom where differentiated instruction results in students using MP3 players, cell phones, laptops, and gaming devices to pursue individual learning goals.  They interact with students around the world via Twitter, Ning, or other social networking vehicles to ask questions, collaborate, share resources, and share learning in real time.  Immediate response, immediate feedback, immediate dialogue about learning.  Twitter is changing the way the world communicates.  Why should our students be the last to benefit?

A third grade student in another class made an awesome connection this week as well. When I use my iPod to record student podcasts, I explain to them that if they goof up, I can use Audacity to edit the recording and remove the boo-boos. That seems to relieve their nervousness about speaking into the microphone. After a recording session with me, a girl went back into her class and told her teacher that I could edit their recordings just like they edit their written work. Connections between old ways and new ways… change will happen! I hope that I’ll continue to be an agent for change in both thinking and learning…one teacher, one student at a time!