21st Century Skills: What the Hell Does that Mean Anyway?

There's nothing I love more than a good debate - healthy debate, with every point up for discussion and emotions taking a back seat to thoughtful commentary.

I guess that's why I keep going back to the local Mid-Riffs blog. I don't always agree, but I always enjoy it. Last week, they criticized the "21st century skills," or 21c, movement in education reform.

If you've been paying attention, 21c learning is the bread-and-butter of the Fayetteville School District's efforts to build a new campus, and the comments at Mid-Riffs couldn't be a better discussion (*cough* unless some members from the district joined in).

Here are some key excerpts from their post and comments, but you should really head over to their blog if you want to join the conversation.

“Thinking that these skills are ‘new’ rather than thinking that they are simply ‘more necessary’ leads to different remedies.” That’s some crucial advice for districts that currently have the adoption of 21st century skills on their agendas. You can find the full text of Rotherham’s comments here.

Diane Ravitch’s take on the topic is especially scathing, especially when she notes that the movement has the potential to be a cash-cow for peddlers of products marketed to enhance 21st Century learning:

The notion of “21st century skills” is a fiction. There are no such skills. Every single skill listed as a “21st century skill” has been in demand long before the 21st century, in some cases for many centuries.  Most of what is now proposed–whether critical thinking skills or working in groups–has been an integral part of the progressive education movement since the early years of the twentieth century. Anyone knowledgeable about the history of American education would recognize most of these skills as another manifestation of progressivism (see Lawrence Cremin’s The Transformation of the Schools or my own Left Back: A Century of Battles Over School Reform). In reality, the so-called 21st century skills are no more than an echo of the ideas that have dominated our colleges of education since the early twentieth century.

Of course, I disagree. It seems to me  that Ravitch's take is basically a complaint about branding and amounts to little more than an academic squabble.

Here is the latest comment I left:

@Stuart – You’re right that critical thinking requires deep knowledge, but deep knowledge doesn’t imply critical thinking. That’s like saying teaching deep grammar makes kids into great writers. It takes more than that.

And affluent kids are VERY exposed to tech tools, but poor kids aren’t. That’s why they need more of a place in the classroom, because right now, gaining technological skills is often the product of your economic situation. The achievement gap hurts all of us.

@BKisida – That’s fair. Let me re-characterize what I meant.

They aren’t new, they’re just underused.

Let me tell you where I’m coming from. I started out in a typical school system. Rural and small, but not too poor. I was taught 5-paragraph essays, formulaic Algebra, and textbook history.

Then, I went to the Arkansas School for Math and Science. I chose my projects. I learned proof-based math, I learned how to write real essays and how to use the scientific method to design experiments. In other words, I learned how to do more than follow instructions and run the formulas.

I have friends starting college now, learning 5-paragraph essays for the second time because their high schools never taught them how to analyze a concept and synthesize their thoughts. They were only taught formulas and facts.

The whole 21c argument comes down to this: is it more important to teach students how to find their own facts, or spend our time teaching the facts themselves? It’s not a black-and-white answer, but it’s clear that there needs to be more of the former. My main beef with your point, Stuart, is that you’re basically saying students don’t need guidance to use tech tools effectively.

To which I answer, “C U l8ter boi.”

And I'd like to invite you to participate in a thought experiment. Imagine it's the year 2050, what kind of jobs are people looking for? What should be on your resume in 2050 to get a good job?

If you have as hard of a time answering this question as I do, then maybe you think our schools should teach kids how to find their own facts, examine them, and think about them critically, rather than focusing on teaching our kids the facts themselves. Both are necessary, but only one is neglected.