Improving education ultimately comes down to supporting our teachers and helping them develop and expand their methods of teaching as the world evolves and the demands of educating our youth change. To me, this means giving teachers the fundamental building blocks and tools to prepare students for the 21st century. Yet, what are those fundamental building blocks? What’s the pedagogy of the future? How does the way students learn today affect the way we need to teach today and tomorrow? These are the questions that are floating around in my head after I watched a compelling video on YouTube titled “21st Century Pedagogy” by Greg Whitby, the Executive Director of Schools at the Catholic Diocese of Parramatta.1 Let’s explore these ideas further.
Spending the 21st Century Perfecting the 19th Century Model
As Whitby describes, we have a curriculum structure that comes from the industrial age, the 19th century. This 19th century teaching model, also known as the factory-model, refers to the scientific management of people and knowledge. In this model, teachers lead the course and teach to a curriculum primarily focused on disseminating information to students. The factory-model is textbook-driven and teacher-centered. It’s the idea that educational institutions work like factories to produce educated individuals by the end of 12 years.
Moving away from the 19th century model, 21stcenturyschools.com extensively outlines education for the 21st century by first redefining the meaning of knowledge and what it means to be an educated person. In this paradigm shift, classrooms will become student-centered with an emphasis on active, research-based learning with a global and high-tech perspective.2
Defining the Fundamental Mismatch
Whitby says the DNA of teachers is over a century old and doesn’t connect with the way students interact with the surrounding world today. Teachers today are often still taught to operate based on the 19th century model where teachers disseminate information to students, students memorize for testing and every student learns the same material despite their interests. Yet, students today are in a digital age where the environment and the way they look at the world is dramatically different. This, as Whitby says, is the fundamental mismatch. I would also say that the industrial age model no longer produces “educated” students that meet the needs of society either today or tomorrow.
So, rather than basing education on the needs of the industrial age, education can develop individuals that contribute to our high-tech, global society. Rather than simply mastering reading, writing and arithmetic, students of today need multiple literacies in critical thinking, ethics, service to others, communication, collaboration and more to be contributing professionals and thoughtful, responsible members of society. Teaching these skills is one way we can connect teaching methods to students’ learning needs and make education more relatable to students today.
Changing the Pedagogy for the Future
Making this shift from the 19th century model to the 21st century begins with teachers. As Whitby says in his blog post titled “Pedagogical sentiment,” every teacher has a pedagogical sentiment, which he or she instills in students.3 He argues that we need to change the pedagogy of teaching to what he calls “DNA for the 21st Century.” He argues that learning and teaching must meet or mirror the complex ways we interact in the world. I think this is supported in the 21st century model outlined by 21stcenturyschools.com. So I ask, how are you building the DNA of teaching for the 21st century?
Check out Greg Whitby’s blog called “bluyonder.” Thanks for stopping by!
Mona Westhaver
President and Co-founder, Inspiration Software
- “YouTube – 21st Century Pedagogy.” YouTube – Broadcast Yourself. Web. 11 Apr. 2011. <http://youtu.be/l72UFXqa8ZU>. [↩]
- “What Is 21st Century Education.” 21st Century Schools. Web. 11 Apr. 2011. <http://www.21stcenturyschools.com/What_is_21st_Century_Education.htm>. [↩]
- Whitby, By Greg. “Pedagogical Sentiment.” Bluyonder. Web. 11 Apr. 2011. <http://bluyonder.wordpress.com/2007/10/04/pedagogical-sentiment/>. [↩]
