The Education of the 21st Century: 5 Things that have changed

21^st  century is here, and a lot has changed! A lot has dramatically changed from the way things used to work. Expectedly, education is the worst hit.

But the danger here is that many educators are still far from realizing this ultimate fact.

In this post, I show you five things that have changed about the education of the 21^st century, hoping teachers will be challenged enough to rise to live up to their billing.

Watch this demonstration video:

Video Guide by: RENTOWN.NET

What has changed?

#1. Our tutees

The 21^st century learners are of digital native. They are not the regular learners of the past centuries. 

Here are unique characteristics of 21^st century tutees:

• Children born at the time of web revolution
• Mobile device is their toy
• Children born at the time of instant text messaging
• Fascination for new technologies
• They are living out the multiple intelligence theory
• They possess independent mind
• Ctrl+Alt+Del is as basic as ABC
• Busy with extracurricular activities

The 21st century children are always in tune with trending news. Some of them seem to be ahead of their teachers when it comes to exploring the world around them. Hence, teaching such bunch of digital-minded kids demands a change of guard.

The question here is: what should be our target (primary goal) in our teaching and learning process?

#2. Our target

To be at the same page with the current realities, our primary goal in teaching must definitely change.

-        We prepare the children for the future as against preparing them for exams

-        We teach to develop lifetime skills as against developing static mastery of subject

-        We teach to produce independent, critical minds as against dummy followers

-        We prepare them for global awareness as against local content digestion

-        We teach to inculcate digital literacy as against conventional subject mastery

#3. Our techniques

As our target changes, so must our techniques and style of teaching.

• §  Learner-centred as against teacher-centred
• §  Collaborative instruction as against direct instruction
• §  Practical as against theory
• §  Process as against content
• §  Formative evaluation as against summative assessment
• §  Broad-based and distant learning environment as against the conventional classroom structure

Teachers who fail to employ these techniques are merely running against the tide. They do so much and see little or no result. And they wonder why…

This is 21^st century; get your techniques well and win over your learners.

#4. Our tools

Much cannot be done in this century when we are still employing all those outdated tools in our teaching and learning processes.

21^st century education is one solely driven by technology. Tech educational tools must be employed if we must get it right.

Our learners must not only be taught with digital tools, they must also be taught to use them in their classroom engagement. Think of the following:

·       Web pages

·       Video creation

·       Animations

·       Graphics

·       Chatting tools

·       Video-conferencing etc

#5. Our tutors

The question is here for us to answer: in the face of this paradigm shift from the conventional education to the current technology-driven model, what should qualify the teachers of the 21^st century?

The 21^st century educator must be tech savvy. Simply put, he/she must be a digital literate.

To understand the full components of digital literacy, read this post.

In the next couple of years, teachers who are tech novice would be out of job.

Today’s education faces irrelevance unless we bridge the gap between how students live and how they learn.

Moreover, we should be concerned about the future of our today’s learners- a completely digitized future. Schools and teachers who have refused to embrace this necessary change, are at best, extorting from the parents, while rendering the children ‘useless’.

And we can’t afford to do that.

Recommended posts:

Preparing the next generation of Africa through digital literacy integration

The Basic Digital Tools for E-learning Takeoff in African Schools