THINK DIFFERENT
About the Workplace of the Future by Mike King
To secure the workplace of the future, young people will need the skills and knowledge base associated with Web 2.0 shared canvases, where every splash of painted knowledge provides a richer tapestry of in-depth understandings of the world in which they live. To succeed in education reform schools must be broadly driven by forward-thinking educational technology minded visionaries. These visionaries must articulate clear and compelling vision that articulate the optimal characteristics that encourage technology-supported education reform that focuses on preparing students to live, learn, and work in the 21st century.
It is true that making this paradigm shift from the industrial age to the information age during a time of uncertainty finds many a scholar not sure just how Literacy 2.0 learning will serve in the improvement of national education. For more than two centuries, schools have used printed paper materials, such as textbooks, to educate students. With the development of Web 2.0 software applicationsparticip atory learning resources are reaching a limitless realm. Schools that are not presently tapping into these resources soon will find themselves left behind in their quest to improve the learning curve. This is not to say that Literacy 2.0 technology, alone, will educate today’s students. Technology is the tape measure in the toolbox that teachers can use to extend student learning opportunities. In order for schools to reach their vision for implementing school-based technology learning programs schools must be empowered to draw the pathways to get from the present to the future.
It is true that making this paradigm shift from the industrial age to the information age during a time of uncertainty finds many a scholar not sure just how Literacy 2.0 learning will serve in the improvement of national education. For more than two centuries, schools have used printed paper materials, such as textbooks, to educate students. With the development of Web 2.0 software applicationsparticip atory learning resources are reaching a limitless realm. Schools that are not presently tapping into these resources soon will find themselves left behind in their quest to improve the learning curve. This is not to say that Literacy 2.0 technology, alone, will educate today’s students. Technology is the tape measure in the toolbox that teachers can use to extend student learning opportunities. In order for schools to reach their vision for implementing school-based technology learning programs schools must be empowered to draw the pathways to get from the present to the future.
Literacy 2.0 Articulating the Future
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To succeed in Literacy 2.0 reform, schools must be driven by forward-thinking, technology-attuned visionaries who can articulate the optimal characteristics needed for technology-supported education reform. Focused on preparing students to live, learn, and work in the 21st Century, the visionaries of Literacy 2.0 learning must cultivate enriched technological environments for learning, where teachers give students multiple opportunities to work together, to establish the confidence, support, and trust needed for desired change.
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Developing a Collective Vision
Since most of today's students can appropriately be labeled as "Digital Learners", why do so many teachers refuse to enter the digital age with their teaching practices? This presentation was created in an effort to motivate teachers to more effectively use technology in their teaching.
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A Literacy 2.0 school cannot exist without a shared vision, a focus on and the commitment to the same vision and goals that the educators themselves helped develop, they must share a voice in and truly want to achieve the outcome.. The forces protecting the status quo can, and usually do overwhelm the forces supporting meaningful change. With a shared vision, the educators are more likely to expose their accustomed ways of thinking and redefine them in cooperative and constructive terms, thereby identifying personal and organizational short¬comings. Therefore, developing a collective vision of the future for the Literacy 2.0 school must be the first strategy of the educators to ensure a systematic design for a successful paradigm shift into the future.
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At its simplest level, a shared vision is the answer to the question, "What do we want to create?" and when that question is answered by the educators , a sense of community will permeate the school giving purpose and meaning to diverse activities. Establishing a shared vision is vital for the Literacy 2.0 School because it provides the focus and energy for learning. However, educational visionaries must first understand the strategies involved in enabling stakeholders to gain confidence in the technological advances of virtual learning. To meet the challenge of mandated education reform issues, schools will need to realign their present visions by establishing new priorities linked to the new 21st Century standards. This does not mean that schools must change their beliefs; instead, they must examine how their present beliefs support the challenges of required change. If a school wants to be a Literacy 2.0 school, then school personnel must engage in strategic exploration so that educators will be able to provide the opportunity to formulate a common vision for the future, this vision becoming the guide for their journey. Schools of the future will need to explore and redefine the change process needed to construct well designed digital lessons for collaborative learning as they explore the five essential elements of developing right brain activities through;
- the design of digital lessons,
- allowing students to use technology to create digital stories,
- provide time for students to synthesize concepts by comparing strands of ideas and to create new elements of thought,
- provide meaning to educational opportunities by allowing students to learn collaboratively and
- help students understand the importance of ethics and digital citizenship when learning in a literacy 2.0 environment.
When students posses these five essential elements they have a greater chance for survival, security, belonging, ego, and the driving spirit necessary to be competitive in their future world, "The Conceptual Age." According to Pink, “Artists, inventors, designers, storytellers, caregivers, consolers, big-picture thinkers – will reap society’s richest rewards and share its greatest joys”. 3
Expanding the Quality of Education
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The primary focus for educators should be on expanding the quantity and quality of ways in which the learner is exposed to content and context. Educators should design extended learning opportunities in ways that immerse students in content by using various existing technology tools that include wiki’s, blogs, and the development of technology-based interactive lessons. The premise of expanding educational delivery in ways to include Web 2.0 opportunities is constructed around the idea that the more children can experience what they are learning and the more teachers immerse students in the learning process the more engaged students will become in interacting, listening, viewing and valuing their education.
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To say that a one size fits all system of education may now be slipping away from the grasp of governmental reform of No Child Left Behind may well be the case. We are now seeing a new movement in education, a silent reform movement that will soon meet its peek when the Net generation begins to surface as societal leaders. This will be the generation that views education from another prospective, a perspective who's ideas are based on skills obtained through collaboration and opportunities to co-create.
- Who are our students? What are the demographics, needs, circumstances, life experiences, learning styles, and motivations of this generation of students?
- In what ways might Net Generation learners differ from previous generations in how they think, learn, interact, and collaborate due to their experience with technology?
- What are students' expectations for teaching, learning, service, and support?
- In this transition period, when three or four "generations" may be represented by students, faculty, and staff, is there a set of principles common across these generations that might help guide interaction, planning, and practices?
Personal Learning Environment
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The Personal Learning Environment distinguishes the role of the individual as a self motivated learner who is capable in organizing his or her own learning through facilitation and instructional guidance. The creation of a PLE are based on the idea that learning will take place in co-collaborative networked environments and will not be provided by a single one shoe fits all learning provider. Linked to this is an increasing recognition of the importance of informal learning as the instruction is primarily based on becoming familiar with Web 2.0 applications in creating and remixing of content.
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The New Alexandrian Libraries of the Future
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" We are moving away from a world in which some produce and many consume media, toward one in which everyone has a more active stake in the culture that is produced."
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The New Alexandrian Libraries of the Future From the Internet’s inception its creators envisioned a universal substrate linking all mankind and its artifacts in a seamless, interconnected web of knowledge. This was the World Wide Web’s great promise: an Alexandrian library of all past and present information and a platform for collaboration to unite communities of all stripes in any conceivable act of creative enterprise.
As the sun begins to rise on the 21st century, Americans are once again experiencing a profound and rapid shift–from the Industrial Age to the Information Age and into the Conceptual Age. American schools are experiencing what historians of the future will call the Third Revolution, a transition to a knowledge-based universal substrate of knowledge based linking of the internet to co-collaboration websites of the new Alexandrian libraries of the future. |
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Mike King Lecture Series Part One
Personal Learning Environments |
Mike King Lecture Series Part Two
The Net Generation |