21st century learning

I recently found this information about 21st century learning and thought I would share it. It is from the website:

www.teachthought.com

The 9 Domains Of the Inside-Out Learning Model

1. Five Learning Actuators

• Project-Based Learning
• Directed and Non-Directed Play
• Video Games and Learning Simulations
• Connected Mentoring
• Academic Practice

2. Changing Habits

• Fertilize innovation & design
• Acknowledge limits and scale
• Reflect on interdependence
• Honor uncertainty
• Curate legacy
• Support systems-level and divergent thinking
• Reward increment
• Require versatility in face of change

3. Transparency

• Between communities, learners, and schools
• Learning standards, outcomes, project rubrics, performance critera persistently visible, accessible, and communally constructed
• Gamification and publishing replace “grades”

4. Self-Initiated Transfer

• Applying old thinking in constantly changing and unfamiliar circumstances as constant matter of practice
• Constant practice of prioritized big ideas in increasing complexity within learner ZPD
• Project-based learning, blended learning, and Place-Based Education available to facilitate highly-constructivist approach

5. Mentoring & Community

• “Accountability” via the performance of project-based ideas in authentic local and global environments
• Local action –> global citizenship
• Active mentoring via physical and digital networking, apprenticeships, job shadows and study tours
• Communal Constructivism, meta-cognition, Cognitive Coaching, and Cognitive Apprenticeship among available tools

6. Changing Roles

• Learners as knowledge makers
• Teachers as expert of assessment and resources
• Classrooms as think-tanks
• Communities not just audience, but vested participants
• Families as designers, curators, and content resources

7. Climate of Assessment

• Constant minor assessments replace exams
• Data streams inform progress and suggest pathways
• Academic standards prioritized and anchoring
• Products, simulation performance, self-knolwedge delegate academia to new role of refinement of thought

8. Thought & Abstraction

• In this model, struggle and abstraction are expected outcomes of increasing complexity & real-world uncertainty
• This uncertainty is honored, and complexity and cognitive patience are constantly modeled and revered
• Abstraction honors not just art, philosophy, and other humanities, but the uncertain, incomplete, and subjective nature of knowledge

9. Expanding Literacies

• Analyzes, evaluates, and synthesizes credible information
• Critical survey of interdependence of media and thought
• Consumption of constantly evolving media forms
• Media design for authentic purposes
• Self-monitored sources of digital & non-digital data
• Artistic and useful content curation patterns

The Inside-Out Learning Model Central Learning Theories & Artifacts: Situational Learning Theory (Lave), Discovery Learning (Bruner), Communal Constructivism (Holmes), Zone of Proximal Development & More Knowledgeable Other (Vygotsky), Learning Cycle (Kolb), Transfer (Thorndike, Perkins, Wiggins), Habits of Mind (Costa and Kallick), Paulo Freire, and the complete body of work by Wendell Berry

TeachThought Self-Directed Learning Framework Draft 1.1

1. Begin With Self-Knowledge

What’s worth understanding?

What problems or opportunities are within my reach?

What important problems & solutions have others before me created?

What legacies am I a part of & what does that suggest that I understand?

2. Analyze Context

What is the modern and historical context of this topic, issue, etc.?

What do I need to understand about this issue to grasp its significance and scale?

How do pathos/ethos/logos factor? What patterns are apparent?

What do experts & non-experts know/believe they know about it?

3. Activate Existing Knowledge

Roughly brainstorm what you already know: Make true/false statements; give examples & non-examples, or otherwise organize your existing knowledge in some useful or elegant way

Concept map your knowledge in a given context

Interact with relevant media, resources, & networks

Analyze for both the obvious & the nuance; the implicit and explicit

4. Design Learning Pathway

How can I learn what I need to know?

Of what I need to know, what can I gain quickly, & what will require more in-depth study?

What technology resources can offer me access to relevant content, resources, & communities?

What learning forms or models makes the most sense for me to use?

5. Clarify Knowledge

Analyze need for creativity, innovation, & information

Form new questions based on learning

Establish what is or isn’t within your present reach of understanding

Revise future learning pathway based on your learning experience, and/or the interaction with mentors & community members

6. Apply Understanding

What are my standards for quality?

What scale does it make the most sense for me to work & study?

What change in myself should I expect as a result of my work & study?

What related actions do the citizenships of which I am a part suggest or demand?

A Self-Directed Learning Model For Critical Literacy

Big Idea: Promote self-directed & critical learning

There are 6 areas in the self-directed learning framework:

1. Self: (e.g., What citizenships am I a member of, and what does that suggest that I understand?)

2. Context: (e.g., What are the contexts of this topic or idea?)

3. Activate: (e.g., What do I or others know about this topic or idea?)

4. Pathway: (e.g., What resources or thinking strategy make sense for me to use?)

5. Clarify: (e.g., Based on what I’ve learned so far, how should I revise my intended pathway?)

6, Apply: (e.g., What changes in myself should I see as a result of new understanding?)

Self-Knowledge As A Starting Point

1. What’s worth understanding?

Out of all of the ideas and circumstances you encounter on a daily basis, what’s worth understanding? What knowledge or skills or in-depth understandings would support you on a moment-by-moment basis? What’s the difference between recreation, interest, curiosity, and passion?

This even can be overtly academic. For example:

In math, what’s valuable? What can math do for you?

What can rich literature enable you to see?

What perspective can a study of history provide?

What mistakes can a scientific approach to things prevent?

2. What problems or opportunities are within my reach?

It sounds noble to want to solve world hunger or play a violin at Carnegie Hall, but that may or may not be in your immediate reach. Right here, right now, what can you do to get there?

3. What important problems & solutions have others before me created?

Interdependence–realizing where we, as a family, neighborhood, state, nation, species, etc. have been, and what trends and patterns emerge under study that we can use to make sense of where we’re going?

What are our collective achievements–poetry, space travel, human rights, etc.?

What are our collective failures–poverty, racism, ecological damage, etc.?

And with this in mind, how should I respond?

4. What citizenships and legacies am I a part of & what do those memberships suggest that I understand?

This is kind of the ultimate question for the first step of the SDL model, and the final step: To “what” do I belong, and how can I care-take that membership through my understanding and behavior?

Below are some hypothetical examples of student responses.

I belong to the “Miller” family, a family long-involved in photography and art. So how should I respond?

I live in an area that used to be “nice,” but has recently devolved through a lack of civic voice and action. So how should I respond?

I love hip-hop but am concerned with recent trends that are blending it together with pop music until the two are indistinguishable. So how should I respond?

I’m an American, a Nigerian, a Canadian. So how should I respond?

I love books, I love fashion, I love clean water. So how should I respond?

My parents were divorced, and their parents were divorced. So how should I respond?

I am poor. I am rich. I am anxious. I am curious. How should I respond?