21st Century Skills

I feel somewhat prepared for 21st century teaching and learning. I am able to incorporate the critical thinking, communication, creativity, and problem solving skills into my classroom; I am not sure about getting the latest technology skills across to my students. I feel that the class I am taking right now for my Masters in Education is giving me more knowledge about the technology that is available for me to use in my classroom. Yes, I am a Business Education teacher and I can teach my students how to type and how to use programs like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Photoshop; what I’m not sure about is how to bring these new technologies into the classes that I am teaching and make it a meaningful learning experience for my students.

Do my students leave my classroom prepared and ready for success in the 21st century? I feel they are prepared in many ways to be successful in the 21st century. Students in my classroom work on problem solving, critical thinking, creativity, communication, and technology skills. One of my classes is called Desktop Publishing. In this class students learn about PowerPoint, Photoshop, Publisher, and common design principles. One of the assignments that students complete during this course is to take on the role of a travel agent. Students must use many of the 21st century skills to develop this project. Students must use creativity to develop flyers and brochures for the destination they are promoting. They use critical thinking and problem solving skills to develop a budget and an itinerary. Communication skills are used to present the project to the class, and technology skills are used throughout the development of the project because the students must use the computer to create all parts of the vacation project. My wish would be that students would leave my classroom with more exposure to updated technology. They use the computer daily, but we are using Office 2003, which is outdated. I would like for students to have the opportunity to learn on the most updated versions of software and newest technologies which would help them to be more successful when they leave my classroom.

As I look at 21st century teaching and learning I see that I have many strengths that I can use to help my students leave my classroom well prepared to enter the “real world.” I am not afraid to try out new technology and to bring new ideas into my classroom. I am willing to update and change my curriculum from year to year, especially because the classes I teach involve technology. I believe that these strengths will help me prepare my students with 21st century skills. The challenges that I am faced with would include the lack of updated technology that is available at my school and the restrictions set by my technology department. I would love the opportunity to use a Smart Board in my classroom, but we don’t have one in our business department. I would also like to incorporate email into my classroom, but the technology department says we can not do that. My challenge is to figure out how to get these things into my classroom and the members of our business department are working on ways to make that happen.