It's funny how an entire lifetime can boil down to a few seminal moments. Fleeting images, mental and emotional vignettes that flash through the recesses of our minds, little things...small things...but ultimately, the things that both shape and define our lives.
I clearly remember one such moment from my youth.
I was a chatty little lad. (Which I'm sure
stuns those of you who know me). I liked learning new and fancy words and then impressing my friends and family by using these new and fancy words in new and fancy sentences. My mother once joked that I started talking fluently at 2, and over 40 years later, she's
still waiting for a pregnant pause.
Rimshot, please.
Anyway,
one day when I was in the 7
th or 8
th grade, I heard the word "gauche" for the first time. I think it was during an episode of Gilligan's Island; from the lips of one of the most iconic characters in broadcast television history--Mr. Thurston Howell, III of course. I remember thinking,
what a cool sounding word. I liked the way it rolled off the tongue.
Gauche, gauche, gauche. Saying it made me feel so
grown up. Like a
man.The problem is I had no idea what it meant.
I thought it meant "sophisticated, proper, something classy." (After all, if Mr. Howell said it,
it had to be something good). So I
vividly remember the day when my father (a very, very large man), my mother, my brother and I were in our kitchen talking casually after dinner and as everyone was about to leave the room I had one of those "let-me-show-mommy-and-daddy-how-grown-I-really-am" moments.
I said, "Mom, Dad...."
All eyes turned to me. I had the floor.
"Our house is so
gauche."
Silence.
Dead silence.
Then my Dad's upper lip did this thing where it quivered, got really thin and turned kind of blue.....which meant he was really mad. My mother, an even tempered person if ever there was one, looked at me without a
hint of amusement and said, "What did you say?"
At this point, I began to suspect I had done something terribly, terribly wrong.
I got as far as "Um...." before my mother said:
"Don't ever say that again."
Now I was in full-blown retreat.
"But Mom,
gauche is a good thing."
Her expression softened a bit but I could tell she was still not pleased. "No, it is
not a good thing," she said.
"Michael," my mother looked me squarely in the eyes and spoke in a cool measured tone.
"Don't
ever use a word unless you know what it means."
With that she left the room along with my father whose upper lip had thankfully returned to its normal size and color. I breathed a sigh of relief. But they never did tell me what "gauche" meant. Since I couldn't even spell the word, I was unable to look it up in the dictionary. I didn't find out what gauche meant until years later.
I remember that day too.
For years, I thought the word "gauche" was spelled "gosh" (which explained why I couldn't find it in the dictionary). But when I finally figured that out that the "o" was in fact an "
au" and the "sh" an "
che," I was able to pull out our twenty pound, eleven inch thick unabridged dictionary (remember those...I am
such a digital immigrant) and look up the cool sounding word with the really funny spelling. As my finger worked its way down the page, I remember feeling what could best be described as an uncomfortable mix of intellectual curiosity and anxiety. Then I found it.
Gauche.
Awkward, clumsy, inept, unsophisticated, inelegant, graceless, unpolished, uncultured, ill-bread, ill-mannered. Each word was like a punch in the stomach. I grew up at a time when there were certain things you simply did
not say to your parents. Like calling your house gauche. My parents were hard working people. We did not have a lot, but whatever we had, they worked really hard to get. And even though my intentions were good, I'd insulted them.
I felt like a fool. Worse than that, I felt like an
educated fool. I'd gleaned what I thought was a bit of knowledge that I thought would make me sound
more intelligent, but I ended up sounding far less intelligent than had I said nothing at all. I have no idea if my parents remembered this incident (they certainly never mentioned it again) but it was a lesson I will never forget.
Never use a word unless you know what it means.Which brings me to phrase "21st century skills."
I'm sure you know what they are.
But do you know what it means?
Because I don't.
***************
A few weeks ago on on
plurk, a teacher posed the following question:
"What would you say if asked to give a one line description of 21st century skills?"
Now you can usually send out a "
plurk" or a "tweet" on virtually any subject, including whether or not you should put pickles on a tuna sandwich (you most assuredly should
not) and get a host of responses. Micro-blogging networks like twitter or
plurk can be an enormous source of information, so I'm not being at all critical of the forum. I like the forum. But I was really curious about this particular
plurk because I had yet to find a single, cogent definition of "21st century skills" myself.
So I waited.
And waited.
And waited.
Finally, a response:
"I can't think of anything at all."
About ten minutes later, a second response:
"Wow...that's hard...I'm thinking."
Then a third:
"I'm game. Here's my shot--it is the ability to use tools of technology to adapt your environment to create active responses."
That was it.
And I thought,
if that's the best we can do we have got a REALLY big problem.I recently read a "tweet" from Gary
Stager that said, in part, "ed tech needs to get its act together...." I'm not sure what Mr.
Stager was referring to on this particular occasion, but I think our use (or overuse) of the phrase "21st century skills" may be one such example.
The importance of developing what we term "21st century skills" is at the very
core of our case for education technology. But have you found an actual definition? What I've found are "frameworks" (a grossly overused word), a matrix or lists itemizing and describing what "21st century skills" are. But as any good English teacher will tell you, there is a fundamental difference between a
description and a
definition. So while we're pounding the pavement, shaking our fists and baying into the wind about the need for pedagogical
change, change, change...we're doing so predicated on a premise--the importance of developing "21st century skills"--that we struggle to define.
And
that folks is a problem.
Remember, I want us to win this fight. But those of us "in" the ed tech camp; those of us who think that technology and other multimedia tools should be fully integrated into our curriculum and classrooms are still the minority. If I may put on my lawyer hat for a moment, we have the burden of proof. We have to convince the majority to move away
from something,
to something. So if we're going to succeed, and to date we have not succeeded, at least systemically, we had better be
very, very clear about why.
So let's try and break this down. What exactly is the problem here? Why has the phrase "21st century skills" become such a lightening rod of confusion and controversy?
The problem, and I will try to tread lightly here because I respect and admire the work of organizations like the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, is that the phrase "21st century skills" is problematic. It is, at best, misleading and, at worse, offensive to a large segment of our audience. If nothing else, it creates an unnecessary and counterproductive distraction that potentially leads us away from more substantive discussions on the merit of education reform through meaningful technology integration.
Vision if you will a conversation with the most truculent and technology-resistant teacher in your school. We'll call him Don. Don's been teaching without computers for about 25 years and you're trying to make your case for technology integration. You're really passionate, your arms are flailing about, you've got charts, graphs, stats and a really cool power point presentation. Don is not moved. You show him "Shift Happens." Don is still not budging. You show him "Pay Attention." Still nothing. Then you give him this:
"Don, in order for our kids to compete and succeed in the 21st century, they have to have 21st century skills and they're not developing those with the way we're teaching now."Now Don perks up. "Excuse me?"
Don folds his arms, a wry smile forming on his face, and he asks, "What do you mean, 21st century skills? What
exactly are 21st century skills? Give me one such skill.
You say:
"Creativity!"
Don starts to laugh. "Excuse me? Creativity? That's a
21st century skill? I'd take Mark Twain over most of the drivel that we spew out today as art, literature or music. Are you suggesting that we didn't need to be creative in the 20
th century? I know a few
hundred highly successful people, all former students of mine, who might take some umbrage at that. Try again. Give me another 21st century skill."
"Communication skills!"
At this point, Don looks visibly annoyed. "Communication skills? What have I been doing for the past 25 years?
What have my students been doing for the past 25 years? Writing on scrolls? Communication is not a 21st century skill. It is a basic human necessity. Please explain to me how something as fundamental to our existence as communication is a 21st century skill? Have you ever read Plato? He was as skilled a communicator as has ever existed in the course of human history
and he lived over 2000 years ago. Barack Obama was a product of 20
th century education and I'd say he was a pretty skilled communicator. Communication is most assuredly
not a 21st century skill. Unless of course you're referring to communicating via text message, a practice that I think is compromising our student's ability to read, write or speak effectively. Give me something else."
Now you're starting to sweat a bit. This time your voice is a bit more sheepish. "Critical thinking?"
Don rolls his eyes. "Yeah, and I guess those of us unfortunate enough to have been born in the 20
th century are just plain stupid. Oh however have we managed to survive, develop a vaccine for polio,
send a man to the moon and build your beloved supercomputers without the ability to think critically."
Don looks you squarely in the eyes.
"What you're giving me are important
life skills. I'll certainly concede that. But these are not skills that are unique to the 21st century or the 20
th century for that matter. So help me out here. Explain this to me as though I was one of your students. Can you give me a simple, one sentence definition of what a 21st century skills is?
You pause. Reflect. Then say: "Don, 21st century skills are the skills our kids need to compete and succeed in the 21st century."
Don sighs and says, now almost sympathetically, "Isn't that where we started?"
And you've lost. Don's gone and no matter how many times you show him "Shift Happens" or thrust PISA results under his nose, you probably won't get him back.
*************
In the law there is something called a "red herring." A red herring is defined as "a diversion intended to distract attention from the main issue." By basing our case, in whole or in part, on the importance of "21st century skills," we may be handing those predisposed against technology integration the perfect red herring. We find ourselves so busy defending what is and what is not a 21st century skill that the main point about pedagogical change gets lost.
So let's try to get down to the heart of the matter.
What are we
really trying to say when we refer to the importance of 21st century skills?
What is the point? Can we offer up something simple, something straight-forward, something that fully, but succinctly, embodies the essence of what we're trying to say?
I've come up with this:
Rather than talk about the importance of "21st century skills," I point out that our
first job as educators is to help our children survive and thrive in the world as it exists now.
That's it.
John Dewey, whose views on “progressive education” provided the theoretical foundation for constructivism, once wrote: “If we teach today as we taught yesterday, we rob our children of tomorrow.” Dewey did not say that our kids needed "20
th century skills" because he did not need to. His premise, as true now as it was then, is that as our world changes the way we teach must reflect these changes. When most of our children left school after the 8
th grade to work on farms, we taught one way. When industrialization changed our means of production, our economy and our world, our schools adjusted accordingly. (Perhaps not for the better, but they changed). Now the personal computer, wireless technology and the global reach of the
internet have changed every facet of our world. And to paraphrase Thomas Friedman, "we ain't going back."
So what do we do?
Our job, as educators, is to adapt and adjust to that change and to prepare our children for that world. For their future. And a part of that challenge is to make sure that our kids are familiar and fluid with the tools of the 21st century and can use those tools to be and create something of value to the world as it exists now. If we fail to do
that, then we fail
them. There's no better or worse here. It's not about 21st century skills versus 20
th century skills and no, kids today don't have to be smarter than we were.
But they do need to be different.
Because our world is different.
Now we can explain what some of those differences are.
Now we can discuss some of the cognitive and practical skills that students need to have mastered before entering the workforce in order to compete on this new, flattened global stage. But note, I present it this way to avoid throwing up the red herring of so-called "21st century skills." The "Don's" of the world might object to the idea of technology, they might balk at the concept of "21t century skills," but no good educator should balk at the idea that our common challenge is to prepare our children for the world as it exists now. How you define and characterize that world is up to you. But going forward, I will shy away from the catch-all phrase "21st century skills" whenever possible because I don't think it helps our case.
Now having trudged through all this you might think: "Mike, this is all about
semantics. All this who-shot-John about
a phrase. It doesn't really matter. We shouldn't get tripped up over
words." Oh really? Teachers.....front and center here. How many times have you heard your students plead to you in their most long-suffering voice when unhappy with a grade or your assessment of their work....but [Mr./Ms.______________], you're not being fair.
You know what I mean."And how do you respond?
No, I
don't know what you mean.
I know what you
said.
We're making a case for change. Right now that case has not been terribly successful. So I ask you to reconsider one element of our case. I ask you to consider this.
21st century skills.
Yes, we know what they are.
Yes, we know what we
mean.But does our constant reference to "21st century skills" help or hurt our cause?
Should we use it?
Or lose it?
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