21st Century Learning and Teaching

Social Media and Teaching
This is my online reflective diary on how social media – Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin, Google Plus, to name a few – is being used by teachers to build their PLN - Professional Learning Network and invest in their PD - Professional Development. What cannot be ignored is the institutional shift to and investment in web-based platforms to provide ongoing development for their teachers.

Learn more / En savoir plus / Mehr erfahren:

https://gustmees.wordpress.com/2016/06/01/update-twitter-chats-what-to-do-better/

Our Big List of 21st Century Skills
The Global Digital Citizen Foundation has given hundreds of presentations to educators and administrators in several countries over the years. Each time we’ve spoken, we have asked them what they feel are the most important 21st century skills students need above all others.
The answers that we’ve recieved most often are narrowed down below. This list comes from our book Literacy is Not Enough (Crockett, Lee et. al.; 2011). You’ll be able to see that these points correlate rather well with both the New Zealand’s capabilities list and the IB Learner Profile. They certainly cover the Common Core’s bases, too. It’s good to know we’re all on the same page, isn’t it? That’s great news for our students!
So, according to the folks we’ve asked, the consensus is that students need to acquire transparency-level skills in the following areas:

Problem solving
Creativity
Analytic thinking
Collaboration
Communication
Ethics, action, and accountabillty

Learn more / En savoir plus / Mehr erfahren:

https://gustmees.wordpress.com/2015/05/26/what-are-the-skills-needed-from-students-in-the-future/

https://gustmees.wordpress.com/2016/02/18/the-new-possibilities-to-learn-and-teach-with-ict/

https://gustmees.wordpress.com/2015/07/19/learning-path-for-professional-21st-century-learning-by-ict-practice/

I believe in the potential power of blogging. I believe it can be harnessed to be a powerful pedagogical tool in the 21st Century.

4 Benefits of Integrating Blogging into Pedagogy

1. Blogs promote participation and collaboration of knowledge and skills. There are a myriad of resources available on the internet that can help students become creators, and not merely consumers of different texts and bodies of knowledge.

2. Blogs promote global communication and collaboration. Teachers can facilitate interactions with diverse cultures, ethnicities, and religions, and social contexts. Students can be helped to challenging their thinking by considering other viewpoints.

3. Blogs promote the critical analysis of pedagogy and literacies.

4. Blogs create the potential for interactive spaces for authentic exchanges. Strategies including reading logs, book reviews, parental communication, encouraging reading and writing and responding around a particular theme or focus.

If we can harness this power, we have a strong pedagogical tool on our hands. As with other areas in education, we can begin to harness this power by asking ourselves the right kinds of questions that can bring about the results we want to see.

Learn more / En savoir plus / Mehr erfahren:

https://gustmees.wordpress.com/2016/06/06/blogging-is-it-difficult-i-guess-not-a-all-follow-my-advice/

https://gustmees.wordpress.com/2013/03/25/practice/

https://gustmees.wordpress.com/2013/10/14/practice-using-blogs-for-home-work-to-get-ict-skills-and-creativity/