21st Century Skills in the Classroom

Cheryl Fuller
Cfuller62@nc.rr.com
919-971-6068
October 15, 2010

(Morning Session)
What is your knowledge level of 21st Century Skills?
Poll Everywhere - www.polleverywhere.com
o Dialogued with group what our current view of 21 st century skills
Technology, Global Awareness, Paradigm shift in thinking
Reviewed levels of teacher eval. rubric will always be
moving up and down the scale depending on challenges
faced, grade levels moved, personal choice
Developing
o awareness of skill, cannot yet do it
o Sits on the bicycle, but cant ride
o Nothing wrong with this, where everyone
starts
o Place you want to rent, not own
Proficient
o Goal level
o You can do the skill, ride the bicycle
o Range from wobbly to riding well, but do not
do it all the time
Accomplished
o Natural skill you do without thinking about it
o Something you do all the time
o Get on the bike and ride it to work everyday
Distinguished
o Doing skill easily, all the time
o Teaching skills to other people
o May do one year, but not the next
Not Demonstrated
o 1st way - No idea a skill exists
o Should never be rated this because it is the
principals responsibility to make you aware
o 2nd way have been made aware but
refuse, or are not able to demonstrate
21st Century Skills Framework
www.21stcenturyskills.org
Preparing students for a world where they complete with
artificial intelligence

Core Standards and Outcomes supported by support

systems
Also talking about children standards and assessments will
be significant changes to EOG testing in coming years
Teachers role is about facilitating learning, helping children
think, learn, and process.
What is the meaning behind the answer?
Support professional development, and learning
environment; created by administration, continued by
teachers

Teacher Evaluation instrument

o Shared how the instrument is designed as a support system to
help teachers grow throughout the year, and only be evaluated
at the end of the year. Do not need to bring artifacts to
evaluation unless asked by principal. Lesson plans are best
natural artifact. Artifacts will rarely help move from proficient to
accomplished because they have to be something you do
naturally.
Themes of 21st Century Learning
o Global Awareness
Using 21st century skills to understand and address
global issues
Learning from and working collaboratively with individuals
representing diverse cultures, religions and lifestyles in a
spirit of mutual respect and open dialogues in personal,
work, and community contexts
Having the ability to utilize non-English languages as a
tool for understanding other nations and cultures
Standard 2 trying to counteract stereotypes, including
culture and social
Pride is ok, but we have to teach human spirit, and that it
exists everywhere
Making connections with the similarities and differences
globally, between cultures
Show them! Give them pictures to make other countries
real and relevant.
Math Problem of the day can use global current events
Compare our community physical characteristic to others
Virtual Field Trips
We can control our classroom conversations and
exposures
o Financial, Economics, Business and Entrepreneurial Literacy

Knowing how to make appropriate personal economic

choices
Understanding the role of the economy and the role of
business in the economy
Using entrepreneurial skills to enhance workplace
productivity and career options
Awareness of future responsibilities as citizens
Money, saving, spending, bills, interest, all the things they
will face as adults
o Civil Literacy
Being an informed citizen to participate effectively in
government
Exercising the rights and obligations of citizenship at
local, state, national and global levels
Understanding the local and global implications of civic
decisions
Students come in with their own beliefs and opinions, and
it is our job to share that there is not always a right and
wrong way, but different ways
o Health Literacy
Having the ability to access health information and
services, navigate health institutions and act as an
effective advocate to improve health for self, family,
and/or community
Understanding preventative physical and mental health
measures, including proper diet, nutrition, exercise, risk
avoidance and stress reduction
Demonstrating understanding of nation and international
health
Give students the ability to find their own answers by
accessing and navigating and digging deeper
Have to know how to ask questions, especial in health
and wellness situations
Jobs are now 24-7 and create a completely different
environment for people to live and work in.
o Environmental Literacy
Global issue
Landfills, etc.

o 21st Century Skills

o Life and Career skills
Leadership
Using interpersonal and problem-solving skills to
influence more than one person toward a goal

Having the ability to leverage strengths of other to

accomplish a common goal.
What part of your lesson plans could you have the
students facilitate and lead?
They have to know who they are and recognize
strengths in others

Ethics
Demonstrating integrity and ethical behavior in
personal, workplace, and community contexts
You have to learn the skill to be able use is, and you
have to value the skill, its a choice
Honesty, social responsibility
Accountability
Setting and meeting high standards and goals for
ones self and others
Teachers are responsible with mastery of the work
and objectives, not success with grades
Have to learn to fail and then make changes based on
what they learn
Have students turn in work with their opinion of what
their grade should be based on their effort
Adaptability
Adapting to varied roles and responsibilities
Tolerating ambiguity and changing priorities
Share with students the difficulties you have in the
classroom, problem solve with the kids
Model having the skills to not freak out when things
changetalk it through out loud
Personal Productivity
Utilizing time efficiently and manage workload
Being punctual and reliable
Personal Responsibility
Exercising personal responsibility and flexibility in
personal, workplace, and community context
Ownership of what they do, say, accomplish
Responsible for what you do no matter how you feel
Others depend on you accomplishing your goals
Planning week, use agenda for outside of school
events
Ask them? Whose responsibility is that? What is my
role, your role?
People Skills
Working appropriately and productively with others

Students learn people skills by learning in groups

mix it upchallenge the students
Self-Direction
Monitoring ones own understanding and learning
needs
Demonstrating initiative to advance professional skill
levels
Having the ability to define, prioritize and complete
tasks without direct oversight
Demonstrating commitment to learning as a lifelong
process
Students who graduate high school have all been
shown to have this skill
Give students more vague rules where they have to
apply that skill to other situations as well (ex. I will not
disrupt my learning or the learning of others
Social Responsibility
Acting responsibly with the interests of the larger
community in mind
How are your actions affecting the people and
students around you? What consequences are you
forcing on others?
o Learning and Innovation skills
Critical Thinking and Problem Solving
Exercising sound reasoning in understanding
Making complex choices
Understanding the interconnections among systems
Framing, analyzing
Allowing the students to investigate before you
explain everything to them
Make Why? cards
Take what the textbooks give you, and stretch the
childrens thinking
Kagan structures reinforce this skill
Communication
Articulating thoughts and ideas clearly and effectively
Presentation is the hardest part of completing a senior
project.
Give students the chance to stand up and talk to the
group
Teach the dialogue that needs to be used
Difference between a robot and a person

Why, how, describe, understand, explain?

Students have to be the primary communicators in the
classroom
Student led conferences with parents
Student led conferences with other peers
Creativity and Innovation Skills
Demonstrating originality and inventiveness in work
Developing, implementing and communicating new
ideas to others
Being open and responsive to new and diverse
perspectives
Allow students to be able to determine answers
before you teach them how to get there, or allow other
students to teach them
Collaboration Skills
Demonstrating ability to work effectively with diverse
teams
Being willing to be helpful and make necessary
compromises to accomplish a common goal.
Students have to spend the majority of their day in
groups
Groups have to change, not always be ability or level,
but cultural, situational
Contextual Learning Skill
Having the ability to take advantage of education in a
variety of contexts both inside and outside the
classroom; understanding that knowledge is acquired
within a context
Relevancywhat does it mean right now?
What you do in this situation might not work in the
next situation (texting vs. writing a paper)
Language used on the playground doesnt work in a
job interview
Adaptability connection

o Information, Media and Technology Skills

Information and Media Literacy Skills
Understanding, managing and creating effective oral,
written and/or multimedia communication in a variety
of forms and contexts
Analyzing, accessing, managing, integrating,
evaluating and creating information in a variety of
forms and media

ICT Literacy
Using technology in the course of attaining and
utilizing 21st century skills

o Standards ad Skills Crosswalk (Most observed standards for

teachers)
Standard II: Teachers establish a respectful environment for
a diverse population of students
Standard III: Teaches know the content they teach
Standard IV: Teachers facilitate learning for their students
Whole instrument in based on 21st Century Learning
Framework
Diversity have to know you students
Contextual Learning know the experiences they are
coming from
YOU HAVE TO USE THESE 21ST CENTURY SKILLS TO PLAN FOR
INSTRUCTIONHAVE THEM IN FRONT OF YOU!
Create a quick reference guide to have with you as you sit down to plan. Thanks
to Pender County for sharing!

Created a wordle with key words from 21st Century Themes and Skills
Research shared about students engaged in media 10 hrs a day, and
have become experts in multitasking
25% of multimedia time is spent social networking

Goal Setting
(afternoon session)

Goals will probably not match with new info, adjust them if necessary
Use PDP and evaluation from end of last year.
Individual PDP entirely written by teacher
Monitored PDP written by principal and teacher together
Directed PDP principal writes goals and shares with teacher
o Stay on Individual PDP if every strategy is proficient or higher
o Write two personal goals that only apply to you.
o Can be from same standard or not, your choice.

Formative Assessment
o Where am I now?
o Where am I going?
o How do I close the gap?

Becoming Goal Minded

o Common assessments
o Feedback
o Challenging the status quo
o Collaboration with colleagues
o Continuous self-reflection
Process Goals vs. Results Goals
o Teachers should always be working towards Results Goals
SMART Goals
o S = specific and strategic (you can describe the details, they are
long-term and aligned)
o M = measurable (you can use either qualitative or quantitative
assessments)
o A = attainable or achievable (you can reach the desired goal)
o R = relevant (success will ensure teachers performance will
increase on their evaluation instrument)
o T = time-bound (the time for completion is specified and can be
accomplished during this school year)
Focus
o Clear vision of where you want to be
o True to your purpose and core values
o Always reflecting on how it will affect students
o Perseverance: never give up on a student
Reflection
o Pause, assess and reflect about where you are
o Analyze data to make improvements
o Use multiple assessments
Collaboration
o Vertical and horizontal collaboration
o Frequent opportunities for collaboration
o Clear outcomes and agendas
o Shared successes and challenges

PDSA correlates directly to goal setting of PDP and new teacher

evaluation instrument

Goal
o Greatest Area of need
o Use levels of rubric to define greatest area of need
o Compare to student achievement levels
Indicators
o The evidence tells you if the goal is being achieved

o What are the vital few areas that will help you reach your goal most
efficiently?
Measures
o What will you use to demonstrate the progress being made?
o How will you know your goal is being met
o Build the goal
Targets
o Establish a target for each measure
o Remember targets should be attainable
o Compare your targets to your overall goal