Ex Writer 38 | - ✏ Freelance Writer
Nov 23, 2015 | #1
Reflection Paper: for the educational issues reflection paper and presentation, select an educational issue to research (ex multicultural education, school choice, single-sex education, etc... choose something that has been a current issue or topic of discussion). Research the topic by reviewing scholarly articles, articles in the newspaper, articles in educational publication.
For too long, the citizens of the United States have tolerated an educational system that is inadequate to meet the needs of 21st century. In the 19th and 20th centuries, schools were comparable to factories (Au 26). This was a sensible model because, after all, schools were preparing large numbers of young people to work in America's industrial sector. In the factories where these students were likely to work as adults, suppliers delivered raw materials to the facility. These materials were then processed by workers, usually using simple machinery, until a final product rolled off the assembly line. Schools were designed in much the same way. The suppliers (administrators and makers of educational materials) delivered raw materials (facts, figures, and other forms of information) to the factory floor (the classroom). There, simple machinery (textbooks, worksheets, filmstrips, and myriad other devices) enabled the workers (teachers) to convert the raw materials into a finished product (students as educated citizens, ready to contribute to America's prosperity through factory work). This system worked fairly well while the United States' economy was based on the industrial model. But the end of the 20th century saw rapid changes in the country's economic basis, with a concomitant need for change in the ways workers were educated. This paper examines the educational needs for the 21st century and the ways in which most schools are failing to meet these needs.
Few people doubt that the world is rapidly changing. The educational system has been slow to respond to these changes, however. In the late 1990s, President Bill Clinton spoke of the need to build a "bridge" to take America into the 21st century. He spoke of a country where "education will be every citizen's most prized possession" (para. 21) in "the dawn of . . . the Information Age and the global society" (para. 6), and he set a challenge for the educational system of the United States. How have we fared in the more than fifteen years since Clinton described his vision of American education? Sadly, not enough has changed, and the dream of an education appropriate for the 21st century is still largely a dream. Much debate has occurred on the subject of updating educational goals, methods, and practices, but few schools have been able to fully implement programs that match the needs of a changing American society. The impetus toward change has run headlong into the educational and political establishments, which have been slow to embrace the dramatic adjustments that need to take place. Arguably, the biggest challenge for reformers is the dominance of standardized testing, adopted under the banner of "accountability" for teachers and administrators. There is a wide gulf between the type of knowledge needed for success in the 21st century and the standardized testing practices of the 20th century, as will be examined below. Meanwhile, an educational system that must conform to the mandate of filling out bubbles on a test sheet in order to demonstrate students' memorization of discrete facts is failing to provide the next generation with the knowledge it needs in a rapidly changing world.
In the 20th century, students were expected to learn to read and write, perform lower-level mathematical calculations, understand a few basic scientific processes, and memorize facts about American history and a few other subjects. All of these skills could be imparted from teacher to student using materials such as textbooks, chalkboards, and worksheets, after which students' learning was evaluated using paper-and-pencil tests. Such tests were perfectly adequate for measuring whether students had memorized, say, mathematical formulas or major dates in American history, and whether they could competently compose an essay. Some students would move on to higher levels of education, where critical thinking skills would become important, but the majority would graduate high school with no need for more education, since they would have assured jobs in the agricultural, industrial, or service sectors. But with the exception of service jobs, the employment horizons today have changed drastically. Neither agriculture or industry has need for large numbers of employees-and those industrial jobs that do remain or are being created require workers with a high level of technical knowledge, as well as critical thinking and problem-solving skills. As knowledge expands exponentially in most fields, problem-solving and integration of processes is crucial. Businesses operate globally, meaning that their employees interact with people from different cultures who see the world in different ways. The expression "thinking outside the box" might well be altered to "thinking outside the American educational system" as far as knowledge and skill needs are concerned. While it is true than some students "are fortunate enough to attend highly effective schools or at least encounter great teachers" (Rotherham and Willingham 352), the vast majority attend schools that are designed on the model of the 20th century.
What, then, are the skills that students need to acquire in the course of their education? Opinion is not unanimous, but this list from the website "What Is 21st Century Education?" provides a fair enumeration:
- Critical thinking and problem solving
- Collaboration across networks and leading by influence
- Agility and adaptability
- Initiative and entrepreneurialism
- Effective oral and written communication
- Accessing and analyzing information
- Curiosity and imagination
Notably, the only skill on the list that is a universal goal of curricula in today's schools is "effective oral and written communication." Granted, critical thinking and problem-solving are emphasized in many schools, as are information access and analysis, but they are not always treated as crucial to a complete education. Even more importantly, they are skills that are not easily measured by standardized tests. Adaptability, imagination, initiative, and the other skills are even less amenable to assessment by paper-and-pencil testing methods, which is one reason why they are seldom practiced as outcome goals. This is a shame, since outcomes of student projects (as opposed to timed paper-and-pencil tests) are an important element of a 21st century educational plan.
An up-to-date teaching plan would look considerably different. It would focus not on the "memorization of discrete facts" (What Is 21st Century Education?), but on teaching students how to access, analyze, and use information, and to create new ideas. It would go beyond the lower levels of Bloom's Taxonomy (remembering, understanding, applying) to higher levels (analyzing, evaluating, creating), where students would process knowledge acquired at the lower levels. Old-style learning is passive, driven by teachers and textbooks; new-style learning is active and dependent on student exploration, research, and creativity. Rather than a curriculum broken into distinct units, the curriculum would be interdisciplinary, with integration of subjects. Students would be given the chance to explore their interests as they learn a wide range of skills in a range of disciplines, working both independently and in groups. Learning communication skills would be essential (Noll 351), and both group and individual projects would be assigned. Multiple intelligences would be valued and utilized, and teaching methods would be flexible. Lessons would be designed to develop the abilities of students with all types of intelligences: linguistic, logical-mathematical, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, naturalist, and existential (McFarlane Table 1). Students would acquire a variety of literacies: environmental, cyber, health, multicultural, social, media, financial, and arts-related. Teachers would engage students' higher order thinking skills and teach them metacognitive strategies for understanding their own learning. Technology would be used to the students' benefit-an important consideration, since most students today rely on technology for social purposes, while often failing to acquire technology skills that would qualify them for high-quality jobs. The entire globe would be used as an educational tool, connecting American students with others around the world. Note that all of these descriptions center on methods of delivering education, not on the content itself. Much, if not most, of the content taught today should be taught tomorrow. The change will occur in how students acquire knowledge, and what they learn to do with it. Education in the 21st century should not be equal to job-skills training; it should provide exposure to the arts, sciences, and more-but it should do so in a way that allows students to discover and utilize knowledge in a way that will benefit them in the post-school world.
But a changed system of delivery will require a changed system of assessment, since teachers will always need to determine whether their students are actually achieving their academic goals. As Rotherham and Willingham point out (356), multiple choice tests, while easy to administer and grade, will not suffice for measuring progress in a 21st century classroom. Creativity, initiative, analytical ability, and other 21st century skills are not amenable to assessment by a standardized test; in fact, standardization is a trait of factory-model education. And yet, twelve years into the 21st century, standardized testing is still the norm nationwide. That it is a nationwide practice "is largely due to the passing of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, . . . the federal US law mandating high-stakes testing in mathematics and reading/language arts that uses the threat of loss of federal funding for failing schools and districts" (Au 29-30). As a result, schools have little choice but to teach the discrete facts and skills that will be on the standardized test and to do so in the most efficient, prescribed manner. Curricula must conform to the test-and the test is not designed to assess 21st century skills. Teachers are "both disempower[ed] and deskill[ed]" by the strictures of the current educational system (Au 30), yet they must conform if they hope to keep their jobs. Furthermore, the emphasis on reading and math skills frequently results in the elimination of classes in other subjects in order to clear more time for the teaching of the language arts and mathematical skills that will be on the test. Au calls this "zero-sum curriculum" (30), since tested content squeezes out learning that will not be on the test. This standardization and narrowing of the curriculum also precludes the use of teaching methods that instruct using 21st century skills, since teachers seldom have time to employ these methods. Despite the increasing realization that students are being shortchanged by the continued use of an outdated educational model, the practice continues in most American schools.
To say that American education stands at a crossroads is an understatement. Public support is badly needed in order to bring about change in the educational establishment-and just as important, in legislative bodies. The natural inclination is for those who have already completed their educations to think that "what worked for me will work for today's kids, too." Despite President Obama's continual call for an educational system that meets the needs of the 21st century, the public does not seem incentivized to take action. Perhaps it is because so many families are struggling to meet their basic needs, they do not have the time or the will to think about overhauling education. But as American society recovers, as it eventually will, attention must be paid to what is happening (or not happening) in our schools. If we continue to shortchange students on the skills they need, we will have created a lost generation of adults who have no ability to participate in the economic growth of the 21st century. Bill Clinton's bridge to the 21st century will have collapsed before our eyes. We need to realize the critical need for changes in education, and cross the bridge while we still can.
Works Cited
Au, Wayne. "Teaching Under the New Taylorism: High-stakes Testing and the Standardization of the 21st Century Curriculum." Journal of Curriculum Studies 43.1: 24-45. Academic Source Premier.
Clinton, Bill. Second Inaugural Address. Web.
Lowther, Deborah L., Fethi A. Inan, Steven M. Ross, and J. Daniela Strahl. "Do One-to-One Initiatives Bridge the Way to 21st Century Knowledge and Skills?" Journal of Educational Computing Research 46.1: 1-30. ERIC.
McFarlane, Donovan A. "Multiple Intelligences: The Most Effective Platform for Global 21st Century Educational and Instructional Methodologies." College Quarterly 14.2: n.p. ERIC.
Noll, James William. Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Educational Issues. 17th ed. Ed. James William Noll. New York: McGraw Hill. Print.
Preus, Betty. "Authentic Instruction for 21st Century Learning: Higher Order Thinking in an Inclusive School." American Secondary Education 40.3: 59-79. Academic Source Premier. Web.
Rotherham, Andrew J., and Daniel T. Willingham. "21st Century Skills: The Challenges Ahead." Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Educational Issues. 17th ed. Ed. James William Noll. 352-58. New York: McGraw Hill. Print.
Senechal, Diane. "The Most Daring Education Reform of All." Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Educational Issues. 17th ed. Ed. James William Noll. 359-70. New York: McGraw Hill. Print.
Stone, Kyle B., Karen Kaminski, and Gene Gloeckner. "Closing the Gap: Education Requirements of the 21st Century Production Workforce." Journal of Industrial Teacher Education 45.3: 5-33. ERIC.
"What Is 21st Century Education?" 21st Century Schools.
Reflection Research Paper on American Education in the XXI Century
For too long, the citizens of the United States have tolerated an educational system that is inadequate to meet the needs of 21st century. In the 19th and 20th centuries, schools were comparable to factories (Au 26). This was a sensible model because, after all, schools were preparing large numbers of young people to work in America's industrial sector. In the factories where these students were likely to work as adults, suppliers delivered raw materials to the facility. These materials were then processed by workers, usually using simple machinery, until a final product rolled off the assembly line. Schools were designed in much the same way. The suppliers (administrators and makers of educational materials) delivered raw materials (facts, figures, and other forms of information) to the factory floor (the classroom). There, simple machinery (textbooks, worksheets, filmstrips, and myriad other devices) enabled the workers (teachers) to convert the raw materials into a finished product (students as educated citizens, ready to contribute to America's prosperity through factory work). This system worked fairly well while the United States' economy was based on the industrial model. But the end of the 20th century saw rapid changes in the country's economic basis, with a concomitant need for change in the ways workers were educated. This paper examines the educational needs for the 21st century and the ways in which most schools are failing to meet these needs.Few people doubt that the world is rapidly changing. The educational system has been slow to respond to these changes, however. In the late 1990s, President Bill Clinton spoke of the need to build a "bridge" to take America into the 21st century. He spoke of a country where "education will be every citizen's most prized possession" (para. 21) in "the dawn of . . . the Information Age and the global society" (para. 6), and he set a challenge for the educational system of the United States. How have we fared in the more than fifteen years since Clinton described his vision of American education? Sadly, not enough has changed, and the dream of an education appropriate for the 21st century is still largely a dream. Much debate has occurred on the subject of updating educational goals, methods, and practices, but few schools have been able to fully implement programs that match the needs of a changing American society. The impetus toward change has run headlong into the educational and political establishments, which have been slow to embrace the dramatic adjustments that need to take place. Arguably, the biggest challenge for reformers is the dominance of standardized testing, adopted under the banner of "accountability" for teachers and administrators. There is a wide gulf between the type of knowledge needed for success in the 21st century and the standardized testing practices of the 20th century, as will be examined below. Meanwhile, an educational system that must conform to the mandate of filling out bubbles on a test sheet in order to demonstrate students' memorization of discrete facts is failing to provide the next generation with the knowledge it needs in a rapidly changing world.
In the 20th century, students were expected to learn to read and write, perform lower-level mathematical calculations, understand a few basic scientific processes, and memorize facts about American history and a few other subjects. All of these skills could be imparted from teacher to student using materials such as textbooks, chalkboards, and worksheets, after which students' learning was evaluated using paper-and-pencil tests. Such tests were perfectly adequate for measuring whether students had memorized, say, mathematical formulas or major dates in American history, and whether they could competently compose an essay. Some students would move on to higher levels of education, where critical thinking skills would become important, but the majority would graduate high school with no need for more education, since they would have assured jobs in the agricultural, industrial, or service sectors. But with the exception of service jobs, the employment horizons today have changed drastically. Neither agriculture or industry has need for large numbers of employees-and those industrial jobs that do remain or are being created require workers with a high level of technical knowledge, as well as critical thinking and problem-solving skills. As knowledge expands exponentially in most fields, problem-solving and integration of processes is crucial. Businesses operate globally, meaning that their employees interact with people from different cultures who see the world in different ways. The expression "thinking outside the box" might well be altered to "thinking outside the American educational system" as far as knowledge and skill needs are concerned. While it is true than some students "are fortunate enough to attend highly effective schools or at least encounter great teachers" (Rotherham and Willingham 352), the vast majority attend schools that are designed on the model of the 20th century.
What, then, are the skills that students need to acquire in the course of their education? Opinion is not unanimous, but this list from the website "What Is 21st Century Education?" provides a fair enumeration:
- Critical thinking and problem solving
- Collaboration across networks and leading by influence
- Agility and adaptability
- Initiative and entrepreneurialism
- Effective oral and written communication
- Accessing and analyzing information
- Curiosity and imagination
Notably, the only skill on the list that is a universal goal of curricula in today's schools is "effective oral and written communication." Granted, critical thinking and problem-solving are emphasized in many schools, as are information access and analysis, but they are not always treated as crucial to a complete education. Even more importantly, they are skills that are not easily measured by standardized tests. Adaptability, imagination, initiative, and the other skills are even less amenable to assessment by paper-and-pencil testing methods, which is one reason why they are seldom practiced as outcome goals. This is a shame, since outcomes of student projects (as opposed to timed paper-and-pencil tests) are an important element of a 21st century educational plan.
An up-to-date teaching plan would look considerably different. It would focus not on the "memorization of discrete facts" (What Is 21st Century Education?), but on teaching students how to access, analyze, and use information, and to create new ideas. It would go beyond the lower levels of Bloom's Taxonomy (remembering, understanding, applying) to higher levels (analyzing, evaluating, creating), where students would process knowledge acquired at the lower levels. Old-style learning is passive, driven by teachers and textbooks; new-style learning is active and dependent on student exploration, research, and creativity. Rather than a curriculum broken into distinct units, the curriculum would be interdisciplinary, with integration of subjects. Students would be given the chance to explore their interests as they learn a wide range of skills in a range of disciplines, working both independently and in groups. Learning communication skills would be essential (Noll 351), and both group and individual projects would be assigned. Multiple intelligences would be valued and utilized, and teaching methods would be flexible. Lessons would be designed to develop the abilities of students with all types of intelligences: linguistic, logical-mathematical, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, naturalist, and existential (McFarlane Table 1). Students would acquire a variety of literacies: environmental, cyber, health, multicultural, social, media, financial, and arts-related. Teachers would engage students' higher order thinking skills and teach them metacognitive strategies for understanding their own learning. Technology would be used to the students' benefit-an important consideration, since most students today rely on technology for social purposes, while often failing to acquire technology skills that would qualify them for high-quality jobs. The entire globe would be used as an educational tool, connecting American students with others around the world. Note that all of these descriptions center on methods of delivering education, not on the content itself. Much, if not most, of the content taught today should be taught tomorrow. The change will occur in how students acquire knowledge, and what they learn to do with it. Education in the 21st century should not be equal to job-skills training; it should provide exposure to the arts, sciences, and more-but it should do so in a way that allows students to discover and utilize knowledge in a way that will benefit them in the post-school world.
But a changed system of delivery will require a changed system of assessment, since teachers will always need to determine whether their students are actually achieving their academic goals. As Rotherham and Willingham point out (356), multiple choice tests, while easy to administer and grade, will not suffice for measuring progress in a 21st century classroom. Creativity, initiative, analytical ability, and other 21st century skills are not amenable to assessment by a standardized test; in fact, standardization is a trait of factory-model education. And yet, twelve years into the 21st century, standardized testing is still the norm nationwide. That it is a nationwide practice "is largely due to the passing of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, . . . the federal US law mandating high-stakes testing in mathematics and reading/language arts that uses the threat of loss of federal funding for failing schools and districts" (Au 29-30). As a result, schools have little choice but to teach the discrete facts and skills that will be on the standardized test and to do so in the most efficient, prescribed manner. Curricula must conform to the test-and the test is not designed to assess 21st century skills. Teachers are "both disempower[ed] and deskill[ed]" by the strictures of the current educational system (Au 30), yet they must conform if they hope to keep their jobs. Furthermore, the emphasis on reading and math skills frequently results in the elimination of classes in other subjects in order to clear more time for the teaching of the language arts and mathematical skills that will be on the test. Au calls this "zero-sum curriculum" (30), since tested content squeezes out learning that will not be on the test. This standardization and narrowing of the curriculum also precludes the use of teaching methods that instruct using 21st century skills, since teachers seldom have time to employ these methods. Despite the increasing realization that students are being shortchanged by the continued use of an outdated educational model, the practice continues in most American schools.
To say that American education stands at a crossroads is an understatement. Public support is badly needed in order to bring about change in the educational establishment-and just as important, in legislative bodies. The natural inclination is for those who have already completed their educations to think that "what worked for me will work for today's kids, too." Despite President Obama's continual call for an educational system that meets the needs of the 21st century, the public does not seem incentivized to take action. Perhaps it is because so many families are struggling to meet their basic needs, they do not have the time or the will to think about overhauling education. But as American society recovers, as it eventually will, attention must be paid to what is happening (or not happening) in our schools. If we continue to shortchange students on the skills they need, we will have created a lost generation of adults who have no ability to participate in the economic growth of the 21st century. Bill Clinton's bridge to the 21st century will have collapsed before our eyes. We need to realize the critical need for changes in education, and cross the bridge while we still can.
Works Cited
Au, Wayne. "Teaching Under the New Taylorism: High-stakes Testing and the Standardization of the 21st Century Curriculum." Journal of Curriculum Studies 43.1: 24-45. Academic Source Premier.
Clinton, Bill. Second Inaugural Address. Web.
Lowther, Deborah L., Fethi A. Inan, Steven M. Ross, and J. Daniela Strahl. "Do One-to-One Initiatives Bridge the Way to 21st Century Knowledge and Skills?" Journal of Educational Computing Research 46.1: 1-30. ERIC.
McFarlane, Donovan A. "Multiple Intelligences: The Most Effective Platform for Global 21st Century Educational and Instructional Methodologies." College Quarterly 14.2: n.p. ERIC.
Noll, James William. Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Educational Issues. 17th ed. Ed. James William Noll. New York: McGraw Hill. Print.
Preus, Betty. "Authentic Instruction for 21st Century Learning: Higher Order Thinking in an Inclusive School." American Secondary Education 40.3: 59-79. Academic Source Premier. Web.
Rotherham, Andrew J., and Daniel T. Willingham. "21st Century Skills: The Challenges Ahead." Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Educational Issues. 17th ed. Ed. James William Noll. 352-58. New York: McGraw Hill. Print.
Senechal, Diane. "The Most Daring Education Reform of All." Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Educational Issues. 17th ed. Ed. James William Noll. 359-70. New York: McGraw Hill. Print.
Stone, Kyle B., Karen Kaminski, and Gene Gloeckner. "Closing the Gap: Education Requirements of the 21st Century Production Workforce." Journal of Industrial Teacher Education 45.3: 5-33. ERIC.
"What Is 21st Century Education?" 21st Century Schools.