Reflections of Workshop #9

Response Workshop #9
Christine Jenkins
March 6, 2009

Education in the 21st century must make a fundamental shift in the academic experiences of students. We need to change our definitions of school and learner to fit with our technological world. The common practice of setting standards for learning and applying those standards in a traditional classroom, and then measuring student achievement with paper and pencil tests is not the course for student improvement. It does not make economic sense to perpetuate classrooms of the 1950’s when we live and communicate in a global community. Current classroom systems will not be effective in this global community so we need to think of a new community system where school exists as only one way to learn.

Publishers and educators who believe that there is a panacea cure for reducing long term literacy failure are heading off in the wrong direction. Literacy in the 21st century will not be simply about learning to read and learning from reading. Students will need to be able to use a variety of global connections to find and validate information. As they synthesis new information, they will also need to collaborate with others as they use the information to problem solve.

I was reminded of the brave Ontario high school student who used “facebook” to organize young teenage drivers across the province to collectively express their displeasure at proposed legislation for newly licensed drivers. The premier of the province recanted the proposed legislative changes as direct result of the electronic petition. The speedy and effective campaign was initiated by a single student who had learned how to think and how to take risks in a community system.

I am also reminded of the two high school students who used the internet to express their outrage after witnessing a peer being harassed and bullied for wearing a pink shirt to school. Their global connection was the beginning of the pink T –shirt campaign which allows everyone to take a stand against bullying.

The combination of global connections and a community system of learning is the way that literacy can bring about social change. As educators we can no longer think about literacy as learning the basics of reading and writing. We can no longer think of curriculum as a prescriptive approach to content learning. In schools of the 21st century, students need think, reason, make decisions and demonstrate values that are consistent with a democratic society. Teachers need to engage students in real-world problems and questions that matter. If educators use a student-centered collaborative approach, using schools as a way for students to come together for joint projects, then literacy may be a way to create social change and schools may meet the needs or marginalized or at risk students.