Many professionals believe that the education of the future will be built with active methods and technological applications; others are betting on artificial intelligence and adaptive approaches; some are walking the gamification path, and there are still groups betting on hybrid education, among others.
No doubt the future, or rather the present, already demands a new education.
Because the world has changed, it has become more confusing, complex, dynamic and uncertain.
We have no way of predicting what the labor market will be like, what challenges the new citizenship will have to face; nor the human conflicts that will possibly emerge from the hybrid nature of our world and ourselves.
In this sense we have to understand that we are not alone in this endeavor, as Newton put it:
"If I saw further, it was because I stood on the shoulders of giants."
For this reason, more than ever we must think about who we are, where we come from, and what knowledge we have accumulated throughout our history that can help us build bridges to the future.
There is no use in following fads or justifying our actions because someone said something, we need to CHANGE, and the first effective change would be to stop with the useless fads and understand that cognitive processes depend on the context of construction, and that there is not a single future, as many people like to point out.
So, let's start at the beginning, what subject do we want to form? And for what?
The first step is to define our objectives by thinking about the learning subject we need to form. What competencies, knowledge, skills, attitudes and values will be necessary to face this new world that we are beginning to see.
There are numerous interesting framewoks to assist in this discussion, this one that illustrates the article, elaborated in the World Economic Forum of the year 2015, presents three dimensions that involve not only the professional dimension but also the development of a personal and citizen dimension, considering core knowledge that students will need to develop for a full insertion in their societies, in addition to the approaches to the complexity and dynamics of the world with new skills, attitudes and values.
The following model was created in the year 2006 and was updated in 2015 by US Department of Education, Apple, AOL, Microsoft, Cisco, and SAP, and organizations involved in education.
The interesting thing about this framework is the fact that it was built by teachers and educational managers, educational authorities, companies, and several social organizations; presenting a holistic vision that looks at the basic knowledge, skills, attitudes, and values related not only to the professional dimension, but also to the personal and citizen dimension, considering the main challenges of the 21st century.
Finally, the European community framework also involves a multidimensional view concretized in 7 dimensions with recommendations for policy making involving content and curricula, assessment, teacher development, organization and leadership, connectivity, and infrastructure.
Of course, these 7 dimensions take on different connotations by focusing on those considered most important in each dimension.
As we have seen, in the World Economic Forum, as well as in the United States and the European Community, the most important thing in building the future is not the technologies, but the vision of the world and of the complexity of the educational system that requires a holistic and interdisciplinary approach.
The most important thing for change, as Google for Education clearly exposes is:
School change only happens when there is a strong vision at the start. When a school has a clear vision it means the leader has ensured that the school and wider community are working together toward shared goals for the future. (School change only happens when there is a strong vision at the start. When a school has a clear vision it means the leader has ensured that the school and wider community are working together toward shared goals for the future).
(Article originally published on April 9, 2018 on Linkedin)
