p>I intended this title to be controversial. How else does one get attention?
Will Richardson offered a post a few days ago commenting (criticizing) a Washington Post column by Jay Matthews. The title of Matthew’s piece “The latest doomed pedagogical fad: 21st century skills” may offer some insight into the focus of the article. Actually, I read the article and found it much more neutral than you might expect from the title. Again, you get little attention for being neutral.
In discussion the nuances of 21st century learning and the value of active online participation, Richardson claims:
But while that can sound like a pretty positive and powerful space, it is fraught with complexity. We have to learn to read not only texts but to edit them as well, not just for accuracy but for bias, agenda and motive.
I could not agree more.
Here is my take – hopefully including an attempt to evaluate for agenda and motive. I agree with the Richardson position that “interest based”, “friendship based”, and “passion based” learning is great. We have all had such experiences and these experiences may have shaped our careers. We may enjoy such commitment outside of our areas of employment and continue to toil into the night cultivating skills that are valued by few and compensated by no one. When we reflect on our interests (science fiction, bird watching, stamp collecting, photography, music performance), we may wonder why others do not share our passions. The reality is that some of us will listen for hours to classical music and others see this pursuit as boring. Education is a lot like this – I still find some tasks quite tedious, but realize in my maturity that this is what my job entails. Others experience these same tasks with a different mix of enthusiasm and boredom.
Richardson speaks of his personal experience in blogging for 7 years. It is true that some of us have committed to this activity for this long, but the reality is that we are in the extreme minority. Most folks who start blogs quickly give it up. Simply put – what are exciting tools and learning experiences for some are not that interesting to others – even those who give it a shot.
I do think that educators should be open to the potential of new tools and new methods. Exposure to these tools and methods will be quite exciting for some students. Others we will find will not engage unless we grade, carefully list the number of required posts, etc. The skills we find exciting and important will be recognized as such by some, but not others. Group-based education kind of works like this and always has.
