Learning for 21st century skills

in

AFRICA

How does 21st century learning differ

from current practice and models

in African schools?

In this presentation, I will not be considering

-ICTs as teaching/learning tools ( = a different sort of book), or ICTs as a subject,

but

some of the implications of virtuality in terms of learning,

and what they might mean for thinking about curriculum

A knowledge-based society

Have we not always had knowledge-based

societies?

Can there be a human society without knowledge?

Now the knowledge-based economy is being spread.

By whom? For whom?

- what still exists for knowledge production and innovation?

Indigenous knowledge systems in Africa

New knowledge is also needed, new ways of thinking,

and new modes of communication!

Huge challenges in education...

...and attempts to use ICTs to meet some of the challenges

The greatest digital divide...

The world is globalised....

...how can we make it glocalised?

New ways of thinking, new ways of knowing

Changing thinking changes ways of knowing

Changing ways of knowing changes thinking.

Reflect....

What has changed your way of thinking?

What has it changed from...

...and to?

Share with your neighbour.

Put these 21st century skills in order of importance:

Digital Age Literacy (incl. global awareness, scientific and economic literacies):

Effective Communication (incl. interpersonal skills, collaboration);

Inventive/Innovative Thinking (incl. managing complexity, curiosity, creativity, synthesis, analysis);

High Productivity (incl. prioritization, planning, managing for results)

Share with your neighbour.

Are there any skills - or domains - missing which you think are also needed for the 21st century?

Make a note of those.

Share with your neighbour.

I wonder...

What happened to:

- identity?

- critical thinking?

- values?

Let’s not take anything for given!

BUT...

...we are entering the second decade of the 21st century

- some African children are fully ICT literate

- ICTs are spreading

- and with other challenges, new knowledge, new ways of thinking, new ways of knowing are needed

Where are we now?

What is the nature of the last curriculum and/or assessment reform in your country?

When was it?

Why was it necessary?

Was it a back-to-the drawing board complete redesign?

How successful would you say it was, seen from a system perspective?

What were the constraints?

My experience:

- from objectives to competencies or outcomes

- complete redesign only in South Africa

- successful in “good” schools and teachers; not in others

- assessment to match curriculum is too resource demanding: compromise: backwash effect

- teacher education not in tune, teacher educators too far behind; teaching still mostly conventional

- the education system as a whole is under-resourced

- learning constrained by poverty, malnutrition, illiteracy, impact of HIV/AIDS

Curriculum reform is a political process

where expertise has to work with

different constituencies

Make bullet points:

What problems have you encountered when trying to get approval to redesign or change curriculum or assessment, or for changes that have been made?

What bodies does approval have to go through?

What constituencies do you have to negotiate with?

What sort of arguments supported changes you wanted to make? What sort of arguments constrained the changes you wanted to make?

Share with your neighbour

In my experience, complete redesign of curriculum constrained by:

-power-knowledge relationships = vested interests

- lack of updated knowledge about learning, intelligence, knowledge, curriculum, assessment

- political and parental fear

- mindsets

- resourcing

Do we need complete redesign for the 21st century?

PREVIOUS KNOWLEDGE SYSTEMS

- COMMUNITY (family, village, town)

- VOCATIONAL TRAINING

- NON-FORMAL/COMPLEMENTARY

- FORMAL SCHOOLING

EACH OF THESE HAS ITS OWN WAYS OF ORGANISING

-knowledge-knowledge - time- time

-space-space - material/s - material/s

-grouping-grouping - instruction- instruction

-assessmentassessment - recognition- recognition

VIRTUALITY IS REVOLUTIONISING

- INFORMATION

- KNOWLEDGE

-TIME

- SPACE

- KNOWLEDGE-POWER RELATIONSHIPS

- THINKING

CURRICULUM USED TO BE THOUGHT TO BE GIVEN

(DELIVERED)

BUT IT IS APPROPRIATED BY THE LEARNER.

ASSESSMENT FINDS OUT HOW MUCH HAS BEEN APPROPRIATED OF THE GIVEN, BUT NOT WHAT ELSE...e.g.

Language Family life

Food & Health

Arts Traditions Locality Beliefs & values

Games & sports

Practical skills

Senior Puberty Š full adulthood

approx. 6 yrs. Š onset of puberty

0 Š approx. 6 yrs

...can be “curricularised” like schooling. It is still given...

...and appropriated. It used to be all you needed to know.

Mother

tongue

English

French

Portu-guese

Maths Natural

Science

Social

Science

Arts P.E. Tech nology

Commerce

Environ-ment

HIV/AIDS

Demo-cracy, Human Rights

Health

Population

Given this knowledge system, curricula are exploding in Africa.

Formal education to a large extent replaced the community curriculum.

Now the children appropriate the world!

Many countries are trying to revise curricula by

constructing frameworks of key skills or outcomes.

But that is not redesign.

The old theories and ways of thinking still underpin curriculum and assessment: taxonomies, hierarchies, linear stages...

Implications of new theories are not fully realised:

- multiple intelligences

-the zone of proximal development

- feminist pedagogy

Pedagogy is supposed to be

-constructivist

- learner-centred

- interactive

but is still largely conventional across the continent.

When pedagogy is practiced as intended, it often causes tensions in relation to community values and culture e.g. especially not questioning elders and traditions.

With virtuality, the changes will be much greater, e.g.:

The learner decides what s/he learns, when they learn it, how, and with whom

Virtuality is changing the way children think, changing intelligences, and changing meaning

Being self-directed, scope and sequence are not given

Intuition plays a very large role

The teacher/instructor is no longer

the arbiter of knowledge, only of schooling

So how do we develop 21st century skills

in teachers in Africa?

How do we develop 21st century skills

in teacher educators in Africa?

Now we are in a stage of formalising virtual learning,

and virtualising formal learning

Suppose we do something really different...

Suppose we re-classified knowledge

...it would be progress, but still not be enough

We could start with the skills, then select and shape the substance,

(but leave a lot open)

and decide what to assess and how

but that would not be enough, because virtuality is even changing epistemology

We have to start by thinking about:

- what is knowledge and what will it be?

- what is learning and what will it be?

- how can we adapt time, space, grouping to use the full learning potential of virtuality?

- how would we curricularise all that?

- how would we assess learning?

-how would we negotiate all that given our constituencies?

It could be a minimalist process curriculum:

Themes to explore and anticipated outcomes

The rest is up to the learners and teachers:

- learners decide how they will explore the theme, search, shape, present

- the teacher models, challenges, supports, gives input where needed

- learners and teacher assess

- the teacher supplements where necessary

Then the barriers between knowledge systems can disappear:

BUT:

Will 21st century learning in Africa be education for all?

or

Will it reproduce the existing structure of the system: an elite gain the skills needed to serve global economic interests? As for the rest....?

Beware!!

The discourse of knowledge-based economies is one of competition

not cooperation,

Individualism

not collectivity.

How can we ensure that African values imbue learning for the 21st century?