Recognizing the complexity of the world our students will be entering allows us to consider how best we should be preparing them. The focus of this week’s post is assessment and my question is:
How can coaches support educators to rethink traditional assessment practices to better prepare students for 21st century learning and working environments.
What are 21st Century learning Skills?
As teachers, our job is to prepare our students to be productive citizens in the world, and already twenty years in to the 21st century it is abundantly clear that the world we are preparing them for has changed significantly, even in the last twenty years. Significant factors for this change include environmental concerns, evolving societal norms and conventions, increasing political upheavals – and most especially innovations in technology. Most agree that we are preparing students for jobs that do not yet exist and for a future that is not easy to predict. So what 21st century skills will be necessary to navigate this world of work?
In my investigation I have found information about the C’s of 21st century learning skills. The 4C’s (Creativity, Communication, Collaboration and Critical Thinking) became the 5 C’s (to the list add Character,) and then the 6 C’s (add Citizenship) and the 7C’s (add Computing.) There are many great articles and posts regarding all the C’s, but I enjoyed and learned from this one by Brian Bullock: 21st Century learning: Sailing the seven C’s. However, the article that I have found most informative is a post which expanded the list even further, What are 21st Century Skills, written by Bri Stauffer. She lists 12 fundamental skills required for successfully navigating the world of work in the 21st Century and these skills are further divided into three categories: learning skills, literacy skills and life skills. Eventually I stumbled upon a list of 21st Century skills developed by P21: A Partnership for 21st Century Learning:
Just to deepen my own understanding, I created an infographic of all the 21st century learning skills (so far:)
21st-Century-learning-Skills-1
How do Traditional Assessments differ from Assessments for Deeper Learning?
In their research paper titled Creating Systems of Assessment for Deeper Learning, Linda Darling-Hammond and David Conley clearly demonstrate that new systems of assessment are needed if students are to engage in 21st century careers.
Genuine readiness for college and 21st century careers, as well as participation in today’s democratic society, requires, much more than “bubbling in” answers on a test.
Darling Hammond and Conley (2013)
Darling-Hammond and Conley suggest that students “need to be able to find, evaluate, synthesize, frame, and use knowledge in new contexts, and to be able to solve non-routine problems and produce research findings and solutions [as well as] well-developed thinking skills, problem-solving abilities, design strategies, and communication capabilities.”
In a white paper titled, Marilyn M Lombardi shows how re-thinking current assessment practices offers new ways of articulating what we value most in education. Authentic assessments can motivate and inspire learners to explore dimensions of themselves and the world that they might otherwise overlook. Lombardi has listed the differences between traditional and authentic assessment for deeper learning:
Traditional vs. Authentic Assessments for Deeper Learning
Project Based Learning: A marriage of traditional and authentic assessment.
Project-based learning meets the requirements of 21st Century learning. Two summers ago I attended a PBL Works workshop, PBL 101. The experience was amazing, a whole lot of learning was packed into three days.
The biggest take-away for me was about assessment. PBL assessment includes both traditional and authentic measures of informing or improving learning. Assessments should be appropriate for the task, learning outcome being measured, and the students’ needs. My notes from the workshop explain that high quality authentic assessment should include feedback loops, critique, self and peer reflection, and revision. For more information and some great examples of PBL Works project design and assessment elements and protocols, visit PBL Works.
A second take-away for me was a reaction from a colleague. According to my colleague, the information and the projects were great, however it would take too much time and energy to transform her curriculum and her current assessments.
The role of the peer coach
So, obviously my colleague and I has some discussions regarding PBL, but at that time I was not wearing my coach hat. My question for this post is How can coaches support educators to rethink traditional assessment practices to better prepare students for 21st century learning and working environments, and my answer is derived from the work of Les Foltos. He writes that in his experience teachers do not have a “clear, concrete understanding of the characteristics of a learning activity that will prepare students with [21st Century] skills or the pedagogy required to offer students this kind of learning” (Foltos 201**.)
Foltos’ answer to this dilemma is for Peer Coaches to introduce the idea of 21st century learning skills through conversation:
- ask their learning partner what skills or competencies they feel their students need
- ask about the school’s educational goals and what sort of learning activities support those goals
- ask what learning skills may be essential for the future of their students
Foltos provides The Learning Checklist, a Peer Coaching tool devised by Eeva Reeder which guides peer coaches and teachers to make practical shifts within current lesson plans to promote 21st century learning. The checklist is divided into four learning characteristics: Standards-based Task; Engaging Task; Problem-based Task; Technology Enables and Accelerates Learning and each of the characteristics has tasks which align with 21st century learning skills.
The power of one small change
Foltos also suggests that a peer coach should ‘start small’. “It will be critical to define just a few aspects of the learning activity the teacher wants to focus on improving” (Foltos 2100.) This is exactly the message that would have benefitted my colleague. Thinking about re-working a whole lesson plan is overwhelming, but focusing in on one key aspect is manageable – and makes a difference. Armed with this knowledge, I think I would have encouraged my PBL-workshop-colleague to ‘start small’; to transform her lesson plans by focusing on just one aspect of the Learning Design matrix at a time. We were both at the workshop because we are interested in giving our students the best possible learning experience.
I’m getting ready to start my 7th graders on their persuasive essay. For fun, I’m having a coaching conversation with myself. Quite frankly, I’ve presented this lesson for a few years now. It’s pretty solid and with my slick rubric, easy to grade. But it does not align with 21st century learning. I’ve decided to make the assignment more engaging: this year the students will have a choice board which includes choosing their own topic and format of presentation. Students will also be engaged in more peer and self reflections, so it will also give me more opportunities for authentic assessment. Hopefully, I can ‘walk the talk’ as a coach.
References
Foltos, L. (2013). Peer Coaching : Unlocking the Power of Collaboration. Corwin.
(n.d.). Retrieved November 05, 2020, from https://battelleforkids.org/networks/p21
Bullock, B. (2010, March 31). 21st-Century learning: Sailing the seven C’s. Retrieved November 05, 2020, from https://santamariatimes.com/news/local/education/21st-century-learning-sailing-the-seven-c-s/article_0e50cdb0-3c8d-11df-b267-001cc4c002e0.html
Framework for 21st Century Learning Definitions. (n.d.). Retrieved November 04, 2020, from http://static.battelleforkids.org/documents/p21/P21_Framework_DefinitionsBFK.pdf
Knezevic, A. (2018, January 12). 21st Century Skills: 6 C’s of Education in Your Classroom: AWW Blog. Retrieved November 05, 2020, from http://blog.awwapp.com/6-cs-of-education-classroom/
Lombardi, M. (n.d.). Making the Grade: The Role of Assessment in Authentic Learning. Retrieved November 4, 2020, from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/255625745_Making_the_Grade_The_Role_of_Assessment_in_Authentic_Learning/citation/download
Stauffer, B. (2020, March 19). What Are 21st Century Skills? Retrieved November 05, 2020, from https://www.aeseducation.com/blog/what-are-21st-century-skills
Vivekanandan, R., & Pierre-Louis, M. (2020). 21st-Century Skills: What potential role for the Global Partnership for Education? A Landscape Review. Retrieved November 04, 2020, from https://www.globalpartnership.org/sites/default/files/document/file/2020-01-GPE-21-century-skills-report.pdf
What is PBL? (n.d.). Retrieved November 05, 2020, from https://www.pblworks.org/what-is-pbl
