ICT is catering to 21st century Learners

This week’s article entitled ‘Twenty-first Century Skills for Twenty-first Century Learners’ outlines what students will need to be competent at, in order to succeed in today’s digital era. The article emphasises the need for a change in traditional teaching approaches stating, “Learning increases significantly when students are engaged in academic study through authentic, real-world experiences”. The article also highlighted the many digital age literacy’s, inventive thinking strategies, high communication skills and mechanisms to be highly productive that students will need to develop in order to compete.

Another article explored this week discussed “How Exemplary Computer-Using Teachers Differ From Other Teachers and the subsequent Implications for Realizing the Potential of Computers in Schools. The results varied depending on the teacher’s education, the teachers experience in computing and their gender. The study concluded that the exemplary teachers were in supportive environments, they were skilled and willing to use computers, made strong demands on available resources and openly “allowed computers to have a much greater impact in how and what they teach”.

So what are the implications of this study for pre-service teachers? I believe it is saying implementing ICT is not always easy, you have to push for IT, you have to educate yourself first, then lead by example so you can educate others and create a strong culture of ICT.   

This week I built and added a QR code to my blog after reading Jessica Newman’s post on Google Groups about how easy they are to make. After building the QR code I realised that it is these sorts of online collaborative environments that draw people in and inadvertently learning.     

Personally I am a fan of students developing a sense of ‘Australian’ identity and being able to access Australian specific resources online. This week I came across a useful website by a Gold Coast teacher I met at a PD session. The website http://ideasforteachers.wordpress.com  has an extensive list of resources for all Queensland Key Learning Areas as well as general ICT integration.

References

Becker, H.J. (2000). How exemplary computer-using teachers differ from other teachers: Implications for realizing the potential of computers in schools. Retrieved from: http://www.zagami.info/4001EPS/Readings/Entries/2011/3/28_Entry_1.html

                     

Metiri Group. (2003). Twenty-first Century Skills for Twenty-first Century Learners. Retrieved from: http://www.zagami.info/4001EPS/Readings/Entries/2011/3/28_Entry_1.html