Administration and Resources

Educational Goals for the 21st Century

The skills and knowledge required just 20-30 years ago have changed and are no longer sufficient to guarantee students success once they have graduated. The Partnership for 21st Skills working hard to describe the skills required as well as helping to define the steps required to teach 21st century skills. Multimedia and Internet Schools Magazine featured an article titled Why We Need to Teach 21st Century Skills-And How to Do It. This article discusses the need to teach 21st skills and provides a framework for implementing 21st Century Skills in the classroom. If you are a K-12 school teacher, Technology and Learning-The Resource for Education Technology Leaders will be an excellent read.

Educational Resources

Apple, Inc. is very active in the education field. They provide training in creating media as well as examples of how to use the media in the classroom.

Apple Education, Apple K-12 and Apple Higher Education

The article Equity and Excellence in Higher Education looks at the complexities of learning and how learning styles affect student outcomes.

Professional Development

I would highly recommend joining the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) if you have an interest in integrating technology into the classrom. Another excellent organization is The Consortium for School Networking (CoSN). The name is a little misleading as this organization covers a number of technology areas in addition to networking. If you are working in higher education then you may want to consider joining the Association of University Technology Managers (AUTM). If you are an educator in the State of Michigan then Michigan Virtual University may be of interest. This non-profit organization provides a number of online resources and training sources for educators.

A new view of Education in Higher Education

Massachussets Institute of Technology, Stanford, and Berkley are providing course content online as HTML, PDF, or podcast. This open approach to education signifies that content provided in the classroom is not the key to obtaining a degree from any of the above presigious educational entities. The degree from one of these organizations signifies learning based on the abilities of the instructor in the classroom, the student experience, and the classroom activities (reading, writing, resarch). The MIT course offerings and philosophy are availalbe at Opening Up Education-Table of Contents-The MIT Press.

Social Constructivism is a learning theory based on collaboration, critical thinking, and problem based learning. Dean Groom is an Australian educator who works in information communication and technology (ICT) at an Australian University. He is an excellent writer with many insights into the educational revolution that is sweeping acoss the world.

Copyright Issues in the teaching of 21st Century Skills

Unfortunately technology has developed far faster than intellectual property laws. As a result, there are many challenges for teachers using media in the classroom. I have included several excellent resources on copyright and intellectual property:

Resource Library--Center for Social Media

The Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Media Literacy Education--Pulication--Center for Social Media at American University

Copyright Guidelines for Administrators