WoW! Here Comes The 21st Century Skills!

Incredible. Interesting. Impressive. Exciting. Confusing. These are the first words that came to mind once I began to maneuver myself around the 21st Century Skills website. The first thing that caught my attention was on the left hand corner of their website:

“The leading advocacy organization
infusing 21st century skills into education.”

Do they ever. Their vision and mission feels like they actually care about what is going on in the world of education. Many times you hear the governor and state school leaders of your area talking about what they plan to do in order to help your school and teachers out but nothing ever becomes of it. It seems like this is almost too good to be true where you have a company of people who devote time to helping educators do their job with the technology and resources that they need.

It is surprising to me that there are not more states that are involved with this website. This makes me wonder why? I teach in one of the best states or so they say, New York, and why is New York not apart of this partnership?

Confusion sets in for me when it comes to exactly what does the Partnership for the 21st Century (P21) do for you and your school system? I have seen many different exciting and magnificent acknowledgments of the website, but what does the partnership do for you? Do they give you lesson plans or ideas on what you should be teaching or how you should be teaching it?

As educators, we all know that the future is going to be technology based and we need to start teaching our students various ways to make themselves ready for the work world.

P21 foundation furthers the already known; we need to be aware of technological advances and connections between business’ in the community and school are extremely important.

Don't we already do this without P21?

Creating partnerships …
Implementing technology …

I think that most of our schools already do …

HOWEVER

incorporating P21 would make the process a lot easier and painless!

P21st Mission statement

Serve as a catalyst to position 21st century skills at the center of US K-12 education by building collaborative partnerships among education, business, community and government leaders.

Is this too good to be true?
Why isn’t ever state apart of this program?

See for yourself, visit http://www.21stcenturyskills.org/index.php

Using Blogs As A Teaching Tool

There are a couple of ideas that came to my mind how I would / could use a blog in my classroom. I teach the 6th grade which covers all areas. Writing is one thing that my students struggle with, so I thought of some ideas that I could use blogs for. I feel that blogging could help the students become more focused and care more about their work. It also might be a good way to motivate and develop interest in a subject that might not be their favorite.

The first idea was for them to search through blogs online to help them try and determine the difference between fact and opinion. They would have to figure out how to come up with supporting evidence of their choice.

The students could also find a website that they could use to help them prepare a persuasive essay. It would give them background knowledge to use in their preparation.

Once the students have concluded each of their responses to either one of the activities they will be able to post their responses online for the rest of the class / myself to see. This will enable conversations between the students outside of school. Not only will I / the rest of the class be able to see their responses, the rest of the world would / could be able to respond to their answers. This might empower the students to take more time and pride in their answers knowing that any online web user will be able to see what they are writing.

Once all of their work is done, it could possibly make them happy to publish their work online for all to see. Pride and respect may be gained upon posting.

First Time Blogger!

This is my first blog ever! I am trying to figure this whole blog thing out and cannot wait to become an expert. I am trying new things with my blog so I am sorry for some of the things online that are not exactly what we are doing with Walden. Please feel free to make comments and give me any ideas on how to make my blog better!

Determining What To Use in School?

Who gets to determine which websites should be allowed in a school district? I have had some students wondering why we were unable to access YouTube or Facebook within the school? These are two of the websites that come to mind that could be an amazing teaching tool if utilized in the appropriate manner. On the other hand, there are many things that could possibly go wrong with the use of the Internet.

I am wondering who gets to make the choices on which websites are allowed for the use of the school? Where do they get their information from and who do they have to get it approved by?