Besides success in life what do these three people have in common? FAILURE in school.
I started teaching in 2008, after graduating from Providence College, in Providence Rhode Island. My first job was teaching middle school math and science. To say I felt ill prepared would be an understatement. However, I approached the year full of optimism and eager to create a dialogue with my students. I strongly believe in the exchange of information that takes place between students and teachers. Each year I joke that I learn more from my students then they learn from me. I hope that's not the case. In any rate, after just two years of teaching I quickly realized the frustrations that all teachers feel. I was bogged down by state mandated assessments, which left me little room for the incredible sense of creativity that I felt I could bring to my classroom. Eager to create change and learn more, I decided that I would apply to Providence College, to pursue my masters degree. One year into my program, my husband received a great job opportunity in Raleigh North Carolina. Never one to pass down a great opportunity we packed up and moved. Once we settled in, I transferred into the NLGL program at North Carolina State University. I was particularly excited about the global learning component to the program, which was notably absent from the program I transferred out of. After job hunting for a year I was hired to teach 4th grade at a small private school in Cary. WHOO HOOO! Yet again I couldn't wait to unleash my passion and creativity into my classroom. Unfortunately I found the classroom conditions in Raleigh much the same as the classroom conditions in Providence. Over 800 miles of separation, but the same problem persists. I began to wonder, how can I change this?
Cosmopolitanism, asserts that as citizens of the world, we have certain responsibilities toward each other and the planet in which we share. Educators have started to view these responsibilities as global competencies. “Global competence is the capacity and disposition to understand and act on issues of global significance. (Mansillia, 2011, p, 13) Mansilla (2011) further suggests that there are four major competencies: investigation, recognizing perspectives, communicating ideas and taking action (p.21). The world we understood to be round has been flattened. Planes can take people to the opposite side of the world in 24 hours or less. The internet has granted people unprecedented first hand access to once little known societies, cultures and languages. These changes can be best summarized by Gates (1999) when he states, “Welcome to the second decade of the 21st century, where information has been globalized, digitized, and sped up to move at the speed of thought” (Morell, 2012, p.2) Research has proven that global learning and technology are closely intertwined. The presence of technology in the classroom has lead students to be more prepared, feel more connected and caused them to be more engaged in the classroom.
Marc Pernsky ( 2011) found students are highly capable of preparing themselves for the 21st century, and are doing so in the place of their teachers. It has become increasingly more obvious that factors Daniel Pink (2005) refer to as “Asia, Abundance and Automation” have caused a shift from the industrial to the conceptual age. In the conceptual age, technology, globalization and innovative thinking are critically necessary skills. It is clear that changes need to be made in the classroom, to reflect shifts and changes that have taken place outside of the classroom. The research team of Spires et all in their work entitled, Having Our Say (2005), found that students had strong opinions on how technology should be used in their classroom to increase their engagement levels and to better prepare them to graduate into the global workforce. The team found that students feel a lack of preparedness and perceive a gap between their at home and at school technology uses. Many researchers have advocated for the use of technology in the classroom. It is clear that when correctly integrated into the teacher pedagogy the results can be substantial gains for the students. In terms of preparedness research has shown that that students need to have technology skills to compete for jobs in the global market. In terms of connectedness research has shown that, “digital technologies have the capacity to link individuals from around the world” (Matthews, 2012, p135). In the classroom students can have live conversations with others all over the word. They can reflect on how their situations are similar, and how they are different. Furthermore students can reflect on problems that are happening in different parts of the world and brainstorm ways to solve them. Connectedness helps to instill the idea of global citizenship. Helping students view people with an “us” versus “them” mentality. In terms of engagement research has shown that technologies presence in the classroom leads to a greater level of student engagement. Knoble (2009) found, “There is little doubt that adolescents are engaging with new media and technologies and using new and everyday literacies in ways that are of high interest and engagement, connected to important social interactions and activities and powerfully shaping identities” (Baildon, p. 24) Whether developing a profile on MySpace or blogging with students across the globe, new literacies are creating a highly engaging atmosphere for middle level learners. At an early age students have the ability to affect change, and if provided the proper support and resources they can implement change. Furthermore students possess the innate awareness to care about “others”. Technology provides the necessary vehicle for students to achieve their desired changes globally.
Global learning cannot take place in isolation, rather, the idea of global citizenship and cosmopolitanism must be interwoven into a teacher’s already existing pedagogy. Through the TPACK framework, technology, compliments the pedagogy and content knowledge to create a global learning fusion. It is with this philosophy in mind that I propose the following ways to integrate global learning in the classroom. Technology opens the doors to global learning in the classroom. It has been proven to help students develop a sense of preparedness, connectedness and a heightened sense of engagement in the classroom. Technology also is the cornerstone in the four competencies of global learning: investigation, recognizing perspectives, communicating ideas and taking action. In the classroom technology and global competency can blend in a variety of ways.
I began to ask myself... how can this problem be solved?
What determines success? Is it excellent achievement on a standardized test? Is it a student's ability to accurately bubble in the correct choice to multiple choice questions? Is the end goal of education to get great grades?
I believe that these activities are nothing more than a waste of time. How are these things products of a student's learning? When is the last time I have encountered a problem at work and multiple choice answers were placed before me? The reality is, school has become artificial.
Our once two- dimensional world has exploded. What is happening on the other side of the world is affecting what is happening in our own backyard on a daily basis. In order to survive our students' don't need to know how to select answers from predetermined responses, rather they need to synthesize, collaborate, innovate, create, work as a team. They need to EXPERIENCE success but more importantly failure.
I believe that if schools would be willing to shift their paradigm, adopt a growth mindset and more importantly accept and value the real potential that every student and teacher brings to the school, school as we know it would become a place of real value. An establishment for students to learn and PRACTICE valuable skills that will help the excel in the 21st century. In other words we need to "think otherwise".