Partnership for 21st Century Skills

After taking some time reviewing the Partnership for 21st Century Skills website, http://www.p21.org, I will admit I am feeling very overwhelmed. I appreciate the amount of information that the website offers. I was able to click on many links to further my knowledge of the skills needed for today's students. There were multiple links for resources and guidelines for educators, community, and policymakers. This site goes above and beyond to help all of the key players make a better educational environment for our 21st century students. I was able to navigate to find very detailed explanations of the skills for the 21st century and ways to implement them in my classroom. I feel the site is very informative, however, there is so much information my head began to swim and I became bored very easily.

The most exciting aspects of this site, for me, were the P21 blog and the List of Exemplar Schools. I felt more interested in hearing about projects that the students were involved in and how these schools were incorporating the skills into their curriculum. I liked the fact that I could see examples of work and visit the school's websites.

When reading the blog, We Were Wrong – A Lesson on Early Grade 21st Century Learning, I was slightly saddened. I thought about my daughter, a 5 year old, creating a presentation about preventing stray animals in our town. I thought about the skills needed to create a visual and oral report and the confidence needed to present the findings to a crowd and I wanted to protect my daughter. I do not want my five year old to have to be worried about doing those types of projects, feeling that she is too young to have those skills. Then I stopped and laughed. I was one of "those" parents, protecting my child from growing up and coddling her so she wouldn't need to challenge herself. Oh no! My teacher mode clicked on and I realized that I would never help her grow and become that 21st Century Learner if I continued to think that way. I do not want to stunt her abilities or contain her enthusiasm. I want a confident self-assured daughter and the only way I can see to help her to that goal is to start teaching her the 21st Century Skills now. This resonates with me when I think about my students, also. I do not want to prevent them from obtaining their 21st Century Skills, but to help them become valuable future employees and bosses.