What Will Education Look Like in Ten Years?

I have been thinking a lot lately about what school will look like 10 years from now. I am finishing my 6th year of teaching right now and it has changed tremendously over those 6 years. Most of the changes are related to technology but I think the bulk of the changes are a reflection on how the world is changing around us.

The world is flat once more. We are able to connect in so many ways that we couldn't connect just a few years ago. Today at a PD presentation, another teacher told us about QuadBlogging. We can now enroll our student or classroom blogs into this blog exchange system with other schools throughout the world. We can get feedback from outside of our buildings. It is the digital version of our old penpal projects done when I was a student in the public school system.



So what will schools look like in 10 years?

I think school (the physical building) will be a place where students go when they are struggling, or need resources, or need to collaborate with people in person. School will provide offices for their teachers as a place where they develop curriculum or meet for professional development or to meet with students for individualized instruction. Schools could very well abolish their bells and become a place of computer labs and recording studios. Learning will become an anyplace/anytime venture. Students will be able to enroll in courses online from a menu of schools who employ highly skilled instructors. Students might be enrolled in multiple online schools so they can have their pick of classes as well as instructors. Their local institution may end up becoming a clearing house for their learning by tracking what students are required to do, testing their competency, setting them up with internships, referring them with online programs that meet their individual needs, tutoring services, learning portfolio and project presentations, etc. Texting their teachers might become as common to them as texting their friends. Accessing learning will be done on-the-go using cell phones and tablets with data plans.

This is just what has been rattling around in my mind. It makes me wonder as a professional instructor how I should prepare myself for this shift? I am currently developing my courses to be blended, requiring all my students to use an online component. I suspect that eventually I will have requests for my blended material be made available to students who cannot fit Computer Sciences into their regular schedule as a way to earn their credit in the subject area. They will become distant learners, but in the building with their online instructor.

An important aspect of this shift will live with the students. They will need to become managers of their own time. They will need to start planning so they can fit it all in. Right now we plan their time and direct that time with bells and a school year that ends on the 180th day. A student that has good time management skills can finish a course in half the time whereas a student that does not manage their time well could end up taking twice as long. Time to learn becomes rolling, and honestly, makes it necessary to have school year round. Learning could become what it should be, a natural process of curiosity and discovery.

Again, this is just what is rattling in my brain. In fact, 10 years from now, kids could still be required to enter the building, spend 6 hours a day there and go home at the end of the day. Maybe we will still have a bell system that moves them from one subject to the next throughout the day. But my gut tells me that the digital component that is entering our lives will force a change in the physical part of how we educate our students.

Learning How To Question

In tonight's class we talked about effective questioning as a part of collaboration with teachers and paraprofessionals.

I thought it was interesting that most of the questions that we ask each other are negative. The art of questioning is approaching the person with positive intentions. I remembered a workshop from last month when the presenter stated "Never ask 'what's going on?' when you witness a situation, instead, be direct and state your observation and what should be changed."

Tonight we talked about clarification, creating timelines, writing things down and clearing up questions at the beginning of the project. I have tried this with my students (before hearing this tonight) by giving them a timeline for the semester and found that this does work. I post it online where I know they will log in every day and they can tell you every day where they are at (behind pace, on pace, ahead of pace) and during my observation the other day, my VP asked students "Do you always know where you stand with deadlines" and the student said right away "I'm behind pace, but I'm absent a lot but I know I could catch up if I were to just log on at home and do the work I missed that day. I just haven't done that ... yet." I think it is important that all invested parties know where on the continuum they stand.

She talked tonight about making sure that we give accurate information when asked to clarify or confirm information because in our haste, we quickly answer questions without first checking the facts. I tend to agree. This happened to me with a student who I had seen working in class, and even checked his work in class, but he asked why he was failing the class. I told him he wasn't failing the class, because I had seen that his work was proficient and that he was right on track. When I went into our OpenClass system to double check his work (because his question prompted me to question my own observation) and there was no work in there. I realized what had happened was that he saved his work in the system but never submitted it. The next day I had to find out if he understood how to use the technology and realized he didn't know the difference between the "save" and "save and submit" buttons.

"Take time before you ask questions." She is so right. I'm very guilty of opening my mouth before I had a chance to formulate the question. I have also often felt stupid or humiliated by the question I asked. I tend to ask fewer questions, or I write out my thoughts as another person is talking so I won't forget what I want to ask but at the same time may find the answers in my own notes.