I have been attending this conference for about 7 years now and I'd say that I always get the most out the wonderful keynotes that present there. This year was no exception.
Opening Keynote “Education in the Age of Disruptive Innovation; Living on the Future Edge”
Lee Crockett, Managing Partner, 21st Century Fluency Project (http://www.fluency21.com/)
Lee’s presentation started with the overview that as educators it is challenging to keep up with changing technology and the sheer fact of adapting to change. Just when you learn one thing and get comfortable another better and new technology is already knocking at the door. Lee explained Moore’s Law (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore%27s_law) which looks at the trends of computer technology history and future change. Basically Moore’s Law shows a pattern of how technologies improve exponentially and then also go down in price. Lee used the personal computer as an example. We can remember how back in the day we could buy a beast of a computer with a whooping 1 megabyte of hard drive for a couple grand! Pretty much every 2 years later the power and space would increase (double) and then price (to make and purchase) would go down twice as well. This pattern currently has been reduced to a 1 year and soon will be on a 6 month schedule. The funny thing about all this is that if Moore’s law is right in just a few years we may be able to purchase a computer that runs on 200 terabytes of RAM and has a 40 terabyte hard drive and may cost only $1.37! It sounds ridiculous but you know if back in 1980 if we asked you if you’d have something like an iphone in your pocket that can do all that it does and that you’d pay about $200 for it we might have been skeptical.
Technology is changing (improving!) as fast as lightening. How quick are we to adapt to the change? How quick are institutions when it comes to adopting and adapting to change?
Take cell phones for example, they are coming out with better versions of cell phones so fast that by the time we buy one there is a new ‘upgrade’ in just a few months and the one in your hand is outdated. Is your cell phone a smart phone or just a thing in your pocket to make phone calls? Seriously, how long are you going to resist getting a smart phone? Contemplate the reasons why you haven’t. I have heard some people say “I just figured out how to use this darn thing why would I go get another (tech item) and have to figure that out?” My reason was mostly due to cost. Of course now that I've finally made the switch, I don't know how I could have lived without my smartphone.
We can apply the same concept of cell phones to education. How many institutions are incorporating mobile technologies with the curriculum? Why might they not be? Certainly could be due to funding especially these days. It might be due to the fear of spending good money on one thing and then finding out the following year it is already outdated. There are a variety of reasons in combination that could be involved.
Obviously, we are all conscious of what is going on with change and technology, but the big question is how will this affect how we teach and what we teach? Are we preparing our students for the future and how to adapt to change? The reality of right now, 2011, information is easy to dig up at our finger tips. One key factor is deciphering the credibility of the information and how the info may be leveraged to problem solve. The future will change our priorities now, and with that our thinking processes may change as well. So that means we need to address how we teach and what teach. The 21st Century Fluency Project describes the fluencies that are critical for our students to have.
Lee Crockett pointed out that we (as educators) may need to be open to the idea of “sitting with uncomfortable” for a while and be open to the change. We can’t necessarily teach the way we were taught or the way we have been teaching for X amount of years. The next generation of workforce needs a different kind professional. For example, a professional that would not be afraid of change; someone who can adapt well to new technology; but most importantly someone who is a creative problem solver and critical thinker; not someone who can regurgitate facts or who is set into doing anything one way. What sets apart your teaching than what students could learn from a book, website, video or other information source? Ponder this: Are we teaching for “obsolete excellence?”
Lee’s keynote was much more engaging thought provoking then I described it above. Although I was certainly inspired, I was left with a feeling of urgency and I will admit a little bit of that ‘uncomfortable’ feeling. Sometimes I feel like a little fish swimming against the sea. But when the sardine approach was explained it made me feel much better. When several small fish (leaders of change) swim together (collaborate) it makes it easier!
Please explore the 21st Century Fluency Project website (http://www.fluency21.com/) for tons of resources, explanations and suggestions for teaching. Find out how you can become a committed sardine.
Later, I attended a round table discussion with Lee and here are some of the notes that I picked up from that conversation:
5 i’s for Teaching for creative fluency
Identify (the problem or situation)
Inspiration (look at what is currently out there, look for patterns)
Interpolate
Imagine (problem solve, brainstorm, think outside the box)
Inspect (review and conclude your solution)
“MFA is the new MBA” – David Pink
Biggest demand in the marketplace are creative thinkers and creative problem solvers.
http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2008/04/the_mfa_is_the_new_mba.html
http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2008/04/the_mfa_is_the_new_mba.html
The Flynn Effect: IQ scores have been steadily rising but creativity took a steep downfall around 1990 and has been decreasing ever since. Why? What can we do as educators to change that?
Understanding the “sardine approach” to change at our institutions: http://www.committedsardine.com/sardines.cfm
Technology is not a 21st century skill, it is the literacy of how we may leverage it and use it.
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