Professional learning for 21st century skills
January 11 2010 by 
Joellen Killion
The buzz about 21st century learning skills for teachers and students is gaining momentum, with good reason. Yet parallel with the call for increasing 21st century skills are questions about professional learning for implementing these skills in classrooms. What kind of professional learning will teachers need to become 21st century educators? How will we equip teachers to use and teach 21st century learning skills? How must professional learning change to meet the demand for 21st century learning skills?
At NSDC, we have a fairly simple answer to all of these questions. The kind of professional learning needed to implement 21st century skills is no different from the kind of professional learning we advocate for all improvement efforts, especially when those efforts focus on teaching quality and student learning. Our standards have stood over time as indicators of effective professional learning grounded in research and evidence-based practice.
While the content of professional learning may vary, and the tools and designs used for learning may change to accommodate different disciplines and outcomes, the acquisition of foundational knowledge and skills, the exploration of assumptions, and the transformation of practice accompanied by adequate resources are the same whether we are striving for improvements in science, literacy, mathematics, or any other area.
Advancing 21st century skills requires substantial professional learning, especially for teachers and principals who will be responsible for implementing these skills. It should align with everything we know about effective professional learning--it should be intensive, sustained over time, standards-based, results-driven, job-embedded, collaborative, content-focused, with sufficient resources and classroom-based assistance to support implementation.
Becoming proficient in 21st century skills requires changes in content, skills, and attitudes that influence the content, processes, and context for professional learning that will transform teaching and learning. We are being called upon to take a stronger stand for effective professional learning if we expect 21st century skills to be implemented. That means using what we know about effective professional learning, and implementing it fully to achieve the outcomes we desire. Other major educational initiatives facing schools today, such as the implementation of national standards, differentiating instruction and assessment, implementing data systems to improve teaching, developing teachers' content depth, expanding principals' leadership expertise, and others require the same form of rigorous and effectiveness professional learning needed for implementing 21st century teaching and learning skills.
Joellen Killion is NSDC's deputy executive director.
Posted in Joellen Killion | 
Jan 14, 2010 at 8:03 AM
What a great assurance is to know that we can move forward with the kind of professional learning needed to implement 21st century skills if we stay focused on effective professional development practices!
I have noticed that best practices can sometimes be sacrificed in the spirit of excitement for 21st century learning. With proven practices well within our radar for sustaining such an endeavor, it is time to step back and refocus our attention on those practices again in order to do what is needed to quip teachers to use and teach 21st century learning skills.
Jan 14, 2010 at 9:28 AM
There are many highly creative teachers in our schools and many schools where creative approaches to teaching, learning and applying 21st century skills are encouraged. But many schools and teachers do not have access to the necessary information, support and guidance and coaching needed to develop and enhance these approaches. If 21st century oriented programs are to succeed, teachers will need the skills, knowledge and understandings to make it succeed. Further, they will need the confidence and support to apply and continuously improve those skills, knowledge and understandings.
There are areas of need for professional development that are especially relevant because of their unfamiliarity to teachers trained in traditional education practice. These include:
1. Creative and critical problem solving methodologies and their application in the 21st century teaching-learning environment,
2. Collaborative learning and teaming,
3. Data mining and its application,
4. Communication and presentation processes,
5. Technology as a tool,
6. Journaling and reflection,
7. Formative student assessment and grading, and
8. Program evaluation.
Another area of high-level professional development is training in metacognitive dialogue so that the focus of instruction is on process rather than on getting and memorizing the right answer .
Acquiring knowledge of such content and strategies is only one aspect of effective professional development. Teachers also need to learn how to effectively apply that knowledge to their teaching. Alan November (2009) provides a metaphore for this by citing a story that describes what needs to be done when you want to hang a picture on the wall. You go the hardware store to buy a drill bit to make the hole for the hook. You dont really need the drill, you need a hole, but the hardware store doesnt carry holes, only drill bits. While the drill bit is important, it is two steps removed from what really needs to be done, hanging the picture. November contends that much of what we call & staff development is a lot like buying drill bits; it is one or two steps removed from what really needs to be done.
(Drill the Teachers; Educate the Kids by Alan November, accessed 5/28/09 http://novemberlearning.com/resources/archive-of-articles/drill-teachers/)
Jan 14, 2010 at 10:42 AM
I agree with HyAL Portner. I would add, however, the need to become culturally responsive in our work with adults. We can no longer seek for children what we are unable or unwilling to practice with adults. We have found networked learning to be a vital 21st century skill. The children are already ahead of us on these kinds of connections; we need to use them in our own learning as well as our teaching.
Jan 14, 2010 at 11:13 AM
Absolutely, Patricia. How best to know what and how we teach than to practice what we preach.
BTW, Please note typo correction of my name.
Jan 15, 2010 at 10:10 AM
New Jersey has joined the 21st Century Partnership. Incorporating 21st Century skills and themes (globalization, financial and health literacy) are now state initiatives. My district is looking at these skills and themes as possible school improvement goals. We are struggling to figure out a baseline measurement tool so that we can track progress. Any ideas would be appreciated. Please reach me at ronni_reed@mcvsd.org
Feb 2, 2010 at 11:18 AM
I think the most important skill that we need to have when learning how to teach using the 21st century is a positive attitude. We must me willing to learn the new information so we can adapt our teaching to the students of the 21st century. We must collaborate with those familiar to this idea so we can not only be teachers of the 21st century, but learners of the 21st century.
Feb 5, 2010 at 8:19 PM
Teaching all students to think and to be curious is much more than a
technical problem for which educators, alone, are accountable. And more
professional development for teachers and better textbooks and tests,
though necessary, are insufficient as solutions. The problem goes much
deeperto the very way we conceive of the purpose and experience of
schooling and what we expect our high school graduates to know and
be able to do.
Tony Wagner, The Global Achievement Gap, 2008
Jul 6, 2010 at 6:52 AM
Hal,
I think you hit the nail on the head. In this era of budget cuts and anger among the public about funding schools, we need to continuously bring the conversation around to what society wants from their schools. We can be thought of as babysitters, as I've seen stated in NJ newspapers, or we can be seen as the facilitators of "Human Capital", as Hayes Mizell( 2008) describes students. These students provide the best hope for America in this century. What then is needed? An emphasis on the skills most necessary to fuel this economy.- innovation, problem solving, collaboration, focus, global awareness and technological skills. Hmm- sounds like 21st Century skill sets to me.