- it is essential to permanently reflect upon our practices so as to achieve the best result and by reflecting we will be ready to adapt, rethink whatever strategy we need to cater for our students’ needs.
- One of the most important issues for this year will be the ability to redesign our existing lessons and learning activities to build students’ 21st century skills. Taking into consideration, global themes,and 21st century skills (see powerpoint from last year) https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1ovAQwI60bZX0fGL5FIOXjCCRK5BKUuokGFAD6agaSqI/edit#slide=id.p
- It is fundamental to provide students with educational opportunities together with the integration of technology into teaching and learning; and to do this ,it is necessary to visit and participate in virtual communities. Many of the opportunities are definitely there! Being able to notice the opportunities and the arrangements with the people involved will be part of the new way of planning, This brings new demands on teachers apart from the need to prepare young learners to use the tools appropriately. Today we can communicate in a variety of formats, either asynchronously through text messages and blogs, or in real time through Twitter or Skype or Google Hangouts. All we need is a device, an internet connection!
- We often ask students to answer questions such as What? Who? How? and How Much?, when in reality we need to move beyond these questions that typically have one right answer. We now have instant access to information and a range of people who can help with finding possible solutions to our questions. So we need to move beyond asking students questions that they already know the answer to or that they can search for online instantly. We want them to construct knowledge by engaging in deep learning where they have to interpret, analyse, synthesise and evaluate information in order to construct understanding.
We need to develop inquisitive minds
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u84ZsS6niPc- There is a need to push our learners to work in teams, to engage in complex problem solving where they are required to take initiative, and in order to achieve this we need to make them aware of the importance of self regulating their own work , giving effective feedback,that goes beyond simple praise or comments such as “good job” or “great work”, this will be fundamental to get improvement.
We have the opportunity in our hands, let´s make the difference with our work and with the compromise we feel towards our students; We will not achieve the results we want without passion, and I am definitetly convinced that both passion and enthusiasm are the best gifts we can offer to our kids.
Inspired by:
