In the early 1200’s, Roger Bacon, considered by many to be the “father of the scientific method,” was studying in Paris. The story goes that one day, he asked his professor “How many teeth are there in a horse’s mouth?”
The professor pondered, consulted with his colleagues, and returned to Bacon with his answer. “We examined Aristotle and the Church Fathers, and none of them discuss this question, so we must assume the answer is unknowable.” Bacon answered, “Why not just open a horse’s mouth and count the teeth?”
For the last 500 years, we have taught on the assumption that “knowledge” was fixed and knowable; a teacher’s job was, as an expert, to help students learn what was “known.”
We now live in a world in which “knowledge” increases almost exponentially, and what “knowledge” consists of is now global in breadth rather than limited to cultural biases.
In such a world, there are few utterly reliable “experts” to help students or teachers sift through the blizzard of information.
What are the characteristics of 21st Century Teachers?
The essential qualities that make a teacher great haven’t changed much since Socrates:
- An unquenchable thirst for knowledge – in order to teach better
- A passionate commitment to foster learning in each individual student – regardless of their initial perceived “ability”
- A skilled preference for asking provocative questions rather than preaching answers
- A cheerful ability to find and share humor in life
- A courageous willingness, when needed, to “buck the system” in defense of real learning
- A life-long habit of reflection, self-assessment and personal growth
Chaucer’s description of the Clerk of Oxford serves as the simplest way to capture the essence:
“And gladly would he learn, and gladly teach.”
Any of us fortunate to have had teachers like this know the difference they made in our lives.
Teaching in the digital age, however, brings with it additional challenges that previous generations of teachers didn’t face, and new critical success factors. Of the many valuable descriptions of the characteristics of 21st Century teachers, here’s one summary.
In addition to the timeless qualities listed above, 21st Century teachers need to:
Have a clear personal vision for their role and its value to students
Teachers work in a world in which they are deluged in information and buffeted by winds of change. Given the failures of NCLB in the public education world and the debates about how to fix it, that confusion of roles may only intensify. Without a clear, calm center: “This is why I teach and why it matters,” teachers are at the mercy of the storm.
Focus on learning rather than teaching
“Teaching” is what teachers do; learning is what students do. It’s time to shift the classroom focus from “What do I have to teach (and what content do I have to “cover”)? to “What do students need to learn?” Similarly, while “What do students have to know?” is still a critical question, so is “How do students need to learn to learn?” In the age of Google and Wikipedia, memorizing facts just to regurgitate them on tests is a pointless activity.
Maintain a creative balance on learning outcomes
The debate over whether it’s better to teach skills or promote understanding of concepts is the wrong question. Students need to do both. So the 21st Century teacher’s question becomes “How can I develop both skill mastery and thoughtful grasp of core concepts?” The same creative balance applies to testing: “How can I measure and reward both achievement against fixed, universal standards and also personal growth and unique individual expression?
Adapt flexibly to what’s happening in the classroom
In content-driven teaching, what matters most is often getting to the next page of the lesson plan – regardless of whether students actually learned anything that day. Plans are just that – plans. In a dynamic world, plans that don’t evolve and adjust to the realities of life limit achievement, or worse, provide the framework for failure. Teachers who have a clear vision of their role and a flexible focus on outcomes are able to adapt day-to-day learning experiences towards goals that actually matter for students. And a big part of what happens in the classroom is the reality that students learn at different rates in different ways.
Collaborate and share expertise and learning resources
In the digital age of the 21st Century, there’s too much for any one teacher to master and too little time to do everything that could be done. Yet another old idea to get rid of is the notion that teachers have to work alone, locked in their classroom by themselves. (Getting rid of that limitation may also require some teachers to let go of the ego-driven comfort of saying “This is my classroom and my students.”) So long as team teaching is freed from the shackles of bureaucratic over-control and mindless paperwork, and so long as teachers stay grounded fostering learning that really matters, collaboration can unleash the power of synergy. And of course, the most fruitful areas for collaborative learning in the digital age lie in what students do together.
Model leadership traits
When teachers were the sole source of knowledge, that knowledge gave them their power and authority. In a time in which knowledge expands and changes, teachers need a different basis of authority. Stripped of its hype, the old leadership maxim, “Walk your talk,” is good advice. 21st Century teachers can increase their effectiveness by role modeling the behaviors they expect to see in their students – as human beings similarly engaged in learning, not as authority figures to be unquestionably obeyed.
Whether large, bureaucratic public schools can create 21st Century Learning environments is still an open question, but one that for the sake of our country’s future, we need to solve. One critical step would be to foster the hiring, development and retention of 21st Century teachers, and to create school communities that strongly encourage 21st Century learning instead of imposing mindless bureaucratic institutional and political control.
