Education for Life and Work Developing Transferable Knowledge and Skills in the 21st Century (2012) / Chapter Skim
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At the same time, business and political leaders are increasingly asking schools to develop skills such as problem solving, critical thinking, communication, collaboration, and selfmanagement -- often referred to as "21st century skills." Private foundations, policy makers, and education organizations use a variety of names for the lists of broad skills seen as valuable. To help the public understand the research related to the teaching and learning of such skills, several foundations charged the National Research Council (NRC)
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• escribe how these skills relate to each other and to more traditional D academic skills and content in the key disciplines of reading, mathemat ics, and science. In particular, consider these skills in the context of the work of the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers in specifying Common Core State Standards for English language arts and mathematics, and the work of the NRC in specifying A Framework for K-12 Science Education: Practices, Cross cutting Concepts, and Core Ideas (hereafter referred to as the NRC science framework)
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We then conducted a content analysis, aligning several lists of 21st century skills proposed by various groups and individuals with the skills included in existing researchbased taxonomies of cognitive, intrapersonal, and interpersonal skills and abilities.1 Through this process, we assigned the various 21st century skills to clusters of competencies within each domain. Recognizing that there are areas of overlap between and among the individual 21st century skills 1 he committee views the abilities included in these taxonomies as malleable dimensions of T human behavior that can change in response to educational interventions and life experiences, in contrast to the common view of them as fixed traits.
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These clusters include competencies, such as communication, collaboration, responsibil ity, and conflict resolution. IMPORTANCE OF 21ST CENTURY COMPETENCIES The committee examined evidence of the importance of various types of competencies for success in education, work, health, and other life contexts (see Chapter 3)
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Since it is not known what mixture of cognitive, in trapersonal, and interpersonal competencies accounts for the labor market benefits of additional schooling, promoting educational at tainment itself may constitute a useful complementary strategy for developing 21st century competencies. At a time when educational and business leaders are increasingly interested in promoting deeper learning and development of 21st century skills, and in light of limitations of the available empirical evidence linking such competencies with desirable adult outcomes, we recommend further research: • Recommendation 1: Foundations and federal agencies should sup port further research designed to increase our understanding of the relationships between 21st century competencies and success ful adult outcomes.
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The new Common Core State Standards in English language arts and mathematics and the NRC science framework are likely to strongly influence educational policy and practice in the coming decades. The committee reviewed these documents and compared them with our definition of deeper learning and with recent lists of 21st century skills, revealing important areas of overlap.
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For example, the NRC science framework aims to prepare high school graduates to engage in public discussions on science-related issues and to be critical consumers of scientific information. Research is lacking on how to help learners transfer competencies learned in one discipline or topic area outside the discipline or topic area: • Conclusion: Teaching for transfer within each discipline aims to increase transfer within that discipline.
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Nevertheless, it has identified features of instruction that are likely to substantially support deeper learning and development of 21st century competencies within a topic area or discipline. For example, we now know that transfer is supported when learners understand the general principles underlying their original learning and the transfer situation or problem involves the same general principles -- a finding reflected in the new Common Core State Standards and the NRC science framework, which highlight learning of general principles.
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: • Recommendation 3: Designers and developers of instruction tar geted at deeper learning and development of transferable 21st century competencies should begin with clearly delineated learning goals and a model of how learning is expected to develop, along with assessments to measure student progress toward and attain ment of the goals. Such instruction can and should begin with the earliest grades and be sustained throughout students' K-12 careers.
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Research on teaching and learning of competencies in the intrapersonal and interpersonal domains is less extensive and less rigorous than the research on deeper learning of cognitive knowledge and skills. Our review of the emerging research on these domains, as well as the more extensive cognitive research, suggests that the instructional features supporting development of transferable competencies in the cognitive domain may also support transfer in these domains (see Chapter 6)
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. In particular, as noted above, the Common Core State Standards and the NRC science framework provide a deeper conceptualization of the knowledge and skills to be mastered in each discipline, including various facets of 21st century competencies.
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Teacher preparation programs will need to help teacher candidates develop specific visions of teaching and learning for transfer and also the knowledge and skills to put these visions into practice. Both novice and experienced teachers will need time to develop new understandings of the subjects they teach as well as understanding of how to assess 21st century competencies in these subjects, making ongoing professional learning opportunities a central facet of every teacher's job.
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If these assessment frameworks include the facets of 21st century competencies represented in the Common Core State Standards, they will provide a strong incentive for states, districts, schools, and teachers to emphasize these competencies as part of disciplinary instruction. Next Generation Science Standards based on the NRC science framework are under development, and assessments aligned with these standards have not yet been created.
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In addition, it will be important for researchers and publishers to develop new curricula that incorporate the research-based design principles and instructional methods we describe above. Finally, new approaches to teacher preparation and professional development will be needed to help current and prospective teachers understand these instructional principles and methods, as well as the role of deeper learning and 21st century competencies in mastering core academic content.
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