The question: Imagine one change in our education system that you feel would be both valuable and “do-able” in the next two years was posted on the VoicEd website, featuring voices in Canadian education. I have cross posted my thoughts on this question here and on the  VoicEd Blog

This is a great question to contemplate. After mulling this around for a few days, I keep circling back to 2 points.

1. How online engagement has changed my own learning and professional growth.

2. While the ideals of education and the qualities of graduates that should be produced by an educational system have, and may remain constant for the foreseeable future, what HAS changed is tools available to support learning and personal growth.

There is growing and strong evidence that students should be online for valuable and positive learning reasons: write, reflect, share, collaborate and establish, cultivate and maintain an appropriate online profile and participate in learning that involves an authentic audience.

Educators need to develop their own personal learning networks beyond their own schools and districts. Educators must experience learning in the same way our students should by role modelling: learning and collaborating online, sharing, reflecting and leveraging the tools of NOW.

This is the world in which we live – a technology enabled world. We need to leverage this to address critical questioning and thinking, engagement, collaborating in a more global sense and writing for a real world audience. Educational experiences need to be personalized and address the ‘anys’ – anytime, anywhere, anything learning for anyone.

As one considers the challenges of moving through stages of change: from the explorers, to early adopters to adoption by the masses and applying the educational context, I think this important shift is for everyone in education, not just the ones who choose this path. The path forward must include being online and connected.

My ‘one change’ would be for Boards of Education to establish personal growth frameworks to engage educators in this environment within the next two years.

~Mark

Note: Cross posted to VoicEd.ca