Module 3 – 21st Century Skills in the Classroom

The paper Redesigning Education: Meeting the Challenges of the 21st Century contains some interesting ideas around preparing students for a 21st century world. Reform of the curriculum at second level and the development of key skills for students has gone some way to addressing the need for a different approach. At 2nd level collaborative project work and the application of key skills across curricular areas is evident.

The new Primary Curriculum Framework for Primary Schools has adopted a similar approach of developing key skills that will be embedded across all curricular areas. On the surface this appears to be a positive development for primary schools. However I read with interest in the report of the varying approaches in many other countries where there is a balance between providing schools with ICT hardware while also supporting it with professional learning for teachers to extend ICT competence as well as the allocation of time for teachers to collaborate. A similar approach will be required here in order for teachers to truly engage their students in 21st century skills in the classroom.

21st Century Skills in the Classroom

I have chosen the skill of “Skilled Communication” to focus on as I feel it is most appropriate in my school setting where pupils because of various challenges use many forms of communication.

Background Info: Senior pupils will work on a project based on the Phoenix Park. On completion of the project they will use ICT to communicate their learning from the project and promote the park as an area of interest for all other classes in the school.

Learning Outcome: Pupils will promote the Phoenix Park as an educational resource suitable for all age groups within the school.

Workspace apps to be used:

• Google Slides to document and share information

• Google Chrome for researching factual information

• Jamboard to collate and share ideas for each slide

• Google Earth and Google Maps

Pupils will work in groups to produce an individual slide for a final slideshow. They will collaborate to agree on the information to be documented in the slide.

 Big Ideas which will be addressed

Extended Communication, Multi – Modal, Fact based supporting evidence

• Pupils will design a separate slide promoting each of the following aspects of the Phoenix Park

1.  Slide 1 – Dublin Zoo – suitable as a venue for School tours. Pupils will use iPads to research Dublin Zoo. In the slide they will include images of Dublin Zoo and share links to the Dublin Zoo website for class teachers and pupils. A link to Google Earth can be included.
2.  Slide 2 – Areas of interest in the Phoenix Park for older pupils – Papal Cross. Pupils will use iPads to research the history of this structure. They will include images of the structure, and links to Youtube videos of the cross.
3.  Slide 3 – Phoenix Park as an area of Biodiversity suitable for the Green Schools Committee. The slide will contain links to the OPW contact details, images of the various aspects of biodiversity in the park etc..
4.  Slide 4 – Buildings of interest – Aras an Uachtarain, American Embassy, Farmleigh etc.. Pupils will research each of the buildings, visit the park and use iPads to take photos of the buildings which can be uploaded to the slide. A link to Google Maps can be included.

Big Idea to be addressed 

Design and communication for a particular audience

Audience: Each class in the school community

The final slideshow will be shared with each class in the school through an online school Assembly. The information contained in each slide will be appropriate to the pupils in various classes and the use of pictures, videos, audio recordings etc.. will hold the attention of all pupils.

After reading through the document “Redesigning Education: Meeting the Challenges of the 21st Century”, I have chosen the skill “Knowing More About the World.”

The Covid-19 pandemic put teachers into a position where we needed to engage with technology quickly and in new ways in order to reach our students. I think the pandemic taught us that the world is really very small when we use the correct technology tools.

I spent quite a bit of time browsing the various Google For Education apps – I was looking for an app that would help me shape a Geography lesson for 5/6th students. I already use Google Earth in the classroom and find it really great. I was hoping to use the Virtual Field Trip resource but couldn’t seem to access it? Perhaps a course admin can help me!

I did however manage to access Google My Maps and was able to view some maps that had been recently created. I would love to use this resource with my children – for them to create their own maps based on their home activities, eg. where I live, where we shop, my sports club/music lessons, grandparents’ house etc.

The document states that 21st century workers need to know more about the world, think outside the box, become smarter about new sources of information and develop good people skills among other things. It also suggests that 21st century workers are sensitive to foreign cultures and conversant in foreign languages. It is also mentioned in the text that countries like Finland who are close to the top if not at the top of all the charts, allow collaboration time for teachers within their working week and that they have a work space or open plan office space where they can gather and discuss, collaborate, plan and implement new methodologies etc. This does not exist in schools in Ireland.

The new curriculum is proposing a 3rd language be introduced from 3rd to 6th class which is great to see and ticks one of the boxes mentioned above. The time allocations have also been altered to allow for the changes in the curriculum but I think we are a long way from countries like Finland.

I haven’t used Jamboard before but having explored it with the intention of doing a KWL chart for any topic really, I think it will be something I will be using in the future. It allows the children to direct their own learning, come up with their own questions and use appropriate tools to source information to answer the questions.

From reviewing the paper “Redesigning Education: Meeting the Challenges of the 21st Century” it is clear education is rapidly evolving and advancing. As educators we need to stay in tune with modern advances in today’s technological and digital world. We must do this keeping in mind the skills needed for today’s world. The new Primary Curriculum Framework goes towards meeting these challenges and ensuring our students have the skills needed for the outside world.

The paper mentions critical skills needed. The skill I am choosing to focus on is “developing good people skills”.  As we move onto learning through more digital technology as well as conversing through digital methods such as voice notes, emojis, memes, etc we must ensure children are able to converse effectively and positively with and without digital tools.  We must also not lose the ability to converse one to one. That is why developing good interpersonal skills is vital for today’s environment.

Effective collaboration and being able to work in teams in the workplace is a skill that we can teach in school. As mentioned in the slideshow children need to be able to negotiate, resolve conflicts, reach agreement, distribute tasks, listen and integrate ideas within a group. Through planned group tasks and assignments using Google Workspace these can be achieved and worked on.

From reading the lesson plan on choosing a site for the 2030 Winter Olympics this lesson is ideal for teaching this specific skill and others. I loved how this lesson is cross curricular and has many layers to it. The children could use Google Docs, Slides, Drive and Drawing for their presentation and letter at the end.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1576HUBYnKd3OCK9MEjnpeXspMWREmSKD/view

After reading through the document “Redesigning Education: Meeting the Challenges of the 21st Century”, I have chosen to focus on “Life/Job Skills”.

The quote that really resonated with me was the following:

“The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read or write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn.”

This really left a mark on me. We all know that circumstances in life change constantly. We also know that companies regularly change how things are done in the workplace, whether that is what technology they are using or the way that they operate. We need to teach children how to adapt to these changes whilst being critical and independent thinkers. In my opinion,  ensuring pupils can work collaboratively is crucial so when change happens, they can rely on each other. As mentioned in module 3, society now requires people who can problem solve in a critical way but as part of a multidisciplinary team. When change happens, it is tackled as a team.

I really think Google workspace provides great opportunities to work as a team and collaboratively allowing pupils to better deal with change in the future as a result.  From reading comments by others, I can see Jamboard might also be a useful app to enhance team building skills. I haven’t used it but looking forward to finding out more about it.

• This reply was modified 3 years, 3 months ago by Damien O'Flynn.

I found the paper “Redesigning Education: Meeting the Challenges of the 21st Century” quite interesting but also something I would like more time to digest properly. I find such documents can be overwhelming when you read them first and try to take too much from it. I would love to see some hands-on teacher training in ICT so that we can all become proficient in our use of it and pass that knowledge onto the pupils. The webinars from the PLC inservice days were not successful so if we want our staff and pupils to become successful digital citizens then we need the support and training.
I am thrilled to see that there is a playlist for Digital Citizenship and Safety- I think this is something entire school communities will benefit from and will definitely be on my yearly plan this year.
I would like to develop the skill of collaboration with the pupils. I think sometimes I set a group task but I don’t necessarily assess the collaboration. I mainly focus on the product and neglect the process. I love the idea of the rubric and decision tree- I think I could use these to structure my learning outcomes and my assessment.

The skill I chose was solving complex, multidisciplinary, open ended problems. I chose this one as I feel it is one of the skills that can be harnessed both in the digital space as well as in the child’s physical environment. This made it the most interesting one for me. What is so interesting about many of the Workspace and the resources available, is that it facilitates problem solving and working in a multidisciplinary way. For instance, I would be interested in setting the children a task and allowing them to chose the method of completing it, e.g. by video, traditional writing, art, design etc. By using the rubric feature, the children would know what qualifies as successfully achieving the learning outcome but it would be their choice as to how to do this. This would also be achieved by keeping the task open ended as the skill suggests. As a fairly traditional teacher, I suppose I might have been hung up on closed questions and this paper has allowed me to question that. I certainly feel that creating more open ended forms of questioning and assessment, will allow the children to develop this important skill.

The paper “Redesigning Education: Meeting the Challenges of the 21st Century” by Hallissy, Butler, Marshall, and Hurley argues that the traditional model of education is no longer fit for purpose in the 21st century. The authors argue that we need to redesign education to focus on developing the skills that students need for the workplaces of tomorrow.

The skill I have chosen to focus on is digital literacy. The new primary curriculum framework highlights the use of digital technologies and places it at the forefront of student learning.The ability to use digital technology effectively is becoming increasingly important in the workplace. Students need to be able to use computers, tablets, and other digital devices to access information, communicate with others, and create presentations.

I would have students address the idea of digital citizenship. They would use google slides to help them create this and the finished product would be showcased as part of a class digital portfolio. The google doc of this lesson plan can be accessed here:

After reviewing the ‘Redesigning Education’ paper, the main thought I am left with is how we, as educators, have to make sure that we are moving with the times and creating learning environments and facilitating learning experiences that are both relevant and meaningful in today’s world for today’s learners. We are preparing our students for jobs that may not even exist yet, and we have to move away from the teacher being the imparter of knowledge and place more emphasis in the role of ICT as being a more central and integral part of student learning, as opposed to being an add on.

The learning skill that I chose to focus on is collaboration. I teach 4th class and I think this is a good age to teach and reinforce and provide opportunities for students to develop this skill. I believe children often learn more when collaborating with their peers on a meaningful task. One way that I think lends itself to the collaborative process easily, is project work. I can see myself using this to have children research countries in geography and create projects using ICT. One of the important parts of collaboration is shared responsibility. I would create a rubric with the requirements for the project listed. I would copy this rubric on a Google Doc for each group and allow them to ‘sign up’ for areas of responsibility that as a group they would need to discuss, agree and take ownership of. I think in the beginning this process would need a lot of conversation around it as a whole class, but that with practice, the children would really become invested in their learning. Group products could take the form of a Google Slide presentation for example, and pupils would also need to collaborate to ensure continuity in the end product. In this way the learning experience requires interdependence. This is just one example of collaboration. I have a million ideas buzzing around in my head and am excited to implement them in my classroom.

In reviewing the “Redesigning Education: Meeting the Challenges of the 21st Century” paper they discuss the need for new learning strategies and environments to evolve teaching methods and students learning to suit an ever growing technologically skilled culture. The paper helped to outlined what characteristics are needed to support this teaching and learning environment and what should be included in our teaching toolkits.

• Students are actively engaged with teachers in the learning experience.

• Guided and supported self-directed learning.

• Support differentiation.

• Support feedback.

The skill I have decided to focus on is the skill of thinking outside the box. I believe that this is an extremely important skill and can help students in all aspects of learning and life even further on in their life-long learning journey. The task I would present to my class is the task of working together to come up with an innovative way of housing particular animals together in the zoo and where to place them in terms of efficiency of the zoo and enjoyment of the visitor. The children would be given the task of designing the new zoo layout and placing animals together in a creative and entertaining way. The children could use a variety of the Google apps to present their work and to explain their planning process and final design.

The children can use Google Blogger to document each step of the plan and what they did to create the project.

https://measuringmaps.blogspot.com/2023/08/the-zoo-redesign-and-layout.html

The children can then use either Slides or Jam board to present the final project the new redesign and layout of the zoo and present this to the class.

https://jamboard.google.com/d/1-OjWZCG1a5XBxnk2GZVhOwD0pDxnjD2BCGMOCgF4pok/edit?usp=sharing

Each class grouping could then review and vote on their favourite redesign and give reasons for their answers.

I reviewed the paper “Redesigning Education: Meeting the Challenges of the 21st Century”. They mention the following skills that are needed for 21st-century learning. Active engagement from the pupils, Self-directed learning,
Effective relationships between the students and the teachers, Differentiated instruction, Reflective practice settings, Integrating feedback from students and the teacher.

The skill that I choose is reflective practice. This is where the students reflect on what they have learned when they have completed a task. In school, we are so busy moving on to the next thing that we rarely take time out to reflect on what we do. In any lesson, students are likely to find some aspect of a lesson difficult. As a teacher, I give students project work to complete. When the students have completed the project, they would reflect on what part of that project did they find challenging and what project did they find easy. Students could share this in the class. The student would have to be taught how to effectively use the reflection process so that it is not another thing to do and run through.

The app I would use for students to complete this is Google Forms. The students would answer a series of simple questions. We could do this about once every two weeks to ensure they are reflecting and learning from their reflections.

• This reply was modified 3 years, 2 months ago by Diarmuid Fitzgerald.
• This reply was modified 3 years, 2 months ago by Eoghan O'Neill.

I found the paper ‘Redesigning Education : Meeting the Challenges of the 21st Century ‘ interesting but a little patronising about those who went before us. Our ancestors had unbelievable challenges to face : the youngest participant in WWW1 was a 12 year old from Cork. I think that beats any challenge faced by contemporaneous 12 year olds. I’ve had pupils in 6th class who couldn’t make a cup of tea and looked at the kettle as though it were a UFO. Yet same individuals were experts  on the computer.
We rise to the challenges that face us and the challenge I see is one whereby we marry the best of what has gone before with modern technology. The latter needs to be tailored to optimise the learning experience ; we need to be careful not to throw out the baby with the bath water.

There are a number of skills I hope to use ; collaborative learning, reflective practice, digital literacy and critical thinking.  It does sound like an overload but I think that a balanced curriculum integrates several skills to ensure a holistic education. We tend to be so busy covering the curriculum areas that we rarely reflect either  verbally or digitally as to our perceptions of what we’ve experienced.

The app I’d use would depend on the particular skill I wanted to highlight ie Jamboard could be useful for collaboration, Google forms for reflection on task completed ( with an accompanying rubric for clear guidelines)..

<p style=”background: white; vertical-align: baseline; margin: 0cm 0cm 19.2pt 0cm;”><span style=”font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: ‘Hind Madurai’; color: #163c42;”>The skill I have chosen is “Becoming smarter about new sources of information”. I think this is particularly important at the moment as we deal with “fake news” and AI. I saw an interesting news article recently about how history textbooks in Russia have been hastily re-written to include Putin’s “special military operation” in Ukraine. This illustrates that we cannot always be sure of what we are reading. </span></p>
<p style=”background: white; vertical-align: baseline; margin: 0cm 0cm 19.2pt 0cm;”><span style=”font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: ‘Hind Madurai’; color: #163c42;”>I think developing this skill involves not only helping students identify reliable sources, but we must help students develop responsibility and accountability when online. </span></p>
<p style=”background: white; vertical-align: baseline; margin: 0cm 0cm 19.2pt 0cm;”><span style=”font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: ‘Hind Madurai’; color: #163c42;”>One possible lesson which would be geared more towards older students could be completed using Google Docs. For example, assigning students the task of searching online for an article and assessing the article to ascertain how credible it is. they could create a table in Docs and answer the following questions. </span></p>
<p style=”background: white; vertical-align: baseline; margin: 0cm 0cm 19.2pt 0cm;”><span style=”font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: ‘Hind Madurai’; color: #163c42;”>Who wrote the article?</span></p>
<p style=”background: white; vertical-align: baseline; margin: 0cm 0cm 19.2pt 0cm;”><span style=”font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: ‘Hind Madurai’; color: #163c42;”>What is the author’s point of view?</span></p>
<p style=”background: white; vertical-align: baseline; margin: 0cm 0cm 19.2pt 0cm;”><span style=”font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: ‘Hind Madurai’; color: #163c42;”>When was the article written?</span></p>
<p style=”background: white; vertical-align: baseline; margin: 0cm 0cm 19.2pt 0cm;”><span style=”font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: ‘Hind Madurai’; color: #163c42;”>Where does the author get their information?</span></p>
<p style=”background: white; vertical-align: baseline; margin: 0cm 0cm 19.2pt 0cm;”><span style=”font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: ‘Hind Madurai’; color: #163c42;”>Why was the article written?</span></p>
<p style=”background: white; vertical-align: baseline; margin: 0cm 0cm 19.2pt 0cm;”><span style=”font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: ‘Hind Madurai’; color: #163c42;”>Developing responsibility and accountability when online is something that can be taught and encouraged from a younger age. I would love to see more resources in this regard e..g. The Stay Safe programme updated to reflect online bullying etc.</span></p>

Sorry – reposting as plain text.

The skill I have chosen is “Becoming smarter about new sources of information”. I think this is particularly important at the moment as we deal with “fake news” and AI. I saw an interesting news article recently about how history textbooks in Russia have been hastily re-written to include Putin’s “special military operation” in Ukraine. This illustrates that we cannot always be sure of what we are reading.

I think developing this skill involves not only helping students identify reliable sources, but we must help students develop responsibility and accountability when online.

One possible lesson which would be geared more towards older students could be completed using Google Docs. For example, assigning students the task of searching online for an article and assessing the article to ascertain how credible it is. they could create a table in Docs and answer the following questions.

Who wrote the article?

What is the author’s point of view?

When was the article written?

Where does the author get their information?

Why was the article written?

Developing responsibility and accountability when online is something that can be taught and encouraged from a younger age. I would love to see more resources in this regard e..g. The Stay Safe programme updated to reflect online bullying etc.

‘Redesigning Education: Meeting the Challenges of the 21st Century’ is an interesting and informative piece of work. The opening paragraph in the executive summary puts it very well – the core set of skills expected include being knowledgable about the world, thinking outside the box, being smarter about sourcing information, having good people skills, an ability to solve problems, to work as part of a team and ultimately to become a lifelong learner.
The Primary Curriculum Framework which will inform the the new documents for the different subject areas has similar key competencies which is good to see – being well, being a digital learner, being mathematical, being a communicator and using language, being creative, being an active learner, being an active citizen.
I have selected collaboration and the related skills of negotiation, conflict resolution, agreement on what must be done, distribution of tasks, listening to ideas of others, integration of ideas into a final product.
We are currently looking at ways to improve our school environment to make it more inclusive particularly during break times. Children will work in groups to come up with ideas. We will use Google Forms to create a short survey which can be shared with other classes for feedback. Example of questions – what is the school good at? what do you enjoy at break times? what can we do to improve break times? what would you like to see more of? what additional equipment would you like? Similar surveys can be created for parents and staff. The final product should be a collection of ideas as a result of a collaborative process – these can be presented in a Google Doc.

The paper “Redesigning Education: Meeting the Challenges of the 21st Century” by Hallissy, Butler, Marshall, and Hurley (2013) presents a vision for transforming education to prepare students for the complexities and demands of the future workplace. It highlights the importance of the integration of technology and its meaningful integration into the curriculum along with developing the student’s ability to use the digital tools and resources effectively and ethically. The importance of skill development was highlighted in that it allows for critical thinking and problem solving. It encourages the ability to approach problems creatively. It also involves collaboration and communication which fosters teamwork and good communication skills in person and digitally. It also mentions lifelong learning and how to instill a love of learning and the ability to acquire continuously new knowledge and skills.
Teachers can use the many google workspace. Having looked at the Olympic site selection https://drive.google.com/file/d/1576HUBYnKd3OCK9MEjnpeXspMWREmSKD/ view the children could also be encouraged to design a community playground where they would have to apply the skills of critical thinking and problem solving. This could be done using google docs, slides, questionnaires and drawings. The children will work together and foster good communication skills as they approach the task creatively and critically.

The paper posits the idea of ‘transforming’ education globally. However, it also states that any transformation must be meaningful! I also note that the paper was supported by Microsoft so there is a possibility of some unconscious bias. Having said that my own daughter works for Microsoft and was educated in primary school with very little focus on IT or student-led activities. While I concur with the findings that the 21CLD or key competencies must be front and centre of our educational ecosystem, I am very much of the opinion that the fundamentals of literacy and numeracy and indeed people skills are best taught at junior primary level, without an overdependence on IT. Of course, this is just my personal and anecdotal opinion and not backed by the research put forward in this paper.

The skill I have chosen to focus on for this exercise is ‘Skilled Communication, as our school has been part of the Languages Connect programme for the past three years where the pupils of 5th and 6th class have had the opportunity to learn Spanish. I intended to use Jamboard (mentioned in this course, which I hadn’t used before) as a tool for the pupils to develop mini-projects on an aspect of language learned. However, when I opened Jamboard yesterday there was a message from Google to say Jamboard will finish on October 1, 2024. Therefore the tools I would use in Google Workspace for this project would be Google Slides and Google Meet, so the children could work in groups outside of school , when collaborating on the projects.

Good afternoon,

The skill which I chose to look at is developing good people skills. I chose this as it is something which is very often overlooked in the primary classroom.
I do think that students at this level find it difficult to work together in the middle classes as they simply can, in general, be quite ego centric.
Group work can often lead to fall out, I have discovered that assigning different students with different roles can help overcome this. These roles rotate as some students try to lead, others are happy to sit back and not contribute.

I created a book report which could be done alongside a class novel. If it was a collaborative project, students would all get a chance to assume different roles within the project. Different abilities could present different slides.

Essentially what I want is students conversing, planning, working together without upset. Listening to one another, responding respectfully and guiding one another constructively.

Attached is a link to the book report slideshow.

https://classroom.google.com/c/NjE4NjYxODk1MTcy/a/NzAyMjk5NDA4MDAz/details

This could be used in a variety of ways.

In “Redesigning Education: Meeting the Challenges of the 21st Century,” the authors discuss the urgent need to revamp traditional educational systems to better prepare students for the rapidly changing demands of modern workspaces. The paper emphasises the importance of integrating technology and fostering skills such as critical thinking, collaboration, creativity, and communication. It argues for a more personalised and student-centred approach to learning, where educators act as facilitators and mentors rather than mere providers of information.

The paper identifies several barriers to this transformation, including outdated curricula, inflexible teaching methods and the resistance to change within educational institutions. The authors propose solutions like incorporating project-based learning and using digital tools to ensure students gain real-world experience and relevant skills.

Developing good people skills is a crucial skill for success in the modern workplace, where team-based projects and communication among colleagues are the norms. I feel using Google Slides would be an effective way to enhance this skill in my classroom.

Google Slides offers several ways in which the development of good people skills could be fostered. Some examples include collaborative presentations, peer review sessions, interactive story telling and cross classroom collaboration.

One example I intend on implementing this year to develop good people skills is the use of collaborative presentations. This could be done in a variety of ways such as team projects whereby students are assigned to small groups and asked to research a specific topic. Each student is then responsible for creating slides on different sub topics for the overall presentation, thus emphasising the importance of collaboration.

Another area I wish to focus on this year is teaching my students how to provide feedback to their peers using the comments feature on Google Slides. This will provide students with an example of real time collaboration and in doing so, replicate the collaborative process often found in modern work environments.

Finally, once children have completed their slideshows, they will then use the ‘present’ feature to practice presenting to the class or other groups, allowing students to improve their public speaking and communication skills.

Upon reviewing the paper ‘Redesigning Education: Meeting the Challenges of the 21st Century’, I found that the writer speaks to an urgent need to transform traditional education systems to better equip students for the ever-changing demands of modern workspaces.

The importance of building digital literacy skills is emphasized as well as collaboration, communication, creativity and critical thinking skills. A more individualised approach to learning is called for, centring the student’s engagement and agency and moving educators to a role akin to a facilitator / mentor.

Barriers to this educational revamp are discussed, such as outdated curricula, resistence to change within institutions and inflexibility in teachign methods.

Project-based learning and utilising digital tools are recommended by the author to support students in gaining real-world experience and relevant skills.

The skill I have chosen to focus on is developing good people skills, as I think this is fundemental to living a healthy and happy life, as well as supporting students in the modern workplace.

I have chosen to use Google Slides to enhance this skill in my classroom.

Google Slides can be used for collaborative presentations, lending opportunity for peer review sessions, interactive story telling and cross classroom collaboration.

In order to enhance the development of good people skills in my classroom this year I will be making use of collaborative presentations. This can be used in a cross-curricular manner throughout the year, giving children an opportunity to work in various small groups to research and construct specific topics. A student can be responsible for creating slides on different sub topics for the overall presentation, thus emphasising the importance of collaboration.

Supporting the students in offering feedback on their peers work will provide students with an example of real time collaboration. it will build people skills in a meaningful way.

Presenting their finished product to the class or other groups, allows students to improve their public speaking and communication skills.

As a sidenote to this assignment I think it is important to note that while preparing students for the modern workspace is an important aspect of primary education, it should not be it’s only aim.

I really liked the piece about knowledge construction as a 21st Century Skill. The lesson example from the presentation, ‘House on Mango Street’, was a very effective way of giving students an insight into the life of an immigrant and the challenges they face. Reading a variety of material and then interviewing a person who emigrated to America would have definitely allowed the children to effectively construct knowledge in this realm while at the same time creating empathy. Writing the poem allowed pupils to apply this newly constructed knowledge in their English lesson.

While this lesson was based on the American experience, I could see value to a similar approach to knowledge construction in the Irish context, particularly with regard to the immigrant experience. This, of course, would have to be done with great sensitivity.

Another 21st Century Skill which is of utmost importance today is collaboration. I loved the 203o Winter Olympics host-city investigation. Given that the Olympics are very much in public consciousness at the moment, I could envisage myself using a simplified version of this lesson with my class to develop the skill of collaboration. I would use Docs and Slides as part of this project.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/15sUPNRGuCqUjAQerP-qQizeztLb_fjT6-BVbcRqEWHk/edit

Workplace Skill: Being Knowledgeable about the world.

Knowledge construction: Schools should create learning opportunities where students:  Interpret, Analyse, Synthesise and Evaluate their knowledge.

This lesson will be applied to new learning – logainmneacha or ‘place names’ and will involve the discipline of Gaeilge, Tír Eolas srl.

Classroom link

https://classroom.google.com/c/NzA0MDgyNzU0MDYy?cjc=5hrlfrm

Link to Assignment

https://classroom.google.com/c/NzA0MDgyNzU0MDYy/a/NzA0NDM2NTk4MTk0/details

I have put together the first lesson on a series of lessons about logainmneacha. I have a child in my Autism Room who spends many hours travelling with his dad in the car going through villages and townlands exploring new names in both English and Irish. He also spends much time on google maps in both maps and street view looking at places. He has an incredible ability to read both Gaeilge and Bearla to a very high standard. However, he finds it difficult to explain his interest at any level and cannot share this enthusiasm with anyone in a meaningful way. Furthermore he finds it difficult to engage meaningfully with the other children in his classgroup. They are very inclusive of him but often their engagement is assisting him or showing him. This activity will enable him to share his interest and will structure a way for him to communicate his knowledge. It is only a starter activity and has many options for further development including a project with the local language planning committee, or perhaps with Galway County Council. (Many of the road signs are incorrect). There  are a number of locals who have an expert knowledge of logainmneacha and there are poets and artists in the region who frequently engage with the pupils in a meaningful way. The group of children in question (including the target pupil in my class) are very musical and perhaps a song may be a great way to showcase local place names. However that will be down to their focus and direction.