We have always built the educational model taking the needs of society as a reference. Today’s schools were designed as economic engines to supply professionals to an industrial society, based on mass production and consumption. The educational system assumed the typical values of industrial organization: hierarchy, planning, control and standardization. In essence, young people were trained to do what they were told. They spent several years memorizing as much body of knowledge as possible to exploit it later, throughout their professional stage.
And so, with very few variations, is how these values have come down to us. The teacher gets on the podium, or approaches the blackboard, and delivers a lesson of approximately 50 minutes that his students must listen to in silence. They take notes, memorize and, later, when it is time for the exam, they regurgitate in a rather uncritical way that same knowledge provided by the teacher, who is the only authority and source of knowledge.
Society demands a change in the educational model
It is true that this model fulfilled its role in another era, but the needs of society have changed radically in recent years, and nothing justifies the maintenance of an obsolete system, which no longer fulfills its function. We are no longer in the Industrial Age, but in the Age of Knowledge and Collaboration. As a result, society urgently demands profound changes in the education system. However, the legacy of the previous model refuses to disappear. It is the students themselves, the Digital Natives, who are expressing their rejection in a more forceful way. They are not like us. They have other skills and other very different needs. They are no longer willing to put up with the homogeneous and unidirectional learning system that previous generations received. And, unfortunately, this disaffection is often manifesting itself in a high percentage of school dropouts.
A new time
It is essential to understand that the Industrial Age has given way to a new era. Today the important thing is not production, but shared and open knowledge. Information is growing every moment. There has never been so much. No one has the definitive answers anymore. They do not exist. We live in times of uncertainty. An example: students of any technical career are absorbing content that in just 4 years, in the last year, may already be outdated. In addition, we are preparing our young people for jobs and disciplines that may no longer exist when it is their turn to join the labor market. That is why I think that Nassim Taleb’s reflection on the “Black Swans” is particularly relevant in times of uncertainty:
“To manage the present, the important thing is what you know; to manage the future, the important thing is what you don’t know.”
Change is never easy, much less when we don’t know exactly where we are headed. But it is clear that in this scenario, The role of teachers can no longer be to provide the content. Their role, from now on, must be to manage and facilitate the learning process and the intellectual growth of each of the students, stimulating their creativity and critical sense.
The ability to keep learning is much more important than what we know. Together, we must be able to move from a “teacher-centered” model to a truly student-centered model, from passive classes to true collaborative learning environments based on open and transparent knowledge. The good news is that technology provides us with the tools we need to take this important leap forward. In the Age of Collaboration, we can all participate voluntarily on an equal footing by creating and sharing from anywhere, collaboratively and globally in networks based on trust. We have already explained it many times: it is not about technology, and technology, by itself, will not be able to change our mental schemes. But we can use technology as a lever for change. It is about starting a new process, reinventing ourselves as parents, as bosses and as teachers. In today’s conversation I am going to analyze the fundamental keys to building Schools 2.0, the seed of a more participatory, fair and supportive society.
The Age of Collaboration makes it possible to create new digital schools that are more agile, participatory, open and transparent, based on open knowledge and truly student-centered.
1. New students
The non-educational model has not changed. The teacher continues to teach a master class that goes in only one direction, and that is unique for all students, regardless of their individual needs. But the students have changed, and a lot. The first generation of Digital Natives is arriving in our schools and universities, young people who have been born and raised in a digital world. These new students present a non-linear learning pattern. Traditional books and lessons do not meet their needs. They no longer accept the role of passive subject. They do not want to be docile consumers of content. They like to experiment and have fun. They want to have control over their learning process, and over the information they process. So much so that they have developed cognitive abilities that are totally different from ours. According to Don Tapscott, author of the book
Grown Up Digital
, there are 8 characteristics that define and differentiate this new generation – the Digital Natives – from their parents, bosses and teachers. I summarize them: they appreciate freedom; they want to personalize everything, make it tailored to them; for them, collaborating with others is the most natural thing, and that is why they enjoy a conversation -in which they can participate- more than a conference in which they can only listen; they will examine both you and your organization; they value the integrity of people and causes; they want to have fun both at school and at work; for them, speed is the most natural thing; and innovation is part of their life.
2. Towards School 2.0
What are the steps we must take to move towards School 2. 0? Taking into account the special characteristics of the new generation, Tapscott proposes some of the challenges that, sooner rather than later, we will have to face in order to update our education system:
Encourage participation. We must abandon the unidirectional style to adopt an interactive and participatory model. No one is in possession of the definitive answer anymore. The only possible response must be collective, the result of everyone’s participation. That is why master classes must be transformed into conversations. You already know that today leading is talking.
Encourage students to go beyond memorizing information, but to figure things out for themselves. It is about stimulating them to start a process of discovery and critical thinking. Before, you had to absorb large amounts of information. Memory was decisive. But now students can obtain information on the spot. Therefore, the important thing is no longer what we know, but how we are able to “navigate” the digital world to find the information we need; and, above all, what we do with it. The important thing is not technical knowledge – in a few years it will be outdated – but the ability to learn.
Schools need to be places to learn, not to teach. New students need to learn how to interpret information, how to analyze and synthesize it, and evaluate it critically. Teachers need to develop a pedagogical approach based on uncertainty and oriented to the challenges we face in the Age of Collaboration. The challenges we face need training that is more oriented to real-world challenges and concerns, such as citizenship, ethical values, sustainable development and multiculturalism.
Promote collaboration between students, inside and outside the classroom. Before, everything was quiet in the classrooms. Only the teacher spoke. Information was not shared with anyone, it was even hidden. But Digital Natives have grown up collaborating, sharing and creating together on the Internet. Today students need to talk to each other.
Adapt education to the needs of each student. We must move from the single and homogeneous lesson, which is valid “by force” for everyone, to a more flexible lesson, designed according to the learning needs of each one. Before, this goal was unthinkable, but thanks to technology, today we can achieve it. As we have said, mass education is a product of the industrial age. That is why it is standardized, it is the same for everyone and it is always taught in the same way. But the reality is that students are individuals with their personal ways of learning. Some are more visual, others are auditory, and many others need to move and experiment with everything.
If before the reference was the factory, now the reference must be much more like the artist’s studio.
3. Design Thinking. From the factory to the artist’s studio
In the Age of Collaboration, it is not the tasks that are important, but the people. The essential values are no longer productivity, efficiency and scalability. Now we must focus on the talent and creativity that people are able to unleash when they are in a stimulating, open and transparent environment. For this reason, the reference for extracting best practices is no longer the factory, as was the case in the Industrial Age, but the artist’s studio, a fertile environment for creation and innovation. The Design Thinking philosophy has taken many ideas and processes from the activity of design schools. After all, designers are professionals used to giving a creative response to the challenges that their activity poses to them.
4. Learning is permanent. Borders are diluted
The traditional model contemplates a limited period for the training of people: from school to university, that is, from the age of 3 to the twenty-somethings. From there, there is a great end point. The idea is that, in that time, the student has been able to accumulate all the knowledge that he or she will later need to carry out his or her work activity. The period for work goes from the end of studies to retirement, close to the age of 70. And from there until the end, there is time for leisure…
The new paradigm is much more complex and flexible. The deadlines for training, work and leisure are no longer firmly bound. And the reason is twofold. On the one hand, the knowledge acquired at a specific time – especially if it is memorized content – is not valid for a long time. Information changes, it is updated daily. Technologies advance. Models and beliefs are revised. What we learned at school or university will possibly be worth very little in the coming years. So the only possible path is lifelong learning, at all stages of our lives, including our professional career. On the other hand, Digital Natives refuse to accept that leisure is excluded from their lives until retirement.
For them, work cannot be just effort and sacrifice.
They want to have fun while working, and they are prepared to combine tasks and activities that belong to both worlds. In other words, thanks to the push of the new generation, the boundaries are being diluted. There are no longer watertight compartments, one for work, another for personal life, another for leisure, another for training… Structures today are of flow. Playing, working, sharing, having fun, creating and, in short, living, are verbs that young people conjugate perfectly at the same time.
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