Description
Rapid changes in today’s world are emphasizing the importance of soft skills (such as critical thinking, collaboration, creativity, and communication) in school education.
Teachers are, thus, expected to adapt their curricula and embrace new pedagogical practices to effectively promote these capacities among young learners.
This course will help teachers to expand their repertoire of pedagogical skills to meet such novel needs. In particular, it will introduce four fundamental student-centered approaches that are gaining momentum around the world: project-based learning (PBL), technology-enhanced learning (TEL), collaborative learning, and design thinking for creative problem-solving.
As a participant, you will develop practical step-by-step know-how on each of these pedagogies. You will learn to incorporate them into your real-life contexts through exploring their main features, learning about best practices, discussing pros and cons, and implementing the use of rubrics to assess learning outcomes.
By the end of the course, you will be familiar with the key features of student-centered learning and feel more ready and confident to adopt them in your classes.
You will also take away lesson plans and activities that help you to initiate the transformation of pedagogical practices in your classroom and school.
A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. For the participants of this course, being a 21st-century teacher will stop being a word on paper, and eventually turn into reality.
Learning outcomes
The course will help the participants to:
- Reflect on the changing role of teachers in the 21st century;
- Understand the key features of 21-century pedagogies;
- Comprehend the fundamental psychological processes activated in student-centered learning;
- Employ project-based learning in their classroom;
- Adopt technology to enhanced their students’ learning;
- Engage students in collaborative learning;
- Design creative tasks for creative problem solving;
- Create lesson plans and activities using 21-century pedagogies;
- Use rubrics to assess the learning outcomes of competence-based pedagogies.
Tentative Schedule
Day 1 – Introduction to student-centered classroom for 21st-century learning
- Introduction to the course, the school, and the external week activities;
- Icebreaker activities;
- Presentations of the participants’ schools.
Student-centered classroom for 21st-century learning
- Competence-based education in the 21st century;
- The learning process in student-centered learning;
- The key features of a 21st-century student-centered classroom;
- Using rubrics to assess the learning outcomes of competence-based pedagogies.
Day 2 – Project-based learning: Changing roles of teachers
- Strengths of project-based learning to implement 21st-century skills in learning;
- Roles and responsibilities of the teacher as facilitator;
- Structure and steps to conduct project-based learning (PBL);
- Brainstorming ideas to organize project-based learning in your school contexts.
Day 3 – Technology-enhanced learning: Blended learning and flipped classroom
- The SAMR model: role of technology in supporting learning;
- Pros and cons of blended learning and flipped classroom;
- Good practices of blended learning;
- Steps to design flipped classroom;
- Introduction to online interactive tools to support learning;
- Designing a flipped lesson plan/blended learning plan.
Day 4 – Social learning: collaborative learning strategies
- Collaborative learning Dos and Don’ts;
- Creative and thoughtful grouping;
- Reflections and debriefing to deepen the collaborative experience;
- Good practices of collaborative learning.
Day 5 – Teaching creative ploblem solving: The design thinking approach
- Understanding the creative process and traits of creative people;
- 5-step model of design thinking;
- Mini-workshop to experience the design thinking process.
Day 6 – Course closure & external activities
- Course evaluation: round-up of acquired competencies, feedback, and discussion;
- Awarding of the course Certificate of Attendance;
- Excursion and other external cultural activities.