“Schools can prepare them for jobs that have not yet been created, for technologies that have not yet been invented, to solve problems that have not yet been anticipated”
(Schleicher, 2018, p. 2)
These words resonated with me this week. I was struck by the enormity of the situation we find ourselves in, with the task of educating students for the 21st century. For a world that I can’t truly imagine. I am reminded of this blog post I read earlier in the week which extends these ideas and envisions a vastly changed world. How can we possibly prepare students for something we cannot truly visualize ourselves? Why are so many classrooms still essentially chalk and talk? Innovation seems a must.
I keep telling myself that it is far into the future, that I can kind of stick my head in the sand. Then, I today, I heard about a whole year level of students found to be using Chat GPT without referencing on an assessment task. When I heard this, I was again reminded about the importance of my role as the teacher librarian. I think back to the start of my course, when I was worried that perhaps teacher librarians are going to be extinct! We are needed now more than ever. Now is our time. Now is the time to support students to feel empowered in this complex, rapidly changing world. To build 21st century skills such as critical thinking, when it is so tempting for students to just get AI to write their assessments for them. To work alongside them building interdisciplinary skills to prepare them for…for what? To bravely step into this unimaginable, complex, awe inspiring world. And I am kind of exited.
Schleicher, A. (2018). The future of education and skills: Education 2023 [Position paper]. OECD. https://www.oecd.org/education/2030/learning-framework-2030.htm/