Since I am in a digital education program, I have special interest in the intersection between pedagogy & technology: specifically, “21st-century teaching (& learning)” as it relates to technology.
What exactly does this look like? It’s not as simple as teaching with technology, which is defined as “the use of media tools integrated within Learning Management Systems (LMS) and/or those run more independently over the Internet. It also involves differing media types (i.e. social or dyadic) and functions (i.e. synchronous or asynchronous).”
Rather, it is all that, but many of us don’t know the nuances and various iterations of how this can look. More to the point, we don’t necessarily know how it can help in terms of student learning outcomes. This is important to keep in mind, as a key mantra of education in recent years is to use technology with intention [that is, to benefit students & society], not just for the sake of using technology.
This week I’d like to discuss a few ways in which educators can use technology in their online or in-person classes while also being mindful of a 21st-century mindset. This can keep us from using Zoom, videos, screencasts, & audio (what we often think of as “teaching with technology”) but with an unintentional 20th or even 19th-century approach that does not serve students.
- Global perspectives – a big part of 21st-century learning is a global perspective, as we function in a world much more culturally, socially, and economically connected than we did decades ago. Where possible, incorporate small assignments and tasks that ask students to view concepts, theories, ways of life, practices, attitudes, & beliefs from elsewhere in the world, not just the U.S. This could be as simple as sharing with students tweets or social media posts from public intellectuals, government leaders, & private citizens from other countries and asking the students to synthesize the thoughts & perspectives they discover with U.S. ideas and/or to your course concepts. In whatever way is appropriate for your content, you could even have students participate in “virtual visits” to other parts of the world: geographical landscapes, art museums, wildlife, etc. If you teach a foreign language, require students to chat with people in other parts of the world and document their efforts.
- Learner-Centered & Personalized Instruction -- Being “learner-centered” in one’s teaching approach means allowing students more autonomy & choice in their learning. Since knowledge is ubiquitous now on the Internet (websites, YouTube, podcasts), there is no need to spend the majority of instructional time in knowledge-transfer mode. Giving students more choice—a desired approach since each student has different goals, preferences, interests, & motivations—allows them to grapple with information that they find most interesting within subject matter you present, seek out websites, social media content, videos and podcasts of their own choosing, and make meaning from it. This reinforces to students that knowledge is ever-changing, always being considered, re-considered, produced, and reproduced rather than static.
- Learning New Technology – It is not just important that you teach with technology, but that you teach your students to use technology. You do not need to be an expert, and you do not even have to directly teach the technology (unless you are able to and it works for your course). You can simply decide on a media format (for example, podcasting) that you will dig into and encourage your students to do the same by assigning a project or task in which they must show evidence of their learning by using that medium. Many websites and platforms out there are quite user-friendly, and many students will be able to manage simple versions on their own. They might never have tried it, however, without a class requiring it. Once students have done a simple version of a technology-related task, they feel more comfortable with it, and they are set up—both confidence-wise and in terms of technical skills--to become intermediate and advanced content creators at some point.
These are just a handful of ways to use technology in your teaching with a 21st century mindset. There are many more, as described in “15 Characteristics of a 21st Century Teacher” and "Podcasts and the 21st-Century College Classroom." Adopting one or a few of these approaches is not only beneficial to the students' future, but it provides them with a more dynamic learning experience while in your course.
