In our opening faculty meetings back in August the Community School faculty participated in an outstanding workshop with Lee Crockett, a Canadian curriculum expert and a consultant with the InfoSavvy Group, an international consulting firm working with schools on program development and innovative curriculum. At the core of Crockett’s message was the notion that in order to prepare students for the future they must have a clear understanding of what he calls “21st Century Fluencies.”
In essence, 21st Century Fluencies provide students with the tools to manage in and navigate through an ever-changing world. Through integrative technologies and innovative programs, schools can address 21st century fluencies at any grade level.
The five fluencies are:
Creativity Fluency: involves the transparent use of artistic proficiency to add meaning to a product through design, art or storytelling.
Media Fluency: is not just about the ability to operate a digital camera or build a Power Point presentation. It’s about being able to look critically at the content of a web site, podcast, newscast, or a video game and be able to understand how the medium is being used to communicate, shape our thinking, and how well it’s communicating the message.
Information Fluency: is the ability to unconsciously and intuitively interpret information in all forms and formats in order to extract the essential knowledge and perceive its meaning and significance. There are five distinct steps in the process, ask good questions, access and acquire raw material from the most appropriate sources, analyze/authenticate the data to distinguish between the good and bad information, apply the knowledge within the context of real life, and assess both the product and the process
Solution Fluency: refers to the creativity and problem-solving applied in real time. Four steps: Define the problem, design a solution, do by putting the plan into action, debrief to evaluate and foster ownership of the problem.
Collaboration Fluency: fosters the notion of teamwork by using social networking tools in an online environment with virtual partners, sometimes located in other parts of the world.
In the months ahead we will be working with 21st century fluencies across the curriculum in an attempt to provide our students with the “real world” skills they will need in the future. In these exciting times this is, indeed, an exciting project!
In essence, 21st Century Fluencies provide students with the tools to manage in and navigate through an ever-changing world. Through integrative technologies and innovative programs, schools can address 21st century fluencies at any grade level.
The five fluencies are:
Creativity Fluency: involves the transparent use of artistic proficiency to add meaning to a product through design, art or storytelling.
Media Fluency: is not just about the ability to operate a digital camera or build a Power Point presentation. It’s about being able to look critically at the content of a web site, podcast, newscast, or a video game and be able to understand how the medium is being used to communicate, shape our thinking, and how well it’s communicating the message.
Information Fluency: is the ability to unconsciously and intuitively interpret information in all forms and formats in order to extract the essential knowledge and perceive its meaning and significance. There are five distinct steps in the process, ask good questions, access and acquire raw material from the most appropriate sources, analyze/authenticate the data to distinguish between the good and bad information, apply the knowledge within the context of real life, and assess both the product and the process
Solution Fluency: refers to the creativity and problem-solving applied in real time. Four steps: Define the problem, design a solution, do by putting the plan into action, debrief to evaluate and foster ownership of the problem.
Collaboration Fluency: fosters the notion of teamwork by using social networking tools in an online environment with virtual partners, sometimes located in other parts of the world.
In the months ahead we will be working with 21st century fluencies across the curriculum in an attempt to provide our students with the “real world” skills they will need in the future. In these exciting times this is, indeed, an exciting project!