21st Century Skills - Teacher Materials

These questions are intended to prompt educators to think about the different ways they can incorporate a particular 21C skill into their lessons.  The questions are not meant to be prescriptive in any way, nor is it intended that all of them would be applicable to every unit of study.  They serve to simply offer ideas for consideration.  These questions could be used by individual teachers interested in developing their lessons further, in department meetings to collectively brainstorm ways their specific subject matter could work to incorporate the 4Cs, or during professional development to support teams of teachers during their planning of units of study.

This section is intended for use directly with students as a way to help them become more aware of the ways in which they use various 21C skills and to contemplate the ways in which they can strengthen these skills. The guides are designed with the understanding that many of these skills can only be built through application and that metacognitive reflection helps to accelerate the acquisition of these skills. There are three pages for this section.  First, a handout for students to complete at the beginning of a unit/project. Second, a check-in giving the students a chance to reflect and for the student or teacher to make some adjustments, perhaps, before the end of a unit of study. Third, a final reflection on the experience as it pertains to the particular 21C topic of focus.  As with all of the materials, the expertise of the teacher would determine whether the guides are best used as-is or just in parts and can also be altered to fit the needs of the individual classroom.

This section provides a list of questions to be used to examine and reflect on a person’s or character’s life as it relates to the particular 21C topic.  The questions provide a lens through which to view that person’s actions. Some examples of how to use them might be to ask students to apply them to the actions of a particular person in history, the professional trajectory of a scientist, the life of a famous artist/athlete/writer, or a character in a novel.  They could be used for group discussion or to produce presentations or essays. The questions can also be applied directly to the student’s life, if desired.  The hope is that through reflecting on the life of another person and how they demonstrated a particular 21C skill that the students will gain insight into the ways in which these skills impact people and can, perhaps, apply that to their own life as well. 

In this section, we listed the standards that apply to the particular 21C skill. Specifically, elements from the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) continuums that apply to this particular topic are listed with a focus predominantly on Level 6 in the continuum.  In addition, standards from several other organizations around the world are also included in order to offer educators more insight as to how 21C skills are discussed and to serve as a resource as they work to incorporate these skills into the curriculum.  For more insight to these organizations, please refer to 21^st Century Skills – Resources for Educators.