Schools must innovate and transform to match the needs of 21st century learners, Dr Heidi Hayes Jacobs, president of Curriculum Designers Inc. argues.
Hayes Jacobs, an internationally recognised expert in the field of curriculum mapping, told a masterclass audience at the recent EduTECH conference in Brisbane that the dilemma educators face is that current curriculum and school structures are behind.
“What’s problematic is you have a clash. You have 19th century structures, 20th century curriculum, 21st century learners, and we are 21st century learners, too,” Hayes Jacobs said.
“The content needs an overhaul and it’s still somewhat dated,” she said.
“Then we have 19th century structures – we have the same school year, we are fundamentally organised, still, in classrooms. We still use grade levels to identify kids. That’s a really old idea.”
Her presentation focused on how learning environments and what schools fundamentally look like need to catch up to meet the demands of modern day students.
Hayes Jacobs outlined four most basic program structure she is exploring which she said could be responsible for holding people back.
“First is time, your schedule, both short term and long term because you’re restricted by that,” she explained.
Second she said is space, the physical spaces we work in. The third one has to do with how we group our learners. And the fourth is how the adults, the personnel are grouped.
“All four of those structures come together to create an environment that would make you as a teacher either inhibited or it would make you capable of providing a really world-class, amazing learning experience.
“I’m looking at these four and the thing that’s really exciting is we can add some other dimensions,” she said.
Click below to hear the full interview with Heidi Hayes Jacobs.