21st Century Skills Education

Introduction

Nowadays we find ourselves in a world that moves so fast we can barely keep track of the changes. Sometimes living in a globalized and digitalised world poses challenges we are not fully equipped to face. Most importantly, it is the youngest in our societies that pay one of the highest prices of confronting a world they do not fully comprehend.

This is the reason why we reckon the new generations need to learn 21st-century skills and most importantly they should learn about them soon. Our proposal is to create a space in formal education to teach young students about 21st-century skills.

Solutions

The core idea is to integrate a subject in the study plan that children will attend from high schools in the whole of the European Union, with the final aim to eventually spread across the world. The subject will include teachings mainly from two fields: media literacy and intercultural communication.

On the one hand, Media Literacy will teach students about the crucial skills they need to approach the digital world and its inherent difficulties. The main aim is to empower students to navigate the digital world both in a safe and productive way by teaching them skills such as critical thinking, creative writing, and media consumption hygiene. Hopefully, this will raise awareness on the importance of being informed about events happening around us, but also about the need to be careful and keen with the information they process on the net.
A critical aspect of the subject should be the inclusion of debate sessions with professionals from the communication and media fields. Unquestionably, the meetings with such figures will help students to analyze current events and problems in society with a critical attitude. A desirable side effect is that this approach will encourage students to actively participate in their communities and will contribute to shaping an informed civil society.

On the other hand, Intercultural Communication mainly focuses on interactive activities, therefore prioritizing practical learning. The general set-up should be that of partnering schools from different countries and getting the students to know each other and socialize through activities such as study trips, penpals correspondence, teacher exchanges, and language exchange.

The underlying intuition is that theoretical teaching would be close to useless to the aim of this subject. In fact, intercultural communication skills are a type of soft skill that can hardly be learned through traditional lectures. On the contrary, intercultural communication can be learned only through practice, through the meeting of peers from other countries, and the sharing of experiences.

Here the digital revolution offers huge opportunities by bringing together students from opposite sides of the globe merely with a stable wi-fi connection. For instance, video calls or the collaboration on shared digital projects may work just fine to build a relationship between students.

Considering the unique nature of this subject, the grading criteria will be different from the traditional grading style and students will be graded on their contribution and development of intercultural skills throughout the course. This choice is not only motivated by the nature of the course, it is critical to engage with students on a deeper level, therefore the need to motivate them to acquire skills and not only absorb knowledge.

All things considered, the two elements of the new subject will allow students to develop their 21st-century skills and will educate them as global citizens.

Importance and Aims

The 21st Century skill program aims to develop students’ 21st-century skills by creating a new curriculum. This will in turn lead to fostering global citizens with the tools and mindsets to contribute actively to their society, democratizing education in the process.