21st Century Skills come up a lot in the literature about one-to-one computing. This session is called “School Leader Development: Building 21st Century School” and is presented by a number of folks who work through Microsoft’s Partners in Learning program.

The presentation begins with some information about globalization. They mention Friedman’s recent work, but the point is that individuals in “Globalization 3.0″ are connected in dramatic ways. Friedman says that 24% of new jobs in America are math and science related while we are graduated a mere 5% in those areas. How is Microsoft responding to this potential crisis? They’ve committed with a strategy in multiple countries to work on new programs like one-to-one computing, schools of the future, and other forward-thinking projects. The presentation appears to be a report of Microsoft’s Partners in Learning project in the six states where they’re working. Boy am I hoping that things get around to some more practical steps that individual districts can work on.

Now we’re getting a look at the Building 21st Century Schools program. It’s a multimeida, modular program that has the feel of a simulation. The intent appears to be to get teachers and school leaders talking about the relevant issues. There are links to background articles and opportunities to compose relfections before and after reading the materials. The system allows groups to work together and take some group notes of their thinking.

There’s plenty of glitz and slick multimedia authoring in evidence here, but my sense is that this system suffers from the same limitations as practically every other similar program I’ve seen. It requires the participants to enter a world entirely separate from their world of work and play. Why can’t this be Web-based? Is there an RSS feed or, at the very least, an email gateway for the discussion component? If not, why not? If I were implementing this program, I can imagine how it would go. A small fraction of the teachers would actually use it because it’s a relatively large pain in the backside to take time to explore this system. From what I can tell, the same program could be built as a Moodle course and delivered in a much more friendly way.

Most of the background learning theory work for this program comes from three books: How People Learn, How Students Learn, and (soon to be published) Preparing Teachers For a Changing World. These would be worth looking at.