How do I infer Jacobs' (2010) claim that ‘To move our school structures into more open, fluid, and correspondingly inventive forms, we need new forms, not reform’ in the context of classrooms of the future?

 

How do I infer Jacobs' (2010) claim that ‘To move our school structures into more open, fluid, and correspondingly inventive forms, we need new forms, not reform’ in the context of classrooms of the future?

Author: Santosh Kumar Biswa, Sr. Teacher, Damphu CS, Tsirang, Bhutan

 

In “Curriculum 21: Essential Education for a Changing World” by Jacobs (2010), he shows his concerns about our existing education system and presents how our schools should transform so that the educational processes match the current 21st-century needs of the learners. He stated, “To move our school structures into more open, fluid, and correspondingly inventive forms, we need new forms, not reform” and he is correct when he said that because the world is reshaping rapidly and the education process needs to be shaped in the new forms, not the reformation at this juncture.

 

I genuinely believe that curriculum for the classrooms of the future needs to take its new forms through up-gradation since the way of life is vastly changing rather than simply sticking to the same old model of curriculum template that was created a long time back through just reforming. He had observed a huge paradigm shift in the educational process from the teacher-centered to the child-centered education and any such paradigm shift should follow replacement in its forms both by structure and methodologies (Nguyen, 2019). Currently, we see that the same building structures, lesson scheduling, teaching processes, and grouping of students during activities have been used for decades. Jacobs felt that they needed to be replaced and stated, "As educators, our challenge is to match the needs of our learners to a world that is changing with great rapidity. To meet this challenge, we must become strategic learners ourselves by deliberately expanding our perspectives and updating our approaches" (Jacobs, 2010). Through his words, we can sense that the curriculum needs to be updated through proper curriculum mapping, streamlining the assessment models, aligning and updating the content, and including socio-technology trends (Spark Adobe, n.d.).   

 

I feel that the present practices are to be replaced so that we can modernize the way we work, not simply by reviewing the curriculum and substituting technology so that we can say we have used technology (Dyson, n.d.). The question is, “How can we change the way we teach in the classroom to prepare 21st-century learners?” (Slideshare, 2012). The changes are necessary for our 21st-century learners because our learners are not new, not the learners that we had before. Our curriculum should focus on meeting all the aspects of life that our learners are going to face shortly.

 

To promote “open, fluid, and correspondingly inventive forms” of the school, the learners should be engaged through inquiry learning, risk-taking, creative demonstration during the learning, social engagement, problem-solving, and self-directed learning. To fulfill this, Jacob (2010) suggested the four key program structures that will shift not just the curriculum but even the structures to effectively promote 21st-century curriculum. They are the schedule, classroom grouping pattern, personal configuration, and space configurations.

 

The Schedule

 

To make the learning objectives constructive and responsive, Jacobs (2010, p.19) stressed short and long-term time scheduling by stating “Educators should envision the learning outcomes first after which they should match and align them as per the time configurations available within the limits of the school”

 

Classroom Grouping Pattern

 

The question of how learners are grouped also matters for the successful implementation process of the curriculum in the classroom. Jacobs (2010) stressed grouping the students in the classroom based on the learning objectives considering the learner’s age group, grades, and other things that are necessary to consider at the time of grouping. By doing so, it fulfills the specific objectives set for the specific groups of students.

 

Personal Configurations

 

Jacobs also shows her concern about educators’ configurations because all come from multiple knowledge, affiliations, and experiences, and configuring them through grouping them so that they can collaborate and contribute ideas to solve problems in the classroom and the curriculum itself.

 

Space Configurations

Jacobs also shares her concern about how the physical space and the virtual spaces are used. The educators should be aware of utilizing both spaces properly, separately, or through combining them and should understand that virtual space should be prioritized for extended learning purposes. Learners should be prepared to use the technology to learn independently because the scenario of the future classrooms would be more virtual and physical.   

 

The principles discussed above would meet the 21st-century demands of education because the future of education is visible due to the gaining popularity of social media and technology. The education system should demand that every learner is prepared well for their future. I believe that the suggested ideas would provide students with a high-quality education to its learners.

 

Reference

Dyson, C. (n.d.).  Curriculum 21. Retrieved January 2, 2021 from https://dysonbigideas.weebly.com/summary.html

Jacobs, H.H. (2010). New school versions: reinventing and reuniting school program structures. In Curriculum 21: essential education for a changing world. ASCD. Download PDF version.

Nguyen, T. L. (2019). Classrooms of the Future. Retrieved January 2, 2021 from https://medium.com/age-of-awareness/classrooms-of-the-future-5e68129c5188

Slideshare.net. (2012). A Summary of Curriculum 21: Essential Education for a Changing World. Retrieved January 2, 2021 from

Spark Adobe. (n.d.). Curriculum 21: essential education for a changing world. Retrieved January 2, 2021 from https://spark.adobe.com/page/ejdWZSiy412K6/