Trends in Education

There is always a slight buzz in education when talking about what’s in store for the future. The buzz normally consists of a mixture of excitement from some and reservations from others. Educators possess fantastic ideas all pointing to making education better. Of those many, many ideas, some of them gain traction. The ideas can even go as far as being identified as trends, based on teachers all over the country having similar ideas. The following three trends are big ones and I wanted to take some time to hash them out.

Data-informed decisions

Big Data has been a frequently thrown around buzzword for some time now. It’s making it’s way into education and for good reason. The premise behind data-informed decisions is relatively simple to understand, but much harder to get exactly right. To start the process, we collect as much individual student data as possible. Then we use the data to make informed decisions about many different things. We can look at college readiness, come to the conclusion of reworking a student’s current course of study, and assist them in problem areas.

Focus on Web Development

Web development, programming, and robotics have all been tossed around for quite some time now. There has been a strong push for programming clubs and additions to curriculum. We are in desperate need of programmers, but not enough individuals with the skills to fill the positions. By focusing on it now, we can assist students looking to follow the path of a programmer. Someday soon, we will be able to supply resources and offer extra support.

Student Centered Environments

Student-centered environments encourage an emphasis on design, project-based learning, creativity, and entrepreneurship. In utilizing a student-centered classroom, give each student the gift of personalized learning experiences. Students get to pick what interests them, how they want to learn and how they want to present work.
The future of education is right around the corner. We just need to continue to nurture the great ideas and push administration on adoption.