The Aaron Rodgers Story

By Noah Geisel

I’m watching an ESPN profile on Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers. If you’ve listened to five minutes of sports talk radio in the last month, then you know people are talking about his season as one of the best played by any quarterback, ever.

One thing that is striking about the story is how it relates to assessment. In the big money, high-stakes world of college football, a lot of work goes into evaluating young men and their potential. Expert scouting begins as early as 14-years-old. As a teacher, this sounds familiar.

At the beginning of the profile, the reporter talks about Rodgers’ dream of playing for Bobby Bowden at Florida State, and how the assessments of his abilities missed the mark: “Florida State did not want Rogers. Nor did any other Division I school.” A guy with a 1300 SAT who would go on to be a 1st Round Draft pick and NFL superstar launched his collegiate career at Butte Community College.

When asked why he believes he was overlooked, Rodgers responds, “Far too much weight is put into your height, your weight, your ‘40’, your bench press. The things you can’t measure: your character, your confidence, your mental toughness, your physical toughness, not as much weight is put into that.” Again, this sounds familiar to educators.

The Aaron Rodgers story is yet another reminder of why we educators need to be implementing in our classes (and pushing for system-wide) assessments that seek to measure the important skills that we know are essential for 21st Century success. We work in a world of high-stakes testing that primarily focuses on evaluating students based on multiple-choice, knowledge-based questions. Certainly, there is a place for assuring that our students have acquired the desired knowledge in our classes but with the weight that is placed on district benchmark exams, statewide assessments and even national exams, we need to be evangelists for the importance of measuring not only what students know but what they are able to do as well.

Got Skillz?

Reader Dave, whose blog you should check out BTW, writes:

21st Century Skills, 22nd Century Skills, they're all the same. We really want to teach our students to be critical thinkers and self-learners.

Without being too convoluted, I respectfully disagree.

Critical thinking and autodidactism aren't 21st or 22nd century skills. They are skills of human intellect going back millenia.

What I'm talking about in terms of 21st century skills are the unique skills associated with the new immediately connected global network. This sort of network acumen goes well beyond traditional inter- and intra-personal skills.

As for 22nd century skills, I'm thinking about the sorts of seemingly sci-fi things that may be possible in merging digital with bio/neurological connectedness. Far out stuff. Visionary stuff. In fact, I use the term 'visionary' specifically with reference to the fact that it nearly lies beyond the imagination.

I think it's very important, however, that Dave brings up this issue. I've been thinking about it quite a bit lately.

For one thing, I think we need to recognize the fact that we are at the very beginning of something. It's not even 2010. Considering the fact that cars, airplanes, and machine guns were in their infancy in 1910 yet automobiles, air travel, and mechanized warfare became the icons of the 20th century's industrial age speaks volumes.

We don't know where this is going to lead. And for that very reason, in my post yesterday I proposed we take some time to imagine the unimaginable. It's going to take critical thinkers and autodidacts to imagine that place; but they've always been with us. And they got skillz.

22nd Century Skills: The Value of Visionary Thinking

Created a keynote idea for ISTE 2010: 22nd Century Skills: The Value of Visionary Thinking.

Here's the blurb:

We have already produced babies who will live on into the 22nd century. Rather than rehash and re-construe the arguments and mistakes of the past, we should take a moment to think about what their future holds. From neuro-networks and nanotechnology to the implications of the ways in which we use education to address environmental, aesthetic, economic, cultural, and social change; the 22nd century will be the result of the decisions that we make today. And for those children born today and for their children born tomorrow who will live into the 22nd century, nothing is more important than that we go beyond the outmoded hierarchies and expectations of yesterday and yield knew ideas in this transformational early digital age.

ISTE is running this as a sort of keynote competition this year, so if you dig this idea and would like to see a keynote about the 'real' future of education ('real' as in "we have no idea where this crazy train is gonna drop us off..."), please vote for my entry.

And while you are at it, create your own entry; you all have some fantastic ideas, it would be great to see you all shake up ISTE a bit! Let's flood them with truly out-of-compartment thinking.