In transit to a new age

World-renowned educator Ian Jukes tackles grave issues that the human race faces with the onset of the Digital Age.

Characterized by the ongoing collapse of traditional industries and the rise of knowledge-based economies, experts say that we are now living in what they call the “Age of Information” or simply the Computer or Digital Age.

In an effort to shed light on this new revolution, world-renowned keynote speaker Ian Jukes conducted a three-city conference tour entitled “Teaching the Digital Generation: Powerful Teaching Strategies for 21st Century Learners”. The conference was organized by Catalyst for Professional Development Services and funded by educational and publishing institutions Jun Ynion of Yngen Holding, Sabak Foundation, Technistock, Vibal Publishing, and DIWA Learning Systems

Canadian local Ian Jukes started out as a professional football athlete turned teacher, and went on to become a world-renowned educator, consultant, instructor, and author of the best-selling books “Understanding the Digital Generation: Teaching and Learning in the New Digital Landscape” and “Teaching the Digital Generation: No more Cookie Cutter High Schools.”

In a recent interview with the Philippine STAR, Ian expressed, “Life for me is like a bumper car. I thought I was going through this one direction. I was a school principal and I thought I was going to do that for the rest of my life, but then I was bumped into a different direction and became who I am today. I just have this incredible passion to change the world.”

One alarming effect brought on by the Digital Revolution is that a barrier has been put up between the previous generations and the current one. For this, Ian states, “I want education to be relevant for the kids. These kids are neurologically different, they see the world differently.”

As a testament of his immense dedication for the cause, Ian has worked with clients and institutions in more than 40 countries, making thousands of presentations in front of 300,000-350,000 people in the name of restructuring educational institutions to be relevant to the fast-evolving needs of the current and future generation.

“The old economy doesn’t exist anymore and the new one requires a whole different set of skills. In the real world, you can’t just work with a theory; you must be able to apply it to everyday circumstances. The problem with schools today is they are too inflexible and teachers tend to teach the way their teachers taught them,” Ian states.

“My mission is to do anything I can to persuade teachers to respect our children the same way we want them to respect us. We must understand their world. Just because we were here first doesn’t mean that we don’t have to respect them. The kids are only turning away from school,” Ian adds.

Ian is also a part of the 21st Century Fluency Project, a collaborative effort of a group of educators and entrepreneurs with a mission of making education and learning highly relevant to life in the new digital age. Through the help of prominent keynote speakers and innovative resources, the group is able to promote the transformation of old educational systems.

In “Literacy Is Not Enough: 21st Century Fluencies for the Digital Age,” a book that Ian co-authored alongside Lee Crockett and Andrew Churches, Ian argued, “We must start talking about skills that children need for the 21st century, such as what it means to be a global digital citizen, because the jobs that used to be there for university graduates are no longer there; people see the world now through digital eyes.”

He adds, “To be fluent is an unconscious thing. What I want to do is teach kids a different set of skills in order to be fluent, and that is by focusing on critical thinking and problem solving. In reality, schools beat the creativity out of children. But what children nowadays need is creativity. They must also learn to communicate through digital media. We need them to be good collaborators where they don’t only sit around the table and talk but rather, they should learn how to communicate with people from all parts of the world — be global citizens.”

As Ian puts it, “Your wages and my wages depend on how we teach the younger generation. If we fail them, we fail ourselves. The economy is rapidly changing, and new skills that are being valued before are different now. These skills are not things that are learned by accident, someone has to teach them. And if we fail to acknowledge that, we will fail, and so will they.”

Fortunately, people such as Ian Jukes, the rest of the 21st Century Fluency Project, and other like-minded movers and shakers have all managed to see beyond the bigger picture and take the first steps into guiding everyone in this global transition. Hopefully, the movement spreads far and wide as the fate of the future generation relies on the willingness of institutions to re-evaluate and evolve their standards.