Iowa Core Curriculum presentation emphasizes ways teaching must change

When the October 19, 2009 Joint School Board meeting reached an item named “Iowa Core Curriculum” on the agenda Julie Meyer, a ¾ time middle school social studies teacher with East Sac County Schools presented to the boards and those assembled a couple of videos that she found on the web. The following is the text of the first video, entitled “Did you know?” (WARNING; both of these videos are a little late 2008ish and don’t contain all of the new technology that has been developed or embraced over the course of the last year. Both make the point regarding the disconnect between the US and the world, and between the generations in the US.)



- If you’re 1 in a million in China, there are 1,300 people just like you
- China will soon become the number one English speaking country in the world
- The 25% of India with the highest I.Q. is greater than the entire population of the United States. TRANSLATION: India has more Honors kids than America has kids.
- The top 10 in demand jobs in 2010 did not exist in 2004.
- We are currently preparing students for jobs that don’t exist yet, using technology that doesn’t exist yet to solve problems we don’t even know are problems yet.
- The US Department of Labor estimates that today’s learner will have 10-14 jobs by the age of 38.
- 1 in 4 workers has been with their current employer for less than a year. 1 in 2 has been there less than 5 years
- 1 out of 8 couples married in the US last year met online.
- There are over 200 million users registered on MySpace. If MySpace were a country it would be the 5th largest in the world, (between Indonesia and Brazil).
- The number 1 ranked country in broadband internet penetration is Bermuda. #19 the United Sates. #22 Japan
- We are living in exponential times
- There are 31 billion searches on Google every month. In 2006 this number was 2.7 billion. To whom were these questions addressed before Google?
- The first commercial text message was sent in December of 1992. Today the number of text messages sent every day exceeds the total population of the planet.
- Years it took to reach a market audience of 50 million: Radio, 38 years… TV, 13 years… Internet, 4 years… IPod, 3 years… Face Book, 2 years…
- The number of internet devices in 1984 was 1,000… in 1992, 1,000,000… in 2008, 1,000,000,000
- There about 540,000 words in the English language, about 5X as many as during Shakespeare’s time.
- It is estimated that a weeks worth of the New York Times contains more information than a person was likely to come across in a lifetime in the 18th century.
- It is estimated that 4 exabytes, (4.0 X 10^19) will be generated this year. That is more than the previous 5000 years.
- The amount of new technical information is doubling every 2 years… for students starting a 4 year technical degree this means that half of what they learn in the first year will be outdated by the time of their third year of study
- NTT of Japan has successfully tested a fiber optic cable that pushes 14 trillion bits per second down a single strand of fiber. That is 2,660 CDs or 210 million phone calls every second. It is currently tripling every 6 months and is expected to do so for the next 20 years.
- By 2013 the supercomputer will be built that exceeds the computational capabilities of the human brain. Predictions are that by 2049, a $1,000 computer will exceed the computational capabilities of the entire human species.
- During the course of this presentation 67 babies were born in the US, 274 babies were born in China, 395 babies were born in India and 694,000 songs were downloaded illegally
- So what does it all mean?

The second video was entitled, “The vision of K-12 Students Today” and it followed the same sort of format. The second video was a series of school children holding up placards with facts on them. The following is the text of that video:

- Students will use engaging technologies in collaborative, inquiry based learning environments with teachers who are willing and able to use technology’s power to assist them in transforming knowledge and skills into products, solutions, and new information.
- I am a 21st Century learner.
- I game 3 ½ hours per week.
- I will spend 16 ½ hours watching TV this week.
- 5 ½ hours on the computer.
- 2 hours reading a book.
- I listened to 5 ½ hours of Harry potter on my IPod this week.
- We expect to be able to create, consume, remix, and share information with each other.
- My parents use e-mail.
- I text
- …instant message
- I Blog
- 76% of my teachers have never used Wikis, Blogs, or Podcasts.
- At least once a week 14% of my teachers let me create something with new technology. 63% never do.
- 61% of my reading teachers never use digital storytelling software.
- We learn by doing. What are we learning just sitting here?
- How do you learn?
- What kind of education would you want me to have if I were your son or daughter?
- By the year 2016, the largest English speaking country will be China!
- There are more honor students in China, then there are people in North America, but only half of us will graduate from high school. [At this point several kids hold up signs that say, “Will I?”]
- I will have 14 jobs before I am 38 years old. Most of those jobs do not exist today
- [Student holds up list of spelling drills written on notebook paper] How will this help me?
- [Student holds up digital camera] How could this help me?
- [Student wears an IPod] Or this?
- [Student sits at laptop] Or this?
- Teach me to think, to create, to analyze, to evaluate, to apply.
- Teach me to think.
- Let me use the WWW (Whatever, Whenever, Wherever).
- Let me tell a story digitally.
- Engage me, we are digital learners.

Ms. Meyer finished her presentation emphasizing that in order to be successful, students will have to be taught to weave together the core subjects with 21st century interdisciplinary skill sets such as literacy in the disciplines of technology, health, financial management, employability and civic literacy.