Words by Aldar Academies
Education providers have many, many responsibilities. But when we look at the ‘big picture’ of what it’s all for – empowering students to shape the future – we see that one of our most important responsibilities is predicting the future.
We’re not talking crystal balls here. Rather, schools are working hard to gain a calculated understanding of the direction that society and economies are moving in, to ensure the education they provide is preparing students for future greatness.
Providing a STEAM-powered education
It’s undeniable – the STEAM skills – science, technology, engineering, art and maths, are playing a hugely transformative role in global economies. As a result, education providers must shape their curricula around these disciplines, thereby inspiring students to pursue a career in a highly in-demand field, while equipping them to succeed once there.
To this end, one very effective method is project-based learning (PBL), which tasks students with solving real-world problems in class. For example, students may be asked to devise new ways in which a coastal city can mitigate the threat of rising tides. Through collaboration between teachers, this challenge might be tackled across the subjects of geography, science, and IT, bringing a deeper understanding of how the STEAM subjects relate to each other.
Being passionate about a field is just as important as possessing a deep knowledge of it. Nurturing this passion should start from the youngest age, by encouraging play-based activities related to STEAM. At Aldar Academies West Yas Academy, our American Massachusetts State Curriculum school, we’ve created a STEAM Innovation Room for this very reason. From the youngest Kindergarten years, students have the freedom to explore and experiment with STEAM activities and tools, igniting a passion at the earliest opportunity in life.
Developing soft skills and hard workers
In tomorrow’s working world, where automation is handing manual jobs over to technology, the combination of STEAM expertise and soft skills will be hugely influential. Here, industries benefit from the emotional reasoning of the human mind alongside the efficiency of tech-driven ways of working. To develop soft skills, education providers are shifting their pedagogy – the art of teaching – towards a method known as flipped learning.
Instead of dictating knowledge at the head of the class, the teacher would instead record learning content as video, image or text for students to study as homework – hence the ‘flipped’ element. Students would then bring this knowledge back into the classroom and apply it to problem solving, under the supervision of the teacher.
Here, the student is in charge of applying theory using the soft skills of independent and critical thinking, interpersonal communication, and problem solving, but with greater guidance. Through closer collaboration with their teachers and peers, students’ soft skills are strengthened, as they interact and learn from others while still leading the task of applying theory.
Creating citizens of the world
Finally, technology has built bridges between continents and metaphorically ‘shrunk’ the world, meaning businesses can operate effectively across borders and time zones. It’s now normal to encounter people from different cultures and backgrounds in the work environment, and to thrive in this diverse world, students should grow as global citizens.
Schools have an important role to play here, starting with instilling values of tolerance, respect and equality from the earliest age. This is especially important for a diverse international school community like Aldar Academies. We teach a cohort of over 100 different nationalities, and for them to grow and collaborate effectively in life, respect and tolerance of others must exist.
One way to achieve this is to give the curriculum an international dimension. Here, the content of lessons such as history, English literature, and geography would be tailored for an international context, to help students understand foreign perspectives on the subjects. An emphasis on bilingualism, which immerses students in the language of another culture, only strengthens this understanding.
The future is for our students to shape, and although education providers can’t predict it, we have an obligation to prepare our students for whatever lies in store.
