When I speak and write about 21st century education, there are three main themes.  First,   we must define and elevate to prominence the critical higher order thinking (and doing) skills and habits of our mind our students must develop for success in our new era.  Second, we must revise and revamp the quality of our students’ learning environment to ensure they are learning these skills in the best way possible.  And third, we must consider carefully the process by which we reform our schools.

Below is a 25 slide presentation I gave this morning, my third in the last few months to Tucson Rotary clubs, on the topic of transforming, and tranformative, 21st century education.  Each time I give this presentation, I revise it according to the feedback of the previous, and this current version represents a new focus.   I feared too often in prior sessions that audiences were losing the focus I put on outcomes, on results, and on reforming education to ensure higher standards of achievements in the things which matter most.   This presentation puts that focus as the priority of how we reform our schools: by a backward design method of measuring what matters most and taking our results seriously.