Twenty-first Century Skills

Our  activities today concentrated on what the staff is calling 21st Century Skills and using them to look at art in new and different ways.

21st Century Learning is not a concept made up at the Walters.  Apparently it is a framework developed by educators and employers and thinkers and yes, even politicians, to try to focus on what skills a student will need to succeed in life in the 21st Century.   Proponents believe that 21st Century students need a blending of specific skills, content knowledge, expertise and literacies to "master the multi-dimensional abilities required of them in the 21st Century."

Student outcomes include life and career skills, learning and innovation skills (the "4Cs - Critical thinking, Communication, Collaboration, and Creativity") and information, media, and technology skills.   The framework recognizes that core subjects must be taught, but suggests that they incorporate 21st Century themes like the 4Cs.   And the staff at the Walters is just brimming with ideas for how to use art to incorporate these themes.


I am so glad that someone out there is thinking about this stuff.  Even if one does not buy into the framework wholesale, there is so much interesting food for thought and so much common sense in the theories.  Thinking about my own children, I am constantly bombarded by reminders that the world they live in is so different than the one I grew up in, and the skills they will need are also so different.

Art education fits so perfectly into the 21st century themes, especially the 4Cs.  We tried out four techniques today, moving from station to station in small groups with different staff members at each station.

A "kinesthetic gallery activity" which could be incredibly fun with a group of kids, involved Tableaux.  We gathered in front of this painting, Allegory of the Element Earth (although we had no idea what the title of the work was) and each chose a figure to represent.  We then tried to capture that frozen moment in time.  We had to describe our character, and talk about how the characters interact.   We were asked to try to capture the emotion that fit that moment, for our character.  We were asked to give a title to our own tableau.  Then to shake things up, we were asked to move to demonstrate what would happen if one of the characters was in a different place or position, and how that would change our expressions, postures, etc.  It got us thinking, talking, moving, working together, expressing emotions in motion, etc.

21st Century skills indeed. 

Next, we gathered in the Italian Paintings gallery to discuss the next activity, this one appropriate for older kids, which involved writing a story.  The instructions were simple [the same instructions would be given to kids]:

Choose an artwork that grabs your attention.  Look closely at it.  What do you notice? What does it sound, smell or feel like? Where are you?  What is it like there?  What might be happening?  What is the mood? What might happen next?  

Finish the story:  Last night, I had the strangest dream.  

Then we went around the gallery reading our short one-paragraph stories.  Some docent-candidates were more creative than others, but again, there we were with communication, creativity, critical thinking and even a bit of collaboration as we shared our stories with others.  I thought it was interesting that some of us put ourselves into the paintings, while others just dreamed of observing what was there.  I wonder what that says about each of us?  By the way, I put myself squarely into the middle of this picture (which by the way is called Allegory of the Five Senses, something we were allowed to know as we wrote our stories).

For the next activity we were divided into even smaller sub-groups, and invited to play the roles of subject and interviewer.  Some of us were St. Jerome in this painting, and some of us were the interviewers.  We were asked to discuss "before, during, and after" but our questions ranged from "how did you learn all those languages?" to "how did you lose your hair?"  In addition to the clues and questions we got from looking at the painting, we were permitted to read the description for clues on what to ask, and even (like good journalists) to look for clues in other representations around the same image.  It was a much more powerful learning experience than just having someone describe the story of St. Jerome in the wilderness.

Finally, we went to the Chamber of Arts and Wonders for a storytelling activity.  Unlike the Visual Thinking Strategies exercise, where everyone is allowed to have a different idea of what's happening in this picture, this was a collaborative effort to come up with one story beginning with the line, "On a dark and stormy night . . ."

I was surprised at the level of creativity, collaboration and critical thinking that this required, even for adults.  At first I didn't like the fact that I had to build on someone else's story about the picture (although I realize now that my initial story line had a lot to do with the artist's own ideas, which I knew only from reading the gallery notes - not so creative) but as we moved around pointing out different parts of the painting and building on each others' ideas, I got it.  21st century skills.

In the afternoon of this day, we were back in the ancient galleries for presentations by individual docent candidates.  As I noted from last week's session, the assignment was merely to give a visual description of the work and then ask questions about it.  Today, many of my colleagues departed even further from this instruction, some giving some fairly detailed (and obviously researched) presentations.  Having seen them all, there is no question in my mind which types of presentations I like better.  I think I'm moving into the 21st Century.