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  On the way: Nation's first tech-literacy exam
  For the first time ever, technological literacy will become part of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), also known as the Nation's Report Card, the test's governing board has announced. [ Read More ]

   

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  Report: Retool instruction, or U.S. will fail
  Creating a 21st-century education system that prepares students, workers, and citizens to triumph in the global skills race is the central economic competitiveness issue currently facing the United States, according to a new report from the Partnership for 21st Century Skills. The report provides a sobering wake-up call for the nation's civic and education leaders. [ Read More ]

   

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  New resource helps teach 21st-century skills
  Social studies teachers now have a new resource to help them integrate 21st-century skills into their lessons: a free online document that maps various social studies projects, tasks, and outcomes to corresponding skills—such as problem solving and critical thinking—that are becoming increasingly important for 21st-century success. [ Read More ]

   

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  Arizona raising students’ technology literacy
  The Arizona Department of Education saw the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) as a window of opportunity to add accountability to the competitive grants it awards through the federal Enhancing Education Through Technology block-grant program. In preparing for the 2005-06 round of competitive grants, Arizona decided to require an assessment of fifth- and eighth-grade students’ technology literacy. [ Read More ]

   

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  ISTE unveils new tech standards for teachers
  Schools looking for a framework to help guide their teachers' use of technology in the classroom have a new resource at their disposal: The International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) has issued new technology standards for teachers. [ Read More ]

   

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  NECC highlights tech's 'transformative' power
  Transformation and collaboration were the central ideas of the 2008 National Educational Computing Conference (NECC) in San Antonio, which kicked off June 29 with a call to fundamentally change education and continued with several other sessions that repeated this theme. [ Read More ]

   

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  States struggle with assessing tech literacy
  The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) stipulates that all students should be technologically literate by the end of the eighth grade. But how to assess technological literacy has proven to be a complex challenge for school leaders. [ Read More ]

   

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  U.S. educators seek new ideas abroad
  With increasing anxiety, advocates of American education have been looking at other countries around the world and asking: What do they know that we don't know [ Read More ]

   

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  Groups push for media-literacy education
  Nearly three out of five states say they have defined what it means for students to be "media literate" and have implemented media-literacy standards, according to a recent survey—a result suggesting that states are beginning to address the importance of preparing students for an information-rich society, but they still have more work to do. [ Read More ]

   

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  Report: Students struggle with information literacy
  We often think of today's students as technology-savvy—and while that might be true, to a certain extent, when it comes to using hardware and software devices, a recently published report shows how little know-how students display when it comes to information literacy, or the ability to use technology to find the information they're looking for. [ Read More ]

   

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  P21: Rethink testing for future success
  Today's high-stakes tests are inadequate tools for measuring the kinds of skills students will need for success in the global, technology-driven workplace, according to a group of key business and education leaders. The group, called the Partnership for 21st Century Skills (P21), has issued a report calling on national and state policy makers to ratchet up efforts to design and implement new assessments that can effectively measure these skills. [ Read More ]

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  New test gauges ICT literacy
  ETS, the nonprofit group that created the SAT and a number of other standardized tests, has worked with educators, information technology experts, and other institutions to develop a new test designed to measure what it means to be literate in the digital age. [ Read More ]

   

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  States erratic on IT literacy
  With its focus on testing for proficiency in reading, math, and now science, it's easy to forget that the federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) also says all students should be technology literate by the end of the eighth grade. [ Read More ]

   

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