【本文作者John B. Mahaffie是顶级未来学家，主要研究影响职业胜任力的技能因素。感谢荆楚理工学院李学银老师推荐并翻译此文。文后附有英语原文，有兴趣的朋友可以对照阅读。】

教育的未来：帮助孩子做好为未来准备的九项技能（中英对照）

撰文|John B. Mahaffie

翻译|李学银

请考虑今天8到10岁的男孩或女孩20年后的生活。也就是在2034年时，这个小孩30岁左右，在某处就职。但会是哪种职业？现在我们知道怎样为这个小孩做好未来准备吗？

你现在最熟悉的职业在2034年很可能已经完全不同，甚至可能会不复存在。哪种职业会取代它尚不确定。作为父母、社区领导人、教育工作者或政策制定者，每天都在为小孩遥远的未来生活作决策，但是某种程度上，我们在盲目行事。

我们必须尽可能弄清世界在未来是什么样子，并且依此来着力引导政策制定和教育工作。相反，我们太多的努力充其量不过是着眼于今天。我们对未来事情的猜测和假设太缺远见。

未来什么样？

这样分析后, 我们应当关注：（1）对于变化的世界我们知道什么以及变化的世界如何驱动工作的变化；（2）使小孩在未来成功的个人和学习的技能。这不是要设计新课程体系，而是在培养小孩时要应对一系列挑战。

对于未来我们比较清楚地知道些什么呢？基于正在兴起和变化的事情，我们可以说：

•我们的生活和工作将受到不断变化的浪潮的强烈影响

•更多工作将会涉及国际联系，并且公民意识更加成为全球关注焦点

•更多工作将会是学科交叉，牵涉到新型合作

•大量职业将会密切依赖数字化机器和智能系统

•工作和生活的更多方面将使用可视化交流

•全球应对可持续发展问题的方式将影响绝大多数劳动者

•因为社会遇到新问题，公民责任只会变得更加复杂

掌握何种技能，才能不惧未来？　　

小孩在未来需要九项技能

为不确定性做好准备，提出的问题从具体到一般，从现在可以确定的职场技能到需要小孩为可能不确定的未来以及逐步变化做好准备的技能。到底是些什么？

1、热爱学习

我们并不确定将来所需的技能和知识是什么。渴望学习会使个人更为成功。成功源于作为小孩的经历：学习遇到挑战，学习引起兴趣，学习受到奖励，学习带来快乐，有时也包括小孩想学习的是什么。

2、学会学习

学会学习是一种可教技能，应当成为学校课程体系的核心。这包括持续不懈地坚持和努力提升学习技能，让学生有机会进行反思和学会最佳学习方式。

3、认识自我

认识自我是一种中心技能。其关键部分就是谦虚，另外还有自信。自我认知的小孩将来能够并且愿意与各式人物交谈，善于倾听并且继续学习。

4、理解他人

小孩可能天生地以自我为中心，这实际上就是自私。有办法解决这个问题。我们可以帮助他们理解别人所处的情形以及他人的观点。能够理解他人的孩子会成为一个强有力的合作者。

5、懂得沟通

沟通除了口头和书面两种外，还有越来越多的可视化沟通。沟通将成为绝大多数工作的根本。理解他人加强了沟通，懂得沟通反过来又会改善和提高合作能力。

6、拓宽视野

并非所有教育都在学校完成。把到首都参观过与从未离开过乡村的小孩加以对比，就会看到前者的优势。同样，只在城市生活从未到过农村的小孩也会显出不足。

7、坦然面对复杂世界

世界并不是由简单的因果关系所驱动，重大问题也并不是非黑即白。我们所处的世界充满着微妙性和复杂性。这样审视和理解这一世界是工作和生活成功的关键。

8、设定目标

成功之人学习设定目标并且实现目标。对于用人单位来说，这意味着他们富有成效；对于个人而言，这意味着个人成功和进步。

9、具有开放心态

如果我们不把小孩培养成为具有适应能力、思维能力和开放心态之人，那他们就不可能成功。小孩未来面对的世界将不断遇到挑战和变化，只有强大和有所准备才能改变。

小结

全世界的教育创新项目把重点放在这九项技能中的至少其中几项，通常设计的课程体系强调从实践中学习和协作，并且重点关注学习者的自身兴趣、需求和动机。例如，许多进步教育原则紧密配合或直接支持这些关键技能，并且提供更加强调这些技能的理念和框架。国际文凭项目IB包含了整体性学习 、跨文化意识和沟通交流等核心理念。在美国，共同核心标准把小孩甚至在整个小学阶段明确怎样学习作为推动重点。

但是当这一创新继续时，“回到基础”的推动可能会超过这种技能构建的兴趣。那样就意味着会失去培养全球青少年技能的深度和强度。

我们现在对长远未来的认识清楚表明：新旧形式的素养以及通识教育都是至关重要的。但是，现在关注职业教育和STEM（科学、技术、工程和数学）教育的压力很容易被夸大，致使在教育系统中偏离核心学习以及学生学会为不明确未来作好准备的东西太远。

不应当使深层次教育只为满足职场的短期需求。那些左右课程体系的职业可能马上会消失并且在几年内肯定会改变。职场需要具体的职业技能培训，学校则要重视教育。

Futureof Education: Nine Skills That Will Help Make Our Children Future-Ready

Leadingfuturist John B. Mahaffie looks at the personal and learning skills that willmake our children successful in the future.

Please bring to mind a child of today, aboy or girl who is eight, nine, or 10 years old. Cast their life forward 20years. It will be the year 2034. That child will be about 30 years old, makinghis or her way in a job somewhere. But what sort of job? What do we know todayabout how to prepare that child for the future?

Thechances are the jobs you know best today will be different or may not evenexist in 2034. What may take their place is uncertain. We work as parents,community leaders, educators, and policymakers, every day, making decisions toprepare children for their distant future lives. But we are working, in part,blind.

Wemust discover all we can know about what that world will be like in the future,and try to guide our policies and educational efforts from that. Instead, toomany of our efforts stand, at best, in today. We guess or assume things aboutthe future with too little foresight.

In this analysis, we look at: 1). What weknow about our changing world and how it drives change in work, and 2).Personal and learning skills that will make our children successful in thefuture. This gives us not a design for new curricula, but a set of challengesto address as we build them.

Whatdo we know with some clarity about the future?

Based on what is emerging and changing now, wecan say that:

·Our lives and work lives will be sweptby regular waves of change

·More work will involve internationalconnections and citizenship will gain a more global focus

·More work will be multidisciplinary,involving new kinds of collaboration

·Far more jobs will mean workingintimately with digital machines and intelligent systems

·More elements of work and life will usevisual communications

·The world will be battlingsustainability issues in ways that will affect most workers

·Citizenship responsibilities will onlygrow more complicated as societies confront new issues

Nineskills children need for their future

Preparing for uncertainty raises thequestion up from the specific to the more general, from workplace skills we candefine today to skills that prepare a child for an uncertain range of possiblefutures and for steady change. What are those things?

1.Love of Learning— With nocertainty about the skills and knowledge we will need. A desire to learn willgive an individual greater success. That comes from experiences as a child inwhich learning is challenging, interesting, rewarding, and fun, and sometimesincludes what the child wants to learn.

2. Skill at learning— Learning tolearn is a teachable skill and should be at the core of the school curriculum.This includes iterative efforts at instilling and advancing learning skills,and giving students the chance to reflect and learn about how they learn best.

3. Self-knowledge — Self-knowledge is thusa central skill. A critical part of it is humility, but another isself-confidence. The self-aware child will grow to be someone who can and wantsto talk to all sorts of people. To listen well and to continue to learn.

4.People sense — Children may be naturally self-focused and thus inpractice, selfish. There is a way out. We can work with them to understand thesituations others are in, the points of view that other people have. The childwho develops people sense will be a strong collaborator.

5. Communication—Communication includesspoken, written, and increasingly, visual communication, and will befundamental to most kinds of work. This is strengthened by people sense, and inturn improves and strengthens skill at collaboration.

6. Worldliness— Not all educationhappens in school. Consider the advantages of the child who has been to thecapital city and has seen what's there compared with the child who has neverleft the village. Or, to be fair, also the child who lives in the city and hasnever seen a farm or village.

7. Comfort with complexity— The worldis not driven by simple cause and effect and big questions are not black orwhite. Our world is full of subtlety and complexity. Examining it andunderstanding it that way is essential for success in work and in life.

8. Goal setting— Successful peoplelearn how to set goals and meet them. For the employer, this means they areproductive. For the individual, this can mean personal success and advancement.

9.Open minds — No success is possible if we don’t raise children to becomeadaptable, thoughtful, open-minded adults. Theirs will be a world of constantchallenge and change, and being strong and prepared means being able to change.

Innovative programs around the world put afocus on at least some of these nine skills, often with curricula thatemphasize experiential learning, collaboration, and a focus on the learner'sown interests, needs, and motivation. For example, many of the tenets ofprogressive education mesh with, or directly support, these critical skills andprovide a philosophy and framework for addressing them even more. International Baccalaureate programs include core concepts of holisticlearning, intercultural awareness, and communication. In the US, the CommonCore drives a focus on readying children, even at the elementary level tounderstand how they learn.

But while this innovation continues, a"back to basics" push may overweigh interest in this kind of skillsbuilding. And that would mean a loss of the depth and strength we need toinstill in young minds around the world.

What we can tell now about the long-termfuture indicates something clearly: literacy in old but also new forms andgeneral education, are critical. But the pressures today for a focus onvocational education and on science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM),could easily be overplayed, tipping the balance in our education systems toofar from the core learning and learning to learn which will prepare studentsfor the unknown.

Let’s not allow deeper education to yieldto the shorter-term needs of the workplace. Those jobs, which want to dictatecurricula, right now may be gone and certainly will be changed within a fewyears. Specific job skill training is for the workplace. Education is for theschools.

（本文选自审辩式思维-critical thinking）