Last November I had a thought. I was one of those thoughts that strikes you like lightening and changes your whole perspective on things. No doubt you have had a similar experience. Until I got hit by this particular bolt of lightening, I thought that teachers who understood the diverse ways that their students learn could directly improve student learning. In other words, if we could provide teachers with best practice strategies and knowledge about how students learn (which they implement in their classrooms) then this would improve student learning. 
There is nothing too wrong with this assumption except that I now see that the idea is missing a crucial piece of the process – the student. I am now thinking that teachers can’t improve student achievement, only students can improve student achievement. Any actions, accommodations or interventions that a teacher uses to improve student learning will only work if these strategies successfully encourage a student to change their perspective, attitude or behaviour towards learning. 
Sheri Edwards wrote to me about this idea. She said, “this is the issue for 21st Century learning, which our students will demand in their behaviors and attitudes –bored with paper, pencil, desks, and a teacher. They want more: more technology and more choice.
Therefore, to “connect their minds to learning” they need personal goals, timelines, reflection, and feedback as the teacher is now also an advisor and mentor in their “learning profile.” Lessons can no longer be finite: they must be open to the student choice in goals and in student’s expression of his/her learning; there is too much to learn.
That sounds like chaos, but I see teaching and learning similar to a conference: umbrella concepts with multiple options and goals, hopefully culminating in personal growth and understanding for all within that umbrella…. the factory model of learning must give way soon to more fluid and fluent spaces and networks of learning or we will never connect learning to the student’s learning profile or style. For now, our project, timeline, goals, reflections, and feedback will help me help the students connect to and advocate for their needs in learning…”
What are other skills that we need to be teaching 21st Century learners? What kinds of conversations do we need to initiate with students to enable them to understand their learning profile and to become advocates of their own learning style?
