Innovation ready

As I was reading this article about Tony Wagner's ideas concerning education/business, I thought of our current ATCI student-directed project where students focus on thinking, communication, and collaboration. I felt pretty good about what we are doing. Like Wagner, we believe we need to prepare students to be "innovation ready" more than "college ready."

A few quotes from the NYT article:

The capacity to innovate — the ability to solve problems creatively or bring new possibilities to life — and skills like critical thinking, communication and collaboration are far more important than academic knowledge.
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Young people who are intrinsically motivated — curious, persistent, and willing to take risks — will learn new knowledge and skills continuously. They will be able to find new opportunities or create their own — a disposition that will be increasingly important as many traditional careers disappear.” 
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We need to focus more on teaching the skill and will to learn and to make a difference and bring the three most powerful ingredients of intrinsic motivation into the classroom: play, passion and purpose.”

I feel very strongly that we cannot concentrate too much on cultivating that "will to learn."