This document discusses teaching and assessing 21st century skills. It begins by clarifying what 21st century skills are, such as creativity, collaboration, critical thinking, communication, and technology literacy. It then examines how these skills are embedded within common core state standards and provides examples. The document also explores sample methods that can be used to assess 21st century skills, such as oral interviews, graphic organizers, presentations, peer reviews, products, reflections, quizzes, and journals. It concludes by discussing how one school assesses these skills and what can be learned from their approach.

1. Teaching and
Assessing the 4’Cs
Andrew Miller
@betamiller

3. • By the end of this session, we
will:
•
•
Clarify 21st Century Skills
•
Examine Sample Methods to
Assess 21st Century Skills
•
Examine Sample Rubrics
st
21
Uncover where
Century
Skills are embedded in the
Common Core

6. =
“The What”

7. “The standards stress not only procedural skill but
also conceptual understanding, to make sure
students are learning and absorbing the critical
information they need to succeed at higher levels rather than the current practices by which many
students learn enough to get by on the next test,
but forget it shortly thereafter, only to review again
the following year.”

8. • Creativity
• Collaboration
• Critical Thinking
• Communication
• Technology Literacy
• and more...

9. •
•
Grade 9-10 Reading Informational - Delineate and
evaluate the argument and specific claims in a text,
assessing whether the reasoning is valid and the
evidence is relevant and sufficient; identify false
statements and fallacious reasoning.
Grade 9-10 Speaking and Listening - Initiate and
participate effectively in a range of collaborative
discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacherled) with diverse partners on grades 9–10 topics,
texts, and issues, building on others’ ideas and
expressing their own clearly and persuasively.

10. •
•
Grade 3 S
peaking and Listening - Engage effectively in a range
of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and
teacher- led) with diverse partners on grade 3 topics and texts,
building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly.
Grade 9-10 S
peaking and Listening - Initiate and participate
effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-onone, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on
grades 9–10 topics, texts, and issues, building on others’ ideas
and expressing their own clearly and persuasively.

11. •
•
•
4th Grade Reading - Interpret information
presented visually, orally, or quantitatively
(e.g., in charts, graphs, diagrams,
demonstrate understanding of the text (e.g.,
time lines, animations, or interactive
elements on Web pages) …
8th Grade Writing - Use technology,
including the Internet, to produce and
publish …
11th Grade Speaking and Listening - Make
strategic use of digital media (e.g., textual,
graphical, audio, visual, and interactive
elements) in presentations…

12. Mathematical Practices
Reason abstractly and quantitatively.
Make sense of problems and persevere in solving
them.
Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning
of others.
Model with mathematics.
Use appropriate tools strategically.
Attend to precision.
Look for and make use of structure.
Look for and express regularity in
repeated
reasoning.

13. “Real Life” Math
7 RP - Analyze proportional relationships and use
them to solve real-world and mathematical problems.
7G-S
olve real-life and mathematical problems
involving angle measure, area, surface area, and
volume
8 G - Understand congruence and similarity using
physical models, transparencies, or geometry
software.
7 BF - Build a function that models a relationship
between two quantities
G MG - Apply geometric concepts in modeling
situations

15. One School. How does this assess 21st Century Skills?
What can we learn from their story?

17. Think
Share
Assessment Tools: What assessment tools do you
already use in your classroom to assess content?

20. Oral Interview

21. Graphic Organizer

22. Presentation

23. Peer Review

24. Product

25. Reflection

26. Quiz

27. Journal

28. Performance
Assessment

29. Rubric

30. www.tinyurl.com/21rubric
s

35. In your group, take on the role of one of the
following superheroes to solve the challenge
given:
•Elastigirl (Mrs. Incredible)
•Superman
•Spiderman
•James Bond
•Katniss
•She-ra
Challenge: Your superhero shake blender is
broken, How will you fix it?

38. Teaching Critical Thinking. Brainstorm instructional
activities you might do to teach this component of
critical thinking.

41. andrew@andrewkmiller.com
twitter.com/betamiller
www.andrewkmiller.com