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21st Century Skills: Students’ Perception of Online Instructor Role

The research inquires how students perceive the role of Technology Education and Cultural diversity (TEC) instructors in improving their 21^st century skills, and the students’ preferred learning style.

21^st century skills include, among others, collaboration, Information and Communication Technology (ICT) skills, higher order thinking, and multicultural communication. These skills are core elements for modern life and are the focus of the study as teacher critical career and life skills.
The study examined (a) the level of ICT skills students acquire from the courses; (b) students’ perceptions of the instructor role in developing 21^st century skills; and (c) students’ preferred learning style. A questionnaire was delivered to 99 students from eight different Teacher Education Colleges and different cultural backgrounds Arabs, Jews, religious, and secular.
The findings show that students complete the course with a high level of ICT skills, and that their preferred learning communication style was face-to-face (F2F) (45.45%) and blended method (43.43%), over the fully online (11.11%).  Regarding online learning, students mostly preferred the mixed method of synchronous and asynchronous (59%), followed by asynchronous (29%), and synchronous (12%). As to student preference of the instructor role of enhancement, the results were prioritized as follow Higher order thinking (M=3.99), online group collaboration (M=3.87), multicultural communication awareness (M=3.82), pedagogical use of digital tools (M=3.73).
Teacher education lecturers ought to (1) design the online courses in a way that integrates F2F meetings and both synchronous and asynchronous methods; and (2) employ the wide range of skills in TEC courses that comply with 21st century principles; hence, the importance of widening such courses in teacher education colleges.

Published

Ganayem, A., & Zidan, W. (2018). 21^st century skills: students’ perception of online instructor role. Interdisciplinary Journal of e-Skills and Lifelong Learning, 14, 117-142.
DOI https//doi.org/10.28945/4090