Week 2 Blog #4: 21st Century Skills & Lifelong Learning

During the hours I have spent reading, listening, and searching online, I have come across the opinion that our educational system does not work; it has been a topic that has been greatly debated and studied, especially now with technology and global connectivism.
If I ponder about a system that doesn't work, then must I also conclude that the digital immigrant teacher is also ineffective, or simply puppets in a collapsing educational system?
In the video 21st Century Literacies, Howard Rheingold mentions the myth of digital natives considered as empowered and fluent as a result of carrying laptops.
He goes on to say something quite contrary to what I've been reading all along 'media enabled does not guarantee that people can perform and persuade others' in other words, just because a student carries a laptop does not make him/her a digital native until they have learned how to use the tools of essential literacies. Learning those literacies is critical and teachers have a pivotal role in becoming learners and teaching the tools for global connectivism.
Rheingold goes on to mention that schools are not the place where critical thinking is taking place, but instead takes place out of the classroom. A place where 'learning occurs as part of a social network of many diverse connections and ties'
Perhaps we are at a crossroads, where the role of the teacher will no longer be as it was, but take on a new role as the learner.

References:

www.toastmasters.org

http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/literacynumeracy/inspire/principals/NewLeader2.pdf