White Papers - Assessment and Teaching of 21st Century Skills (ACT21s)

[Post originally written on 11 January 2010, and rewritten on 16 September 2010.]

The CISCO/Intel/Microsoft Assessment and Teaching of 21st Century Skills (ACT21s) initiative published a series of draft Working Group White Papers on 11 January 2010. Each of the white papers deserves to be read. According to the announcement made at the January 2010 Learning and Technology World Forum (attended by ~700 people including over 70 education ministers),  Australia, Finland, Portugal, Singapore, UK, and USA are "signed up" to apply (take account of? actively implement? I do not know) ACT21stCS. The individual white papers are (were?) on 21st Century Skills, Methodological Issues, Technological Issues, Classroom Learning Environments and Formative Evaluations, and Policy Frameworks for New Assessments. They were originally available for download, but now [16/9/2010] need to be requested by email, which seems to be a backward step.