According to the New Ukrainian School reform, teachers should create conditions in their lessons to enable school children to collaborate and communicate in the classroom, use their creativity, think critically and be responsible for their own learning results. Therefore, the reform puts forward new requirements for teachers to organise work in the classroom and to create an environment to develop language skills, communicative skills and 21st century skills. Development of core skills can be integrated in every subject. It is expected that teachers create favourable conditions for learners to develop their core skills using communicative methods and techniques and learning technologies.
The aim of the blended Core Skills Programme and course, designed by the British Council, is to supplement the traditional, subject-focussed curriculum and help teachers develop required skills.
The course consists of online and face-to-face components and is delivered in Ukrainian. The modules Critical Thinking and Problem Solving, Collaboration and Communication, Creativity and Imagination and Digital Literacy have been translated to Ukrainian and localised to suit national educational context.
Online course Core Skills of the 21 Century has been developed by the British Council together with online education studio Edera. It was launched in May 2020. This course helps understand the competence approach to teaching for developing learners’ critical thinking and problem solving skills, digital literacy, communication and collaboration, creativity and imagination.
It is available to anyone who wants to learn about core skills and who is interested in improving the educational process and developing their own skills.
The face-to-face Core Skills course consists of the following modules: Critical Thinking and Problem Solving, Collaboration and Communication, Creativity and Imagination and Digital Literacy.
Teachers will be able to continue their studies and deepen their knowledge of the core skills of the 21st century with the refresher face-to-face course in INSETTs after completing the online course.
Methodologists of Humanities, Sciences and the English Language from all INSETTs (75 methodologists) have been trained and validated by the British Council as Core Skills trainers. They deliver a face-to-face training course to teachers of all subjects at the INSETT refresher courses.
The Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine supports the initiative of the British Council in Ukraine and has approved the Programme and the “Core Skills of the 21 Century’’ course to be delivered at the INSETT refresher courses for teachers of different subjects.