Schooling in 2056: a perspective from Singapore

Madam Yip Weng Ee Telok Kurau Primary School Singapore

The future school is one that serves a larger teacher and pupil population but is smaller in physical size.

In the year 2056, most of the curriculum will be online and both teachers and pupils would not need to be present in school physically at a specific time. Pupils attend classes at their own pace and time, remotely. Teachers prepare and present the lessons virtually. So why is the population of teachers and pupils getting larger, despite the fact that the global population shows a decreasing trend? The future education system would be one that offers programs that are customised for each pupil, according to ability and interest. Pupils would not be bound by the programs offered by any one particular school. They are free to select and take up modules offered by specialised schools. This simply means that future pupils can be studying in a few schools simultaneously, instead of only one. Teachers, on the other hand, would specialised in different subjects and teach in different schools offering the subjects.

Schools in the future would not operate on a large scale that caters for the whole teacher and pupil population. The school premises will be reduced considerably, as teachers and pupils will not be present in schools all of the time. The school will maximise its resources to provide state-of-the-art facilities that best enhance the teaching and learning process.

Boutique classrooms

Teachers and pupils are scheduled to meet in the school weekly for coaching sessions and social interaction. Besides the petite but well equipped school premises, there are boutique classrooms located strategically in public places like malls, libraries or even entertainment centres. The boutique classrooms are learning hubs set up with the necessary resources, manipulatives and apparatus that complement the online lessons. On days that the teachers and pupils are not meeting in school, pupils will visit the boutique classrooms in their own time to complete their lessons. They are free to make bookings to use the boutique classroom anytime, at their convenience. The learning process is one that is flexible and feasible anytime, anywhere.

The curriculum will be customised according to individual needs. There will be reliable devices to assess pupils’ attitude and aptitude before a personal curriculum plan is recommended. Contents of knowledge will be largely digitised materials presented in a way that appeals to the pupils who grow up in a media-rich environment. The education system will support a highly collaborative learning community globally.  There will be a vast amount of collaboration via real-time multimedia conferencing among teachers and pupils around the world.

The traits of our future pupils are quite different from the present. We may say that they are IT savvy now but IT skill is just the basic literacy that every future child is equipped with. The main trait of future students is being what I call ‘multi’: they are a multi-sensory generation who multi-tasks in a multi-disciplinary curriculum, supported by a multicultural and multimedia environment. They are highly independent learners who reflect, research, redefine and even reject during their learning process. A scenario will be when a science teacher is delivering a lesson on the ‘greenhouse effect’, the students will be researching on the topic, doing an online survey, contacting some experts on the topic simultaneously, with a click or two of their computers. They can also be multi-tasking at the same time, perhaps making an appointment, planning their schedule or exchanging some information. All is made possible with just a click or two.

In the year 2056, I will be in my 80s. I may not live long enough to see how much of my imagined scenario turns into reality. But I strongly believe that for any curriculum we may have in the future, the core will be the inculcation of values, and this has not changed in the numerous educational revolutions that we had throughout history.