As districts and states work to define 21^st century skills, abilities and literacies, a number of organizations have sought to provide a framework for their planning.  The partnership for 21^st Century Skills, for example, has seven states committed to their Route 21 path.

Another long established resource comes from Metiri Group and Learning Point Associates/NCREL. The enGauge 21^st Century Skills define what 21st Century Skills are, why they are important, and how they will contribute to the success of students as individuals striving to live, learn, and work in the Digital Age.

The Skills
Combining what is known from cognitive science about learning with an ever-changing, high-tech landscape, the guideposts establish four quadrants of 21^st Century Skills:

• Digital Age Literacies
• Inventive Thinking
• Effective Communication
• High Productivity

Each category includes a subset of specific skills with definitions, and the complete chart is available with their 21^st Century Skills brief. A separate resource,the Continua of Progress, provides a rubric defining what each skill looks like at novice, basic, proficient and advanced levels.

Implementation Guidance
The complete report for this work adds resources for:

• Glimpses into 21^st Century Classrooms
• Getting There From Here
• A Process for Bringing 21^st Century Skills into Your Schools, and
• A Cross-match to National Models

Cross-match to Other Skill Sets
The Cross-match also exists as its own document. It compares enGauge to:

• ISTE NETS (1998, International Society for Technology in Education)
• Secretary's Commission on Achieving the Necessary Skills (SCANS, 1991, US Department of Labor ),
• Information Literacy Standards for Students (1998, American Association of School Librarians & the Association for Educational Communications and Technology)
• Technically Speaking: Why All Americans Need to Know More About Technology (2002, National Academy of Engineering and the National Research Council)
• Standards for Technological Literacy (2002, the International Technology Education Association)

This work came before the release of Route 21, so there is no cross-match for those skill definitions.

The enGauge 21st Century Skills were developed through a process that included literature reviews, research on emerging characteristics of the Net-Generation, a review of current reports on workforce trends from business and industry, analysis of nationally recognized skill sets, input from educators, data from educator surveys, and reactions from constituent groups

Source: enGauge 21^st Century Skills