The education system It necessarily undergoes great changes over time, since the vast majority of people go through it in its initial stage, and it is evident that each one of them goes through it in a different way. In some cases, experience gives rise to prospects for change and improvement.
One of the most recent transformations of the educational system is the introduction of the concept of competency education, a comprehensive approach that seeks to link the educational sector with the productive sector at the same time as raising the potential of individuals, in tune with the transformations of the current world.
Competencies
Competences are adequate performance processes in certain contexts, which integrate different knowledge: two of the most important are the know how to be and the know to do. For instance: ethical and moral values, gardening knowledge.
Through these competencies You can carry out activities or solve problems with a sense of challenge, flexibility, creativity, understanding and entrepreneurship, within a perspective of continuous improvement and with the goal of contributing to personal development but also to social development.
There are many differences in the teaching by competencies with respect to more traditional teaching, insofar as this new method assumes cognitive processes as elements that tend to develop a task and do not tend to capture the content of academic disciplines.
Place the learning within a context and does not take it as abstract, prepares for life and not for the course of higher studies (which not everyone reaches anyway), and considers learning as a functional tool.
Know how to be
When talking about know how to be reference is made to the competencies that are called ‘existential‘: the communicative activity of the students is not only affected by their knowledge but also by individual factors related to their personality.
Examples of know-how competencies
- The attitude of being open to new experiences.
- The development of a way of being between optimism and pessimism.
- Ethical and moral values.
- The opening before peoples to which one does not belong.
- The development of memory capacity.
- The development of a way of being between rigidity and flexibility.
- Religious beliefs.
- The development of a way of being between the entrepreneurial spirit and indecision
- The human need to communicate.
- The open mind.
- Being able to put one’s own system of cultural values into discussion.
- Know how to apologize, if necessary.
- The development of a way of being between self-confidence or lack of it.
- The development of a way of being between spontaneity and self-control.
- The development of self-confidence.
- The willingness to distance oneself from conventional attitudes due to cultural differences.
- Intrinsic and extrinsic motivations.
- The development of a way of being between introversion and extroversion.
- The attitude of being open to the opinion of other people.
- The will to relativize one’s own cultural perspective.
Know to do
The know to do refers to practical skills, that is, the development of a skill.
This type of skills can include:
- Social skills. The ability to act in accordance with the types of conventions.
- Everyday life skills. Carry out routine actions.
- Professional skills. Those needed to perform job duties, and leisure skills.
Examples of know-how
- Bath.
- Have knowledge of gardening.
- Repair a refrigerator.
- To know how to swim.
- Use Software programming language.
- To be able to repair a water heater.
- Change the wheel of a car.
- Make embroidery.
- Put together a PowerPoint presentation with the objectives of a company for the next year.
- Draw.
- Climb a mountain.
- Cook your own food.
- Interpret the operation of a medical device.
- Take photos.
- Play a musical instrument.
- To be able to practice a sport.
- Do carpentry work.
- Teach a class.
- Build spreadsheets in Excel.
- Make sculptures.