One of the biggest challenges for me, by far, is to try to incorporate the 4 Cs into my lessons. They are creativity, critical thinking, collaboration, and communication. Here is a breakdown of what each of the components means:

So why the 4 C's?? Because these are the skillsets that we need to build in our children to equip them for living in the 21st century. Communication is being able to effectively communicate and share thoughts and ideas with others. Collaboration is when students are working together to reach a common goal and as they are doing so, each student is contributing to their group in their own unique ways. Critical thinking is the ability to tackle problems that are multi-tiered in challenges in varied ways. Last but not least, creativity is becoming innovative and original in either methods or the process of solving a problem.

When I first encountered this 4-C concept, I was blown away by the notion but was confused and lost on how to deliver such lessons. I assumed there would be much prep work and lots of research. Upon browsing for ideas, I came across this which became my reference point:

I started with anything to do with Google since I was most familiar and comfortable. Then I got courageous and branched out and started to use other platforms. The hardest point was to get started with this mindset--> the 4-C perspective. Lessons need to be meaningful and effective instead of doing busy work. Since this idea is still fairly new, there are "challenges and constraints faced by teachers involving various aspects such as knowledge, understanding and skills related to effective strategy, method, technique and approach to be applied in the teaching process. Support in terms of professional development and pedagogy enhancement related to 21st-century learning and fostering 4Cs skills should be provided for all the teachers" (Carter, 2014).

Carter, J. (2014). The 4Cs of Mathematics Instruction: Collaborate, Create, Communicate, Critique. Westlake High School, Austin, TX.