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KEY COMPETENCES

the keys to improve your life

The world around us is constantly changing and the more it changes, the more we have to learn new important skills. These key competences are needed to achieve the ability of lifelong learning, eight competences, all important, meant to improve the life of whoever mastered them all. Here in this article, we want to have a closer look at these combinations of knowledge, skills and attitude and find out what they are, why it’s necessary to teach them and if the German school system has managed to give all of them the place in the curriculum that they deserve.

Literature, multilingualism, mathematics and other sciences, digitalization, social, citizenship, entrepreneurship and cultural awareness are all important fragments of our modern culture. To be able to live progressively in attention to all these aspects, certain key competences need to be taught in school.

The literacy competence includes the ability to communicate both orally and in writing and the knowledge of understanding and expressing ideas and opinions, as well as basic principles of research. In addition to that you shall develop interest in communicating with people. The multilingual competence basically contains the same requirements, but of course one needs to learn this in a different language. The next competence is split into two parts: firstly, the mathematical competence is the ability to develop and apply mathematical thinking to solve problems in everyday situations, which assumes knowing how to use the numbers and basic principles related to mathematics. Secondly, the competence in science, technology and engineering teaches the willingness to look out for natural laws in practical situations and makes one understand the impact of humans on the environment.

Next, digital competence is the ability to reflect, create, present and understand digital content as well as knowing how it can be used responsibly. In the modern, digital world with rising digitalisation it is an important skill to be able to work with the latest technological devices. On top of that personal, social and learning to learn competence is the ability to reflect upon oneself, effectively manage time, information and problem solving and also work with others in a productive way. That is very important in the modern world, because teamwork is essential in a lot of jobs nowadays. Citizenship competence is necessary for good integration into society and working in a new social environment. One needs to know about the history, politics and main developments to understand how and why people are living the way they do. One also needs to understand, in which way that is contributing to Europe. Cultural awareness also includes knowledge and respect for different cultures.

Entrepreneurship competencies are really important for life, because after graduating from school one has to decide whether one wants to be an employee or an entrepreneur. This decision is important in the context of key competencies for the future, because a person who loves his or her work is much more effective than a person, always thinking about what he or she could have done. For example, there are many people in the European “middle class," who would have liked to become entrepreneurs, but did not have a chance to get in touch with this economic sector. To prevent this thinking of past opportunities, it is necessary to learn about the advantages and disadvantages of being an employee with a fixed salary, but less freedom, or being an entrepreneur with more freedom at the expense of safety.

However, to be implemented into school, it should be taught by a successful entrepreneur, who has already reached a certain age, so he no longer has to focus all his energy on business, but also on transferring knowledge to the next generation. Perhaps now someone thinks, why does it have to be an entrepreneur who teaches, it could also be a specially trained teacher. In this case, you need to know that the good teacher does what he teaches. Therefore it is sometimes indispensable to have an entrepreneur and not a conventionally trained educator, who speaks of book knowledge instead of experience in this position.

Keeping that in mind, we came to the conclusion that the entrepreneurship competence, although it isn’t more important than the other ones, is the one key competence that is neglected the most in our school system. Thus, the government should invest more into the entrepreneurship competences, maybe in the form of inviting established and experienced entrepreneurs into secondary schools to talk about their career.

We can see that the German school system is engaged to teach these key competences for lifelong learning. But until we reach the point that all students, who leave school are equipped with each and every one of these key competences, we need to focus on those that we left behind. Once we achieve this goal, we as the European Union can make school more effective and sustainable.

Sources:

European Union, key competences for life-long learning. European Union, 2019.