You've probably viewed the YouTube video "Did You Know; Shift Happens" and its latest incarnation "Did You Know? 4.0" more than once by now. Stunning isn't it?  

The exponential rate of change is a cliché these days, but it's the world we live in and the world for which we need to prepare today's students. Coupled with the rate of change is the dynamism of such things as social networks, social production, and media grids that are a regular part of today's world. These two factors alone - and there are many others - support the argument that a major survival skill for the 21st century must be "agility and adaptability" as Tony Wagner and others name it.

Massive changes in technology have caused massive shifts in social adaptations. It's easy to see why agility rules. Most of us would acknowledge that our jobs are not the ones they were last year or five years ago much less 20 years ago, and we'd probably also acknowledge that we learn differently than we did even a few years ago. We use different tools and we use tools differently. We're all adapting every day, and the flexible mind will be increasingly important. 

So where's education adjusting and moving to teach the habits of adaptability and agility? What are American schools doing? Is current teaching in the US at the leading edge or not? Are schools actually reforming or only re-arranging themselves? Where's the evidence of advancement or stalemate on embedded curricular and delivery change? Education has historically been a conservative process and industry. Educators have believed in order and certainty in both pedagogy and their profession. But tomorrow's world begs a much more organic, web-like, non-linear and rather messy way of learning and carrying out work. 

Fostering agility and adaptability changes the old educational paradigms, most of all, perhaps, the one that considers the teacher as the classroom leader with all the  right answers, if not all the right questions. If we're to teach our students to be adaptable and agile, then they need practice managing disruption and uncertainty, which are often perceived to be negatives, as well as practice creating innovation and embracing new ideas.  Asking questions, challenging what is, understanding that ambiguity is often a fact of life and being able to actually thrive in ambiguity are skills that should be learned in classrooms and schools that are actually "run" by students. Learning that there are sometimes no completely right answers and certainly not just one right answer is fundamental to living and leading in a world that changes profoundly at an exponential rate.