To Prepare Students for Tomorrow, Teach the Future Today!

Erica Bol

Young people go to school to prepare themselves for the future. We teach them about the past and the present—but nothing about the future. Why is this? The main reason that most schools do not make the future part of their curriculum is the challenge of teaching something that is not yet there. But just because a descriptive depiction of what the future holds cannot be provided, it does not follow that we cannot help young people develop the skills needed to optimally prepare for that future. Preparation can give direction to individual futures—and to that of the world.

I argue that being prepared for the future is more important now than ever, if only because the world is changing at such a fast pace. The speed of change and its often attendant lack of control can produce stress, anxiety, or even shock. Consequently, people shy away from contemplating the future and end up letting the future “happen” to them. This is the real tragedy, as there is no reason we cannot properly prepare people—whether students or adults—for a thriving future. When people learn future skills, fear evaporates, and they instead come to embrace, and even shape, change.

Futures Education

The education system should play a pivotal role in preparing students for the future, but it has all but abdicated that responsibility. Alvin Toffler recognized this. “Government ministries, churches, the mass media,” he wrote, “all exhort young people to stay in school, insisting that now, as never before, one’s future is almost wholly dependent upon education. Yet for all this rhetoric about the future, our schools face backward toward a dying system, rather than forward to the emerging new society.”

While the majority of schools have failed to change course over the 50 years since those words were written, there are a few that have answered the call, taking a more proactive role in society, and “teaching the future.” But what, exactly, does that mean?

Teaching the future means showing students how to anticipate and influence change in the midst of complexity, uncertainty, and ambiguity. It means abandoning the idea that one should teach the “right” answer. There is no longer a “right” answer; it is about finding multiple answers in the midst of rapid change. It is guiding students in the discovery of their dreams of the future, the discovery of potential futures, and the links between the two. It is also about guiding students to think about how to go from the present to the future and from the future back to the present.

Students develop “future scenarios” and analyze which of these scenarios are preferred. They brainstorm the actions they can take to increase the probability that a preferred future scenario is the one that will actually occur. It’s a process that involves not only critical thinking, but empathic and creative forms of thinking. This helps students develop the metacognitive skills—both sense-making and strange-making—needed to navigate and flourish in the future. Toffler recognized early on that the necessary kind of teaching would require a new skill set. “By instructing students,” he famously wrote, “how to learn, unlearn and relearn, a powerful new dimension can be added to education.”

The Role of the Teacher

Teaching future skills is not something that comes naturally to most teachers. Because it was never part of their teacher education experience, they are simply not equipped to do it. However, as we see in the course of our work, once teachers overcome the fear of the unknown, they enjoy it fully and value the possibilities it brings to the classroom. Exploring the future in this way allows them to experiment with the virtue of not knowing. And the effect it has on the kids? Renewed interest and active, imaginative engagement. It stimulates their curiosity, gives them freedom to think differently, to talk openly with their friends and fellow students. Indeed, it empowers them.

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Teaching the future means showing students how to anticipate and influence change in the midst of complexity, uncertainty, and ambiguity. It means abandoning the idea that one should teach the “right” answer.

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This creates a feedback loop for the teachers, who then develop deeper relationships with their students. It motivates teachers just as much as it motivates their students! Suddenly, not being able to answer a question is a sign that they are actually doing their work well!

Teach the Future Foundation

Teach the Future is a non-profit organization dedicated to bringing foresight and futures thinking to schools and students around the world. Founded by Peter Bishop in 2013, it followed his retirement from the University of Houston, where for 30 years he led the Master’s in Foresight program. Since then, Teach the Future has grown into a community of educators and advocators dedicated to empowering teachers and young people the world over.

To activate our mission we develop and organize all kinds of activities, services, tools, and resources. Everything we do is aimed at empowering young people to become entrepreneurs in the making of their own futures—and to share their future visions with the world.

Future Readiness

Future Shock was an inspiring force behind the Teach the Future movement. Alvin Toffler put a spotlight on the importance of teaching young people to think about the long term, to help them develop wider, deeper, and longer perspectives. He started the conversation about making students “future-proof” so they would be enabled and empowered not only to be proactive with respect to their own lives, but to have a positive impact on the world.

Erica Bol is founder and CEO of Teach the Future Europa. In equipping teachers to teach the future, she also empowers them to be part of making the education system more future-proof. Her work was recognized with the Next Generation Foresight Award Education 2018. To learn more about the Teach the Future Foundation, visit www.teachthefuture.eu. Connect with Erica at www.linkedin.com/in/ericabol.