How will your students communicate when they leave school? How will they gather information? How will they say what they need to say?

The thing about toolbelts though, is that no two people ever really need the same one.

So the trick to tool use is to learn to evaluate tasks and environments and your skills and the tools themselves as they change and determine what works best for you. I call this the "TEST" - <span style="font-weight: bold;">T</span>ask - <span style="font-weight: bold;">E</span>nvironment - <span style="font-weight: bold;">S</span>kills - <span style="font-weight: bold;">T</span>ools, a specifically ordered reframing of <a href="http://sweb.uky.edu/%7Ejszaba0/JoyZabala.html">Joy Zabala</a>'s "<a href="http://www.ode.state.or.us/initiatives/elearning/nasdse/settintrogeneric2005.pdf">SETT</a>" protocol. A specifically ordered reframing designed for self-determination.

And on top of this, the tools most schools are devoted to are antiques which serve few functions anywhere outside of school. It is as if you were learning to build homes but were allowed to use only tools invented before 1940. You'd be close to unemployable when you finished that training.

The only way to allow students to assemble this essential toolbelt for information and communication is to to throw open your classroom and let the world in. How will your students know which calendar works for them - the one on their phone, Google Calendar with SMS appointment texting, Microsoft Outlook, or any of a dozen paper systems unless you allow them to try them out?