Cognitive Flexibility Theory and the Assessment of 21st-Century Skills

Design for now, but with the future in mind: a “cognitive flexibility theory” perspective on online learning through the lens of MOOCs

“…Preparing to deal with such a world requires instructional features that promote and support the skill in the management of real-world complexity and the ability to deal adaptively with novel, ill-defined problems. Those have always been the main goals of Cognitive Flexibility Theory (CFT; Spiro et al 1988Spiro et al , 1992Spiro et al , 2017Spiro et al , 2019Spiro and Jehng 1990). According to the World Economic Forum (2016), such skills will be essential for good jobs within five years if not sooner, a trend that will be exacerbated by the exponentially increasing 'employment' of artificial intelligence for less novel tasks (Brynjolfsson and McAfee 2014).…”