21st Century Skills Analysis of Philippine Textbooks

Abstract

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As the global workforce demands change due to rapid technological evolution, it is necessary to analyze and review the Philippine mathematics textbooks, curricula, and frameworks to understand how to produce competent Filipino graduates with the desired skills to thrive in the future. This study examines the integration of 21st Century Skills and Higher-Order Thinking Skills in mathematics textbooks in the Philippines, using the PISA 2022 Mathematics Framework as a basis for analysis. The research aims to assess the extent to which these skills are incorporated in comparison to the Mathematics Document Content Analysis (MCDA) participant textbooks. By analyzing the worked examples, problem sets, and narrative parts of the textbooks, various characteristics such as Content Type, Solution Type, Response Type, Application& Context Type, Mathematical Process, Problem Type, and 21st Century Skills are examined. The findings reveal that the Philippine textbooks exhibit limited opportunities for the development of 21st Century Skills and Higher-Order Thinking Skills, primarily due to questionable realness of Real-World exercises, discrepancies among contexts, and a lack of challenging mathematical processes and combinations. These findings align with the patterns observed in textbooks from other countries analyzed in the study. Therefore, it is recommended that publishers, policymakers, and educators prioritize the integration of 21st Century Skills and focus on the quality rather than the quantity of content, optimizing the opportunities for students to develop these essential skills.