Skills in the 21st Century

I've been thinking a lot about this and my current thinking is that our education system is roughly in sync with what our society needs in terms of a work force. We talk about how in the 1950s, the emphasis was on rote learning, memorization, and other similar skills. The jobs that were available then emphasized these skills (working at an office or in a blue collar factory). We are in a transition time right now, with the technological tools kind of outpacing the skills high schools and colleges are training students in. I think this results in a disconnect of sorts, in that we sometimes feel that our teaching methods and curriculum are not what students need. That is why curriculum that is more nebulous (using Twitter for instance) are probably fairly necessary to help our students achieve competence when out in the business world. However, this does not excuse teachers from having their students master basics (in my field, English, that would include things like thesis statements) because these skills are important as well. I am wondering, for anyone else, how aesthetic teaching (those things we teach that are important to make them well rounded like art or literature) is affected by technology.