The idea of education is that it is supposed to prepare a child for the world. That means that subjects and methods of study should do that. Even the organization of learning should do that too.
In the early part of this Century, education provided tools such as reading, writing, and Îrithmetic and also structured the day in ways that mimicked the factories and offices into which graduates would go when their education was done. A problem today is that much of what we are doing in education has not changed, while the world around us has changed dramatically. That contrast has significant implications.
Inside the classroom today, lecture remains the prevalent method of getting information across. Studying from printed, state-approved, and bound textbooks is popular as well. In most places, there is a fixed and rigid grade structure into which children must fit.
Let's contrast that with the world outside. Just about everyone with a pulse seems to believe that it is important for a person to engage in what we used to call (when it was special) lifelong learning. That would seem to imply that our curricula ought to include the ability to formulate problems, uncover resources that might enable solutions, explore those resources, evaluate and generate potential solutions, and take action. Very little education points in that direction.
Many years ago, the West Point Physical Education Program was modified to teach cadets a sport or activity that would help them maintain their fitness throughout their life. There's no reason to limit that concept to the physical world. Yet, there's almost no equivalent for that kind of education in any major educational institution.
There is also, clearly, a disparity between the technology that children encounter outside the classroom and what happens inside. This is not just a matter of making sure that every school has a computer. Word processing is not simply typing, only faster and with a screen to look at instead of a page. Word processing requires you to think in different ways.
The possibilities of the technology -- the ability to cut and paste, and move material around, the ability to check spelling and grammar, all provide possibilities that modify the thought processes.
In a world of calculators and computers, there ought to be an emphasis on mental arithmetic. We ought to be striving to give students the ability to reach an approximate answer so they know whether the computer is feeding them gibberish or not. Oddly enough, these sorts of skills are the kind best learned by rote, individually-paced drill -- the very things that computers can aid us with an education.
We've also learned quite a bit over the last fifty years or so about learning styles and different types of intelligence. We know that some people learn best by seeing, others by hearing. We know that some people learn best when they are moving about and others while they are sitting still. We know, thanks to Howard Gardner, that there are not individual intelligences, but indeed many different intelligences.
All of this begins to change the question from how smart am I, and how do I get smarter? To How am I smart, how do I learn best, and how can I be more effective?
Basically, the education system that we've developed over most of this Century needs to be massively re-worked. What we've created is a massive bureaucratic structure filled with folks with pedagogy degrees but no passion for their subject, mandated curricula and texts, and finite choices within a narrow band. Just about everything about that could be improved upon.
Here are a couple of suggestions about some things we might look at.
The Information Technology available on the least expensive PC today gives us the ability to track individual progress in individual areas, and tailor instruction even when we have lots of people to instruct. This ought to enable us to mix and match people's learning, based on where they are. A young person who is good at math ought to be able to move briskly in math while taking more time with subjects that give him or her trouble.
We have computers. And we have the myth of the great teaching machine in which the computer does all of our teaching for us. Somehow, we seem to have decided that that's an all or nothing choice. But computers are perfect for certain kinds of drill.
Individualized computer programs can do quite a good job of getting people to be quite good at things like learning the multiplication tables. While we're on that subject, it seems to me that we can use some flexibility in the way we grade as well.
For a subject like History, 70% knowledge of the appropriate facts might be suitable for passing. But, for more practical, outcome subjects such as writing and arithmetic, a higher standard might prevail.
For arithmetic, things like how to add and subtract, the passing grade ought to be something like 100%. You either know those multiplication tables, or you don't. Knowing 70% of them doesn't guarantee that you can do the mental arithmetic necessary to know if the computer is tricking you or not.
For writing, a qualitative judgment based on some clearly articulated principles, makes a lot more sense than some kind of numerical grade if what we're teaching is basic communication skills.
It might also be possible at some time in the future to approach professions, oddly enough, in the way they were learned a Century ago. The ability to connect and Online databases and E-mail for tutorials, wouldn't it make some sense to at least make it possible to "read lawä as an alternative to a formal Law School. It seems to me that a number of professions and disciplines are as much apprentice trades as they are mastery of specific knowledge. And that our educational system ought to allow for that.
The way I think we should deal with all of this comes down to a few recommendations.
Start by acknowledging what we've learned over the last couple of decades about individual differences in how folks learn. Then modify our teaching toolbox to make use of what we've learned.
Make some common sense changes that allow us to grade different kinds of learning differently. Use Pass/Fail where it fits best. Use basic competence where it fits. Use practically perfect performance as a standard for some things.
Re-assess what skills will be needed to be a functioning and successful human being in the 21st century. Keep what's still important from the last century and the century before that. But modify our curricula so we're equipment students for the world they're going to enter, not the one their parents did.
Use technology to support basic education in the following ways.
Use technology to allow us to customize and track individual student's paths through the education maze. With computerized record keeping we can let some students do some things at a different pace than other students.
Use technology to connect students and teachers to resources. On the net experts, expertise and experience are a click away. Use them.
Don't use the Seagull Method of putting technology into the schools. That's where some bigwig flies in (or issues a news release), makes a lot of noise, dumps on a few folks, and flies out.
Instead, understand that teachers and parents and students and others will not learn or modify habits all at once. The phrase "all deliberate speed" makes sense here. Train the teachers, don't just expect them to spend their free time learning the new things.
You've heard that clichŽ, "The children are our future." That's true and it's why we should change what we do in education. But children and their parents and teachers are also our present. That's why we need to proceed knowledgeably, carefully and compassionately to make the most of Education in and for the Digital Age.
Created/Revised/Reviewed: 9/2000
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