Month: November 2012

Are traditions good because they are good or because they are practical

Every time I read an analysis that proposes there is something wrong with education because “the system” failed to recognize and develop the talents of Einstein or Edison, I go into reaction mode. Science and technology are important, talent needs to be developed, but it is also important to keep things in perspective and appreciate the practical limits we all impose on our educational institutions.

Some thoughts:
1) There are all kinds of passions – which do we encourage adolescents to pursue? The same names in the STEM argument always come up – Einstein, Edison (maybe Jobs, Gates). These individuals obviously were responsible for great advances or great companies. They may have been missed or misrepresented by the educational system (actually Gates was supported by the educational system). The message though is that the educational system is unable or unwilling to respond to the personal STEM passions of young people.

Just for sake of argument consider the reaction typically generated should I replace “all he wanted to do was math and physics” with “all he wanted to do was play basketball”. Educators sometimes lament the unrealistic world view of adolescents (often young men from the inner city) who idolize NBA stars and invest as much time as possible in playing the game they love. These kids probably have never heard of Richard Feynman, but are familiar with Shawn Kemp, Kevin Garnett, Kobe Bryant, and Moses Malone (if your own background does not offer the necessary insight – these are all individuals who went directly from high school to the NBA, made millions, etc.).

Schools do attempt to address unique talents to some degree – which (math, music, sports) are the passions that should be supported and what degree of support is practical?

2) What is the reasonable balance between depth and breadth? My personal experience with this issue stems from my university’s decision to increase the number of “essential studies” requirements. The counter position to students should be allowed to pursue personal passions seems to be – students on their own do not make the decisions necessary to prepare them as well rounded individuals. They may not take a foreign language, develop adequate communication skills, become sensitive to the world views of different cultures, etc., etc. At my institution, there were existing expectations focused on such goals, but evidently these requirements were not sufficient. Many students supposedly taking advantage of the opportunity to concentrate on their majors and self interests were leaving the institution as poor writers, unaware that others within the world see things differently or seemingly unaware where other parts of the world are, and incapable of recognizing the flaws in anecdotal reasoning.

The people concerned about breadth are serious academics concerned with the big question of what being educated means. I assume these educators  recognize that many students have little interest in many of the areas of knowledge and skills they are expected to develop, but they persist in pushing additional requirements forward because they believe this is the best model for all graduates. Consider your own position on such issues. Learn a second language or take more chemistry – what do you think? Calculus for all or a course in world religions?

My point? If those in higher education worry about the development of breadth, what is the appropriate model for other levels of education and what is the appropriate breadth that should be expected of those unlikely to continue their education beyond the secondary level? I tend to see issue in terms of the reality of a closed system – something is added and something has to be eliminated. Perhaps you do not see this to be true -how would that work – more time for more courses?

3) Finally, there is what I describe as the “and then the magic happens” concern. Assuming all of us should have the opportunity to develop those interests and skills unique to each of us, just how should this happen? Given the limited resources (time, teachers, equipment) available in schools what is reasonable to expect? Without the addition of resources, promoting STEM is likely to reduce opportunities in other areas.

Frankly, I see the STEM advocates as pretty selfish. The proportion of students likely to make significant contributions through science and technology is likely small.  Standardized tests have already forced a lack of balance in the skills we develop and this ranking of academic areas by economic importance would seem to promote more of the same.

My position? If forced to work with the present level of resources, I guess I support breadth. My 30+ years of experience have taught me to smile and nod when young people tell me their plans. Reality indicates that more change from such basic decisions as “what is my major” than do not. Parents already complain about the waste in tuition dollars when students cannot graduate in 4 years. I try to make the argument that exploring something and then deciding it is not for you is not a waste, but there is a limit to how far I can push this position with parents (and maybe now with those in the state legislature). Aside from the arguments I have already identified for being well rounded, the reality is that we discover passions as life presents us new experiences, we encounter the reality that we are not as good at something as we need to be to achieve success, and we change our minds as our perspective on life matures. I advocate breadth early, focus late.

I have encountered a couple of posts in the past couple of days that identified a potential new role for books (The Chronicle, The Atlantic). Coursesmart has developed an approach allowing faculty members to scrutinize how students are “processing” the books they assign. It is interesting to contrast the analysis from the two sources I link – one presents this as a way for faculty members to reach out to students who are poorly engaged with the assignments and the other proposes this as a way to “catch cheaters”. Different spins on the same data mining opportunity. The data are no different than those which any of us reading a Kindle book generate – the highlights, notes, and pages viewed. The difference is in perspective – a Kindle book keeps track of the pages I have moved through and presumably read and saves this location via Whispersync so that I might find myself at the same location on a different device. Likewise, I can visit kindle.amazon.com and read my notes and my highlights. Allow the instructor to have access to these same data and you have the situation described in The Chronicle and The Atlantic.

A couple of months ago I proposed using these exact same capabilities but in a different direction. What if the instructor read the textbook and made his/her notes and annotations available to students? Student to teacher or teacher to student, these capabilities are already available with Kindle books should those who read a given book make the effort to share with others reading the same book.

Are there potential problems? Sure – students may interpret this situation as the instructor checking up on them and the instructor may fear that students will complain should he/she fail to highlight something that appears on a test. Such is the case with a social situation – one must share something or the situation is not social. What is shared could be abused or manipulated, but the sharing is what may also open up new opportunities. Share your course notes and another student may use the notes to identify holes or misunderstandings in their own notes. Share you course notes and another student may decide it is not necessary to go to class. The issue may come down to whether we would rather offer a superior experience with the potential that some may take advantage and not do their share or to offer a lower quality experience to all.

The idea of using a book as a starting point for shared experiences appeals to me. Imagine a more sophisticated version of the highlighting and note-taking system that combines the input of multiple participants (pretty much what Kindle does now). What content is most frequently highlighted or annotated? This is pretty much the logic Google uses to identify more important online resources; i.e., what pages are most frequently the target of links from others sites.

I think these ideas that pretty much take advantage of content already internal to the existing book and are just the beginning of “the book as social focus”. What about those who relate to a book by adding extensions to the book? What if the notes added to a Kindle book are substantial or offer links to sources not identified by the author? ? My use of the word “focus” may provide the wrong impression. Perhaps a book is merely a starting point and what could build from this point would be something significantly more advanced and valuable. I tried the “starting point” idea some years ago and my interpretation at the time was that people were still looking for a focus (lots of use, few contributions). Perhaps we have changed and when I have time maybe it would be worth trying the participatory approach again.