The Demise of Institutional Education - Part 1 - The System is Flawed

By institutional education I mean from Kindergarten through Post Graduate College.

My experience of institutional education was very disappointing.  I personally did well, when I applied myself.  In fact I graduated Magna Cum Laude from the University of Boston.  So I am not coming from a position of failure but rather one of success.  In fact many considered me gifted within the system.  I never was truly challenged.  In fact I found that the greatest challenge that the system presented me was how could I subvert it,  how could I succeed within the system by exploiting its fundamental weaknesses.  So it is important that we establish that this is not a rant against something that I was unsuccessful at.  It is import to understand that before I was 19 I understood the fundamentals of the system and how they could be exploited.

There are four pillars that our current system is based on.

1. Institutes are the BEST places for transference of knowledge and skills, and by inference teachers that are in those institutes are the best vehicles to confer that information.
2. Placement within the system is based on age, as well as advancement.  On a rare case an individual will be held back, and on even rarer cases someone will be propelled forward.  Age is the unifier.  So we group people primarily by AGE. (Until we get to graduate studies where the range of age is extended but is still limited.)
3. It is possible to teach a group of people by using the same method, process, etc. for all of the individuals within the group.
4. Success is measurable by assigning grades or scores.

To begin with the very concept of scoring knowledge is ludicrous and by implication grades.  I understand the need to evaluate the success or failure of a students grasp of concepts.  What I find insane is the belief that one can ascribe a point value to that evaluation.  Let me see if I can defend this position.

Lets assume I am wrong and that it is possible to evaluate the ability to grasp concepts by setting a score.  How can we accomplish this?  The only way that I can think of is setting up some sort of standard.  This standard / scale would then be applied to each student equally.  One could administer this in its most common form, by giving a "test".  Perhaps this is a simple "answer to a series of questions" sort of test.  If these questions are prompted questions (multiple choice) then scoring would be simple.  A question would have only one possible "correct" answer.  Then we could evaluate the success of the student by counting the quantity of correct answers.  Again we would set a scale/standard that would be applied to the quantity of correct answers that constitutes the successful grasping of a concept.  But all of this assumes that the following are true:

1. It is possible to set a standard/scale that is fair for all students
2. Questions can have only one correct answer
3. There is a guaranteed relationship between the quantity of correct answers and the understanding of a concept.

From the bottom up.

3) - All one can judge from the quantity of correct answers from a multiple choice questionnaire is that the test taker has the ability to discern, successfully, the wrong answers and then select the correct ones.  I understand that someone who understands the concept has a high probability to answer a series of questions correctly, but that does not guarantee it.  I also understand that someone who does not understand the concept will have a high probability not to be able to answer the questions correctly.  I also understand that as the quantity of questions increases then we statistically increase the probability of both possibilities.  But it must be understood that it is POSSIBLE for one to successfully answer a series of questions correctly solely by chance, and therefore degrees from that as well.  So although we can show a PROBABILITY between the successful answering of questions we cannot guarantee that relationship.

2) - Most questions, unless they are factual in nature (and even then there is interpretations on this as well) do not have single correct answers.  What that means is that the other answers must be unambiguously incorrect.  For if it is possible that more that one answer could be correct, or even argued that it is correct, then the foundation of the concept of the test fails.  How can we SCORE an answer as being correct if it is possible that a different answer is also correct.   If you are testing facts then you will fall into the trap that you are not testing the ability for the test taker to understand the concept that was being taught but rather their ability to remember an esoteric fact.

1) - People are not the same.  This is something that is understood.  If need be I will be glad to argue the improbability of two people to be identical, including identical twins.  But I will not argue that point now.  My point is that if people are not the same then it is not possible to create a scale or standard that will work for ALL people.  I understand that it is possible to create a scale that will work for most people, but remember that MOST is satisfied by being 51% of the people.  So in its worst case a scale or standard will NOT be applicable to 49% of the people in the pool.  Again my argument is that a scale or standard cannot be constructed that is fair to ALL students.

So the fundamental assumptions that support the concept of grading or scoring are flawed, and therefore grading and scoring themselves are flawed.   If grading and scoring are flawed then that pillar in our current system has been proven to be a sham.

It has been proven that there are many different methods of learning.  Some group people in the following way, audial (people that learn from listening), tactile (people that learn from touching/doing), visual (people that learn by seeing).  Some group people into other groups, Math and Analytical, or Language and Emotional/Intuitive (Left/Right Brained).  Here my point is that we have already concluded that people do NOT learn the same.  If that is true combined with the fact that individuals are different, even IF you could get a group of all AUDIAL learners together their pace of learning would be different. 

So if it is accepted that people DON'T learn the same, nor do they learn at the same pace, then it would be IMPOSSIBLE to teach people using the same method and the same pace.  So if we attempt to do this, at best we will teach to the LOWEST common denominator.  This will leave out a disproportionate number of individuals.  If we then add in that we should leave no-one behind we now cannot teach to some common "average" level, but we must now teach to the lowest paced individual in the group.

This exposes the failure of another pillar.  It is pretty much stupid to try and teach everyone in a group exactly the same way.   Now you may be able to argue that if you group people by skill, and learning style, then you could teach in a common way.  But we don't.

We place people in groups by age.  Age, as if that was some master way of grouping people.  Now I get the idea that a 6 year old is not as mature as an 18 year old.  And I get that a 13 year old is different than a 10 year old.  But by using age as the EXCLUSIVE grouping method we set people up for failure.  We don't recognize the different learning methods. We don't recognize left / right brain learners.   Next, the WHOLE system is age based.  So people that cannot or should not advance, advance anyway because of the stigma associated with not being in the same age group.  This also applies to people that can or should advance, they are held back for the same reason.

Another off shoot of the common age is that the groups are not groups of common interested learners but rather more likely to be social groups.  People of the same age will find that they have more in common outside of the scholastic arena.  They will therefore see and treat the learning environment more like a social venue, rather than a place to learn as a group.  In fact upon further thought it becomes more obvious that grouping people by age is probably the least useful grouping we could have thought of.   Intelligence, artistic talent, language skills, or even social economic status would be better than age.   If I need to argue each of these I will. So a third pillar is proven dumb as well.

The final pillar is that Institutes of learning are the best places to transfer knowledge.  What do I mean by institutes?  I mean predefined places of learning.  Places like schools, or colleges.  What makes a school or college?  For me they are communities run by administrators, with a set limited amount of teachers with a fixed quantity of students.  These communities historically were where knowledge was concentrated.  And I would agree that even as much 20 years ago they may have had a role because of that concentration of knowledge.  But now knowledge is accessible anywhere and at anytime via the internet.  No longer are institutes the restricted communities of concentrations of knowledge.  So one of their main values has been eliminated. 

Perhaps we could argue that because they are a community of learners and teachers they are better suited for the exchange of knowledge.  But what makes them the only or best community?  Is it directed discussion?  Then what are blogs about?  Is it lectures?  What about iUniversity or TED?  Is it dialog and shared conversation and arguement?  What about discussion boards or forums?   Is it review and analysis of qualified people?  What about deviantart or writersclubs?  What attribute makes them the best other than their own assertion that they are?  Currently the only thing that I believe institutes bring to the table is the certification that people have mastered certain skills.   And I fear I don't think they can't even do that well.

So I conclude that the four pillars, that our current educational system are based on, are fundamentally flawed and in fact they are false pillars.  Pillars that do not create a foundation but in fact bring nothing of value to the art of education.

Charles Strange
Thinker

What is the purpose of teaching?

The answer to this question in my opinion will depend on the one asking the question.  If it is the student, it will be to learn something new.  If it is a business owner it will be to transfer knowledge of a task or skill.  If it is a teacher, it will be to educate or inspire a student.  But for the philosopher, we see a deeper question. 

Can you really teach?  What does it mean to teach?  What is the act of teaching?  In fact can teaching actually occur without another action?  Most verbs do not require something to occur in someone else for the act to be fullfilled.  If I were to run, I would be running.  If I were to sing I would be singing.  But teaching does not work that way.  I can't acomplish it without someone else.

Now you may argue, "Charlie, many things require two or more people, this is not an exclusive property of teaching."  True, arguing, discussions, fighting, fencing are some that come to mind, but all parties are doing the same thing.  Teaching requires another seperate action in the others that are participating in the event.  So teaching requires learning.  Therefore you cannot teach without a learner.  Teaching is dependant on learning.

But does learning require teaching?  I would argue that learning and teaching are a dance, each dependant on the other and made better by each other.  I don't think that the teacher and the learner must be different people, but I do believe the richest learning comes from engaged teachers and enthusiastic learners.

Now that we have established that learning and teaching are codependant events and require each other, but what are they.  What does it mean to teach, what does it mean to learn? 

My experience in school leads me to believe that a large number of people believe that teaching is the transfer of knowledge or facts.  In my state Florida, and in fact my country the United States of America, we have a test that tests if students have learned a standardized set of requirements.  We have test that are required for acceptance into our colleges and universities that test our knowledge, knowledge as being defined in two main categories, mathmatics and english.  When taking classes the classes are based mostly on the Teacher knowing something and then sharing that knowledge with the student.  Then we create a test that student must pass to confirm that this transfer has occured.  I will admit that at a very simple level this is teaching and learning, but it is an extreemly narrow view and in fact creates dead ends.  What I mean by dead ends is once the transfer has occured the dance is over.  It is often very task oriented, or very fact based.  Once I know the dates of the major events in Europe then the task of the teacher is complete.  Once I know how to solve that word problem, the learning of that task is done.  But is that fully teaching?  Does that successfully answer our original question?  No.

The purpose of teaching is not limiuted to the simple distribution of knowledge.  In fact that role is being replaced by the internet. Teaching should faciliate exploring knowledge, how to gather facts and the more importantly what to do with them when you have facts.  Having facts and not being able to using them, except in perhaps Trivial Pursuit, is pretty useless.  So teaching needs to create users of knowledge or maybe even better creators of knowledge.  When people are successful at teaching the results are people that can gather facts, interperate those facts, and the extrapolate on those facts. The grand purpose of teaching is to create thinkers,  independant, creative thinkers.  And thinkers want to become learners.  Thinkers engage and challenge their teachers because they will see the dance and understand that it is in the dance that there is an opportunity to enrich the experience even more.


Charles Strange
Thinker