Mr. Obama has promised that by 2020, America will "once again have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world."
Can we think about that for a minute? Why does this matter? We Americans so believe in college that we rarely ask why. I asked my students at Yale and later at Northwestern why they were in college. I heard a lot about parties, a four year vacation, going because their parents made them come, and a lot about how you need a college degree to get ahead.
I never once had anyone say they were there to learn. Never.
College offers diplomas. Education, not so much. And to the extent that colleges do offer education, a Yale English major is typically considered well educated by modern standards, what difference does it make to the country? Those English majors don't easily find careers and in bad economic times even a Yale degree may not buy you much.
I am sure what Mr. Obama meant to say was that by 2020 our population will be able to reason effectively, work well with others, and communicate well. At least that is something he quoted from me while he was campaigning. But alas, now it all about making sure those 3000 colleges we have survive regardless of whether they are turning out more productive and reasoning citizens.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Why study what we have been teaching?
When I was at Yale I occasionally did some freshman advising. I once had to advise a student who had just arrived from the LA ghetto as to what courses to take. I said to take what interested him since there were very few requirements. That is not what he wanted to hear.He asked what I had taken as a freshman. I had attended Carnegie Tech 20 years earlier than the date of this advising session. There were no choices. You took Calculus, Physics, Chemistry, Western Civ, and English Lit. No exceptions. He said that he would take those courses. I said that was absurd. He said that I was very successful and that had been how I had started so that was what he would do. And that is what he did.
I was reminded of this story when I had my little encounter with the Obama administration last week. They are about to propose spending hundreds of millions of dollars on education to ensure that we do a better job of teaching the curriculum that has been in place since 1892. Re-examining what is taught and why it is taught will not be considered because they are worried about class warfare. They don't want people saying that a new education system will be different than the one that got them to be the successes that they all are.
If Duncan, Obama (and Nick Kristof) got where they are by taking algebra and physics then we can't take that way from the next generation of students.
This argument is so stupid it is hard to know where to begin to counter it. Let me just say that not all my friends from Carnegie Tech nor from Stuyvesant High School for that matter have become great successes. And that those that have succeeded did so in spite of the mind-numbing "study for the test fact retrieval system" still in place in our schools.
I learned to think from my father, not from school. Most successful people fare well because of good parenting and good genetics not good schooling. We will always have winners of any system that is in place. School should help people live happier, more productive lives. School should not be about winning the competition. Of course, that is exactly what school is about now. What is needed desperately is to pour money into an absurd system?
I was reminded of this story when I had my little encounter with the Obama administration last week. They are about to propose spending hundreds of millions of dollars on education to ensure that we do a better job of teaching the curriculum that has been in place since 1892. Re-examining what is taught and why it is taught will not be considered because they are worried about class warfare. They don't want people saying that a new education system will be different than the one that got them to be the successes that they all are.
If Duncan, Obama (and Nick Kristof) got where they are by taking algebra and physics then we can't take that way from the next generation of students.
This argument is so stupid it is hard to know where to begin to counter it. Let me just say that not all my friends from Carnegie Tech nor from Stuyvesant High School for that matter have become great successes. And that those that have succeeded did so in spite of the mind-numbing "study for the test fact retrieval system" still in place in our schools.
I learned to think from my father, not from school. Most successful people fare well because of good parenting and good genetics not good schooling. We will always have winners of any system that is in place. School should help people live happier, more productive lives. School should not be about winning the competition. Of course, that is exactly what school is about now. What is needed desperately is to pour money into an absurd system?
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Obama, Kristof, Duncan and the NY Times all agree
I had some hopes for education when Obama was elected. Gone now. Here is what happened:
Nicholas Kristof, an otherwise seemingly intrepid journalist, wrote a column in the NY Times about how he now realizes that education is our most important priority, and that the solution is higher teacher salaries and memorizing math songs like they do at the KIPP schools. This column was so wrong-headed that I decided to try and contact him so that I could help him understand the issues in education better. I asked a friend who could help me do that. This is what he told me:
Both the New York Times and the Obama administration are very concerned with keeping education exactly as it has been. They are afraid that if radical changes occurred they would be criticized by poor people because they will be seen as having kept the kind of education that made them successful away from the poor. The people who run Washington and New York went to the best academic schools, so any attempt to transform high schools into places where learning is fun and where real world skills are taught, has to be stopped because it would be received badly by poor people and this be politically damaging to the folks in power.
In other words, no job training, no life training, but more algebra and Dickens and Chemistry formulas. Despite the fact that those things were put into the curriculum originally by elitists in a very different world who cared not at all for the poorer classes learning these things is perceived by them as on the road to success and that idea will not be fought.
I have always said that everything evil in education starts with P. Politicians and the Press have always been my two favorites. They don't want to fix education, they want to make it look like it has been fixed.
Nicholas Kristof, an otherwise seemingly intrepid journalist, wrote a column in the NY Times about how he now realizes that education is our most important priority, and that the solution is higher teacher salaries and memorizing math songs like they do at the KIPP schools. This column was so wrong-headed that I decided to try and contact him so that I could help him understand the issues in education better. I asked a friend who could help me do that. This is what he told me:
Both the New York Times and the Obama administration are very concerned with keeping education exactly as it has been. They are afraid that if radical changes occurred they would be criticized by poor people because they will be seen as having kept the kind of education that made them successful away from the poor. The people who run Washington and New York went to the best academic schools, so any attempt to transform high schools into places where learning is fun and where real world skills are taught, has to be stopped because it would be received badly by poor people and this be politically damaging to the folks in power.
In other words, no job training, no life training, but more algebra and Dickens and Chemistry formulas. Despite the fact that those things were put into the curriculum originally by elitists in a very different world who cared not at all for the poorer classes learning these things is perceived by them as on the road to success and that idea will not be fought.
I have always said that everything evil in education starts with P. Politicians and the Press have always been my two favorites. They don't want to fix education, they want to make it look like it has been fixed.
Monday, February 2, 2009
Thank God for Educational Research!
In today's New York Times:
Children who misbehave at school are often punished by being kept inside at recess. But new research shows that recess helps solve behavioral problems in class.
This is how our Department of Education and all those brilliant Education researchers spend our money. What next? 20 years of research to prove that algebra is boring and irrelevant to all of those who drop out of school? How about a research program to determine why children find school stressful?
I went to school ten times one year to suggest to my son's teacher that she stop banning him from recess as a way of punishing his inability to not act up in class. "He can't sit still that long and making him sit still longer will not help," said I. If only I had known the relevant research!
Children who misbehave at school are often punished by being kept inside at recess. But new research shows that recess helps solve behavioral problems in class.
This is how our Department of Education and all those brilliant Education researchers spend our money. What next? 20 years of research to prove that algebra is boring and irrelevant to all of those who drop out of school? How about a research program to determine why children find school stressful?
I went to school ten times one year to suggest to my son's teacher that she stop banning him from recess as a way of punishing his inability to not act up in class. "He can't sit still that long and making him sit still longer will not help," said I. If only I had known the relevant research!
Monday, January 26, 2009
Some quick comments addressed to those who wrote Obama’s K-12 reform plan on whitehouse.gov
The first phrase in each paragraph is the stated Obama-Biden goal:
Reform No Child Left Behind: you used the wrong word; surely you meant “get rid of” and not reform; not a good start
Support High-Quality Schools and Close Low-Performing Charter Schools: what will your measure be for assessing low performance? I hope it is not test scores
Make Math and Science Education a National Priority: why? Is our current economic situation due to too few people knowing algebra and physics?
Address the Dropout Crisis: by making school interesting and relevant for job skills? Nah, not what you suggest at all.
Expand High-Quality Afterschool Opportunities: why? Because what goes on in school is useless? Why not try making it less useless?
Support College Outreach Programs: more people going to college is really not the problem for anyone except college administrators; why is this your issue?
Support College Credit Initiatives: more effort on getting people into college; was your college experience so magical?
Support English Language Learners: teaching English is a good idea; too bad schools don’t do this too well; what are your ideas on improving the situation?
Recruit Teachers: as the economic situation deteriorates there will be plenty of people wanting to be teachers; next?
Prepare Teachers: look, the problem isn’t teachers; it is the nonsense that teachers must teach and the obsession with testing that nonsense
Retain Teachers: make teaching a better experience; that might help
Reward Teachers: not for raising test scores I hope
It would be nice, if those who are in charge of our education policy understood that the issue is not test scores, teacher salaries, or getting into college. High school is an awful and useless experience. Has anyone in your education department noticed that? Stop teaching the 1892 curriculum. No adult knows most of what is taught in high school. Teach stuff that actually matters and see what happens.
Reform No Child Left Behind: you used the wrong word; surely you meant “get rid of” and not reform; not a good start
Support High-Quality Schools and Close Low-Performing Charter Schools: what will your measure be for assessing low performance? I hope it is not test scores
Make Math and Science Education a National Priority: why? Is our current economic situation due to too few people knowing algebra and physics?
Address the Dropout Crisis: by making school interesting and relevant for job skills? Nah, not what you suggest at all.
Expand High-Quality Afterschool Opportunities: why? Because what goes on in school is useless? Why not try making it less useless?
Support College Outreach Programs: more people going to college is really not the problem for anyone except college administrators; why is this your issue?
Support College Credit Initiatives: more effort on getting people into college; was your college experience so magical?
Support English Language Learners: teaching English is a good idea; too bad schools don’t do this too well; what are your ideas on improving the situation?
Recruit Teachers: as the economic situation deteriorates there will be plenty of people wanting to be teachers; next?
Prepare Teachers: look, the problem isn’t teachers; it is the nonsense that teachers must teach and the obsession with testing that nonsense
Retain Teachers: make teaching a better experience; that might help
Reward Teachers: not for raising test scores I hope
It would be nice, if those who are in charge of our education policy understood that the issue is not test scores, teacher salaries, or getting into college. High school is an awful and useless experience. Has anyone in your education department noticed that? Stop teaching the 1892 curriculum. No adult knows most of what is taught in high school. Teach stuff that actually matters and see what happens.
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
"We will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age."
President Obama, I have bad news for you. You will not be able to do that. Here is who will stop you:
1. The testing industry does not want change.
2. The teacher's unions do not want change.
3. The textbook publishers do not want change.
4. University professors do not want change.
What they all want, and they are very powerful, is continue to make money and have lives unencumbered by notions that we are teaching the wrong stuff in the wrong way. It is only the students who want and need change. They need meaningful, enjoyable, experiences that prepare them for employment. The school system has never been about employment. They will not get the change they need because those in charge of the system would have to give up on what they now do and do something completely different. Really- how often does that happen?
1. The testing industry does not want change.
2. The teacher's unions do not want change.
3. The textbook publishers do not want change.
4. University professors do not want change.
What they all want, and they are very powerful, is continue to make money and have lives unencumbered by notions that we are teaching the wrong stuff in the wrong way. It is only the students who want and need change. They need meaningful, enjoyable, experiences that prepare them for employment. The school system has never been about employment. They will not get the change they need because those in charge of the system would have to give up on what they now do and do something completely different. Really- how often does that happen?
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
The experts in education and e-learning have no idea what they are talking about.
Usually in this space, I gripe about school and the continuing nonsense that presents itself as reform and change in education. The “changes” accomplish nothing because they fails to address the real issues of the problems with what we teach and how we teach it. But today, I find myself irritated by the corporate training world instead which, of course, misperceives education in exactly the same ways as the school reformers do.
My irritation comes from this e-mail sent to the president of Socratic Arts the other day from an executive responsible for e-learning in a big company.
Good to hear from you again. Hope all is well with you, Roger and the company. Can you please provide me with an update about the work you currently do? Do you do have Web 2.0/3.0, Serious Gaming or any new and innovative learning approaches?
Why is this question irritating? Entailed within it is the assumption that the problem with the training that this man’s company provides is that it isn’t fun enough or high tech enough. His company’s employees are not learning to do their jobs because they just don’t have video games that will teach them their jobs.
On the surface this doesn’t sound all that unreasonable. A cool video game that looked exactly like an employee’s job would be a good way to teach him or her that job. Right?
People who believe that probably also believe that you could learn to be an NFL coach by playing Madden’s NFL 09 or learn to be a criminal by playing Grand Theft Auto.
So maybe this guy just doesn’t know much about learning. Uh. Well. Sorry. The “experts” agree with him.
I was asked to make predictions for 2009 for two on line e-learning magazines this month. Here are the links.
http://www.elearnmag.org/
http://www.trainingzone.co.uk/
In the former one, I saw these three predictions:
Alternative interfaces will be big this year: more Wii toys hooked up to computers, orientation-sensitive interfaces, gesture-based presentation software, even brain-wave and body feedback games.
2009 is the year when the cell phone and the laptop emerge as the learning infrastructure for the developing world. Initially, those educational applications linked most closely to local economic development will predominate. Also parents will have high interest in ways these devices can foster their children's literacy.
I see the emergence of several new corporate-focused Virtual Learning Worlds (VLWs) or Massively Multi-Learner Online Learning Environments (MMOLEs) nudge out interest in consumer-oriented versions of 3-D worlds that haven't made the adaptation to corporate needs.
These predictions may well come true. But, let me ask a simple question. How will any of this make anyone learn better? Is the reason that people fail to do their jobs well the lack of Wii body feedback games? If education were available on a cell phone would that make it good education?
This stuff all makes the assumption that the real issue in education is accessibility and fun. Those are issues to be sure, but they aren’t even in the top ten of the issues that I care about for education in school or in corporations.
What are in the top ten? Here is my list:
1. Moving away from a system that assumes that conscious factual knowledge is at the heart of what needs to be learned.
2. Moving away from a system that thinks that the teacher’s role is to know the answers and tell them to you.
3. Moving away from a system that does not allow enough time for practice.
4. Moving away from a system that thinks failure is a bad thing (while learning.)
5. Getting expert knowledge delivered just in time to those who need that knowledge not years before because they “might need it.”
6. Understanding that a learning environment means one where people are always learning and that one shouldn’t have to go to school or go to training.
7. Getting rid of classrooms in all forms.
8. Getting rid of courses.
9. Getting rid of certification that is more important to the students than the learning itself.
10. Getting the reward system right.
I could go a long time making this list before I started worrying about Wii, cell phones, or 3-D worlds. Let’s try fixing what is broken and use technology only if it helps us do that.
My irritation comes from this e-mail sent to the president of Socratic Arts the other day from an executive responsible for e-learning in a big company.
Good to hear from you again. Hope all is well with you, Roger and the company. Can you please provide me with an update about the work you currently do? Do you do have Web 2.0/3.0, Serious Gaming or any new and innovative learning approaches?
Why is this question irritating? Entailed within it is the assumption that the problem with the training that this man’s company provides is that it isn’t fun enough or high tech enough. His company’s employees are not learning to do their jobs because they just don’t have video games that will teach them their jobs.
On the surface this doesn’t sound all that unreasonable. A cool video game that looked exactly like an employee’s job would be a good way to teach him or her that job. Right?
People who believe that probably also believe that you could learn to be an NFL coach by playing Madden’s NFL 09 or learn to be a criminal by playing Grand Theft Auto.
So maybe this guy just doesn’t know much about learning. Uh. Well. Sorry. The “experts” agree with him.
I was asked to make predictions for 2009 for two on line e-learning magazines this month. Here are the links.
http://www.elearnmag.org/
http://www.trainingzone.co.uk/
In the former one, I saw these three predictions:
Alternative interfaces will be big this year: more Wii toys hooked up to computers, orientation-sensitive interfaces, gesture-based presentation software, even brain-wave and body feedback games.
2009 is the year when the cell phone and the laptop emerge as the learning infrastructure for the developing world. Initially, those educational applications linked most closely to local economic development will predominate. Also parents will have high interest in ways these devices can foster their children's literacy.
I see the emergence of several new corporate-focused Virtual Learning Worlds (VLWs) or Massively Multi-Learner Online Learning Environments (MMOLEs) nudge out interest in consumer-oriented versions of 3-D worlds that haven't made the adaptation to corporate needs.
These predictions may well come true. But, let me ask a simple question. How will any of this make anyone learn better? Is the reason that people fail to do their jobs well the lack of Wii body feedback games? If education were available on a cell phone would that make it good education?
This stuff all makes the assumption that the real issue in education is accessibility and fun. Those are issues to be sure, but they aren’t even in the top ten of the issues that I care about for education in school or in corporations.
What are in the top ten? Here is my list:
1. Moving away from a system that assumes that conscious factual knowledge is at the heart of what needs to be learned.
2. Moving away from a system that thinks that the teacher’s role is to know the answers and tell them to you.
3. Moving away from a system that does not allow enough time for practice.
4. Moving away from a system that thinks failure is a bad thing (while learning.)
5. Getting expert knowledge delivered just in time to those who need that knowledge not years before because they “might need it.”
6. Understanding that a learning environment means one where people are always learning and that one shouldn’t have to go to school or go to training.
7. Getting rid of classrooms in all forms.
8. Getting rid of courses.
9. Getting rid of certification that is more important to the students than the learning itself.
10. Getting the reward system right.
I could go a long time making this list before I started worrying about Wii, cell phones, or 3-D worlds. Let’s try fixing what is broken and use technology only if it helps us do that.
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