Coursera

http://www.ted.com/talks/daphne_koller_what_we_re_learning_from_online_education.html

Marking Education

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Humans are by nature social creatures. Humans are also naturally curious. Hence, the nosy neighbour, gossip, reality T.V., and those brightly coloured magazines in the racks bracketing the grocery checkout line. Our schools, however, are oddly anti-social. They are predominantly designed for individuals to work individually on their individual assignment or test. Talking is often a no-no in class, and can get you kicked out of a test.

Web 2.0 and social media have evolved (relatively quickly) the Internet from a largely individual-receives-information-from-computer model to an intensely dynamic interactive online world where everyone is free – and often encouraged  - to participate. Schools, on the other hand, tend still to follow and archaic system dating back to the industrial revolution: an “expert” stands at the front of the room and imparts knowledge to the others in the room. The emphasis in this model is telling rather than teaching and learning.

This “telling” model dominates largely because it represents a teaching style you, your children, your parents, and even your parents ‘ parents most likely experienced. This is the model we know best, and so we have gotten in the habit of believing that being lectured at is the way to learn. Humans are creatures of habit, proven best again in an academic settings where students – even post-secondary where seating is typically self-selected – will sit in the same spot (or general area) for the entire semester. What if we gave up the habit of being told and regained the habit of asking?

Many theorists and great thinkers (Lev Vygotsky perhaps most notably) have studied young children in order to explore how humans learn.  We can do the same. Just watch a child interact with her or his environment; invariably (whether spoken or acted upon) their interaction is one of inquiry, exploration and discovery: Who is this? What is going on? How did that happen? Where are they going? And (worryingly) Can I eat this?

Case study: At the age of three, my brother’s vocabulary shifted from that typical for boys his age to one word: “Why?”. Regardless of the complexity and depth and completeness of the answer he was given, my brother’s invariable response was “Why ?”. My six-year old self found this perfectly natural, yet noticed adults were initially charmed yet ultimately annoyed by my brother’s quest to seek the answers to all in his universe. My parent’s frustrations came because they soon realized that not only did they not have all the answers, but even if they did there would always be more questions.

For many educators their relevance depends on their (perceived) role as expert, even though they too will never have all the answers.  In a telling model of education, questions are dangerous because the can undermine authority. In a telling model of education questions are often seen as best when contained within a Socratic system where questions may be asked ,  yet only as a means to reach the (known-by-the-expert) answer.

Curiosity is natural, and leads naturally to questions. This is how we learn. What if educators adopted the question mark as the symbol of education?  What if education dropped its preoccupation with experts trying to fill students’ heads with facts? What if education invovled inquiry and investigation and discovery leading to even more inquiry and investigation and discovery? What would we ask? What would we learn? Why?

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An Instructionist Walks Into a Zone of Proximal Development...

The School of Comparative Irrelevance

Where useless or impossible courses are given.

Mandate: To turn out scholars capable of endlessly increasing the number of unnecessary subjects.

Department of Tetrapyloctomy. This department of useless techniques has a preparatory function; its purpose is to inculcate a sense of irrelevance. Courses:

DUT0013 Tetrapyloctomy: The art of splitting hairs four ways

DUT0017 Potio-section: The art of slicing soup

DUT0019 Mechanical Avunculogratulation: Building machines for greeting uncles.

DUT0023 Pylocatabasis. The art of being saved by a hair.

Department of Adynata, or Impossibilia. The essence of the discipline is the comprehension of the underlying reasons for a thing's absurdity. Courses:

DOA9543 Morse syntax

DOA9654 History of Antarctic Agriculture

DOA9210 History of Easter Island Painting

DOA9191 Contemporary Sumerian Literature

DOA9123 Montessori Grading

DOA9444 Assyrio-Babylonian Philately

DOA9203 The Technology of the Wheel in Pre-Columbian Empires

DOA9111 The Phonetics of the Silent Film

DOA9876 Gypsy Urban Planning

DOA9321 Aztec Equitation

Department of Oxymoronics. Courses:

DOX1221 Tradition in Revolution

DOX3443 Democratic Oligarchy

DOX5665 Parmenidean Dynamics

DOX7887 Heraclitean Statics

DOX1001 Spartan Sybaritics

DOX2112 Tautological Dialectics

DOX4554 A Grammar of Solecisms

(Adapted from Umberto Eco’s novel ''Foucault's Pendulum''

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