An Ideal Education
I don't think I would have chosen to be a teacher if not for two things. The first thing relies on what is easily confirmed as fact, and most people would accept it to be a valid excuse; the second relies on what is much less easily confirmed as fact by the scientific paradigm, and is sure to be hotly disputed by many people.
The first thing is that I come from a family heavily laden with teachers. Studies have shown that this tends to correlate with the chance that someone will also become one; it is the apprenticeship phenomenon – growing up surrounded by the instruments (red pens, record books, test papers etc) and methodologies (inquiry-based learning, small group study, project work etc) of a trade tends to make one adopt the behaviours associated with that trade. I know for certain that very nearly half of my ancestors and siblings are or have been teachers. Some of my unfortunate students have thus had multiple doses of a teaching philosophy which is roughly the same and just as vexatious.
The second thing is that I believe I have a gift for a peculiar kind of teaching; it does not focus well on details but is good for weaving an extensive web of connections. Victims of this teaching mode, should they succumb to it, therefore learn a lot about many things and occasionally not enough about specific things. I've learnt to remedy that by pointing out where the specifics can be found. The crux of that matter to me is this: it is easy to find details and specific answers (search engines, anyone?) but it is not so easy to bring concepts together from across the spectrum of human knowledge and link them into something useful. However, I confess that this makes me a pain to some students.
Further to the first point, I have to say that the kind of family I came from is characterised by traits conducive to learning:
Further to the second point, I believe that teachers who are good at thinking across many areas of interest keep their brains more active that those who don't. By this I do not mean that teachers who teach a specific subject are fools, or that specialists are like idiots savant. I mean that while a teacher might teach a specific subject, that teacher cannot keep focussing the mind onto a tiny subset of that subject (like what my mother once called "an expert on four texts and useless elsewhere"). The broader the range, the greater the challenge.
Which brings me, at last, to the point. What is an ideal education?
I believe that the roots of an ideal education lie in cultivation of the soil, metaphorically speaking. A fertile mind is the result of painstakingly tended soil, adequate nutrients and watering, proper periods of light and darkness, and some periods of reflective calm or peaceful weather (in between the storms and floods, presumably). Planting seeds in a fertile mind results in growth if the fundamental substance is present. A good farmer can optimise this growth by pruning and other interventions. Rare is the plant that prunes itself to outstanding effect; however, the natural balance of regulatory hormones can do this fairly well in many cases. Some plants therefore come with built-in advantages for a given terroir. It's worth it to remember, however, that accidents of nature and incidents of management can make any plant do very badly or very well.
So what does this translate to in application?
The first thing to master is word-based communication. It initiates a specific feedback loop. Once you can talk, you can give feedback and ask for detailed and useful responses. Babies have hardly any comprehension, calculation, consideration or contemplation. They are limited to imprecise learning for a time. But to be educated, a person must have control of language in at least one aspect. People should minimally have functional ability to communicate intelligibly within their social context. It must not stop there. There must be opportunities for extension.
The second thing to master, therefore, is the ability to understand large chunks of word-based material. It is all right to base this on unwritten forms only if you come from a strong oral tradition. People who don't read need prodigious memories by our standards. So everyone should read a lot if they are not going to spend the effort to memorise everything they hear. This second mastery demands the interactive use of both ear and eye to handle the spoken and written word well. Literature follows language; the two feed off each other and regather to greater effect in the mind. As you read, so also do you learn how others have expressed their thoughts, and you learn ways to express your own thoughts more lucidly and exactly.
If I had to plan a curriculum, therefore, it would begin with language and literature. History, geography and all other accounts of living behaviour would creep in. The world of ideas and of mind would follow. The ability to apply the mind to problem-solving, information gathering and manipulation of the environment would follow. Design and technology, mathematics and engineering would be mobilised at this point. What of music and the other arts? I think those should be part of the learning environment. Eventually, if I had to summarise the game plan for an ideal curriculum, I would condense it to three points:
Thank goodness I don't have to plan all of this curriculum. It's already available out there if you look hard enough, and I am glad that my ancestors had similar ideas.
In recent years, a lot of my students have taken to speculating about what skill-sets I possess. I can only say to them: nothing that you can't surpass. I honestly believe that at least 40% of my students are much brighter, much more talented than I am. I am amazed by their ability. What some of them need is the self-belief to look beyond the constraints of school curriculum (which in every place and time is necessarily narrow) and aim for the far horizon. For the best is yet to be. Heh.
The first thing is that I come from a family heavily laden with teachers. Studies have shown that this tends to correlate with the chance that someone will also become one; it is the apprenticeship phenomenon – growing up surrounded by the instruments (red pens, record books, test papers etc) and methodologies (inquiry-based learning, small group study, project work etc) of a trade tends to make one adopt the behaviours associated with that trade. I know for certain that very nearly half of my ancestors and siblings are or have been teachers. Some of my unfortunate students have thus had multiple doses of a teaching philosophy which is roughly the same and just as vexatious.
The second thing is that I believe I have a gift for a peculiar kind of teaching; it does not focus well on details but is good for weaving an extensive web of connections. Victims of this teaching mode, should they succumb to it, therefore learn a lot about many things and occasionally not enough about specific things. I've learnt to remedy that by pointing out where the specifics can be found. The crux of that matter to me is this: it is easy to find details and specific answers (search engines, anyone?) but it is not so easy to bring concepts together from across the spectrum of human knowledge and link them into something useful. However, I confess that this makes me a pain to some students.
Further to the first point, I have to say that the kind of family I came from is characterised by traits conducive to learning:
- high implicit standards of achievement
- a lot of tolerance for eccentricity and experimentation
- reservoirs of good humour (and horrendous puns)
- long-suffering patience mixed with rare moments of terrifying wrath at stupid behaviour
- a love of multifarious erudition
- a tendency to hoard books on many disciplines, in many genres, from many periods, with many perspectives
Further to the second point, I believe that teachers who are good at thinking across many areas of interest keep their brains more active that those who don't. By this I do not mean that teachers who teach a specific subject are fools, or that specialists are like idiots savant. I mean that while a teacher might teach a specific subject, that teacher cannot keep focussing the mind onto a tiny subset of that subject (like what my mother once called "an expert on four texts and useless elsewhere"). The broader the range, the greater the challenge.
Which brings me, at last, to the point. What is an ideal education?
I believe that the roots of an ideal education lie in cultivation of the soil, metaphorically speaking. A fertile mind is the result of painstakingly tended soil, adequate nutrients and watering, proper periods of light and darkness, and some periods of reflective calm or peaceful weather (in between the storms and floods, presumably). Planting seeds in a fertile mind results in growth if the fundamental substance is present. A good farmer can optimise this growth by pruning and other interventions. Rare is the plant that prunes itself to outstanding effect; however, the natural balance of regulatory hormones can do this fairly well in many cases. Some plants therefore come with built-in advantages for a given terroir. It's worth it to remember, however, that accidents of nature and incidents of management can make any plant do very badly or very well.
So what does this translate to in application?
The first thing to master is word-based communication. It initiates a specific feedback loop. Once you can talk, you can give feedback and ask for detailed and useful responses. Babies have hardly any comprehension, calculation, consideration or contemplation. They are limited to imprecise learning for a time. But to be educated, a person must have control of language in at least one aspect. People should minimally have functional ability to communicate intelligibly within their social context. It must not stop there. There must be opportunities for extension.
The second thing to master, therefore, is the ability to understand large chunks of word-based material. It is all right to base this on unwritten forms only if you come from a strong oral tradition. People who don't read need prodigious memories by our standards. So everyone should read a lot if they are not going to spend the effort to memorise everything they hear. This second mastery demands the interactive use of both ear and eye to handle the spoken and written word well. Literature follows language; the two feed off each other and regather to greater effect in the mind. As you read, so also do you learn how others have expressed their thoughts, and you learn ways to express your own thoughts more lucidly and exactly.
If I had to plan a curriculum, therefore, it would begin with language and literature. History, geography and all other accounts of living behaviour would creep in. The world of ideas and of mind would follow. The ability to apply the mind to problem-solving, information gathering and manipulation of the environment would follow. Design and technology, mathematics and engineering would be mobilised at this point. What of music and the other arts? I think those should be part of the learning environment. Eventually, if I had to summarise the game plan for an ideal curriculum, I would condense it to three points:
- learning to explore and synthesize from what is found
- learning to define different areas of knowledge and choose appropriate tools or paradigms based on this
- learning to develop a personal curriculum, plan of study, or schedule of self-education
Thank goodness I don't have to plan all of this curriculum. It's already available out there if you look hard enough, and I am glad that my ancestors had similar ideas.
In recent years, a lot of my students have taken to speculating about what skill-sets I possess. I can only say to them: nothing that you can't surpass. I honestly believe that at least 40% of my students are much brighter, much more talented than I am. I am amazed by their ability. What some of them need is the self-belief to look beyond the constraints of school curriculum (which in every place and time is necessarily narrow) and aim for the far horizon. For the best is yet to be. Heh.
Labels: Curriculum Development, Education, Learning
etched with acid at 9:36:00 am
2 Comments:
Fully concurred with! Thank you for those quotable analogies! May I say that you've been an ideal - or close to ideal, save for the 'unattainable' quality of it - educator.
carl: you're being very kind... thank you.
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