Dr. Theva Nithy
Are we actually achieving what we think we want to achieve by having an education system structured the way it is now, based on archaic ways of thinking and with its carrot, sweeter carrot and stick, sharper stick approach?
The research and the science says NO, but governments, social scientists and educationists have, for the last century, made the opposite choice – IGNORE THE RESEARCH AND SCIENCE AND DO WHAT WE ARE DOING NOW ANYWAY! The current education system is stifling and eroding the one talent and skill that young people of the 21st century need most of all – the power of creative thinking.
Different types of exposure and different types of experiences change the actual structure of brain development. You could say with a very high degree of certainty that children who grew up in the digital age have brains that are literally different from the rest of the human race. This will also cause different ways of thinking and will have different demands for mental stimulation and sustenance. Most importantly, these brains will learn differently.
Our children and students are a different, perhaps new and improved, version of the evolving human brain. They represent the first real generation who grew up nurtured by technology - surrounded by mobile phones, email, Facebook, intelligent systems and digitised information - and their brains and minds have been programmed accordingly; and differently. To expect them to be down and cool with an archaic education system that represents the remnants of the Industrial age is not only crazy, but downright foolish!
There is this puzzle called The Candle Problem. It was created in 1945 by a psychologist named Karl Duncker and here’s how it works. Suppose I bring you into a room. I give you a candle, some thumbtacks in a box and some matches, and I say to you, "Your job is to attach the candle to the wall above the top of that table, light the candle and ensure the wax does not drip onto the table. You cannot move the table." How would you proceed?
Now, many people begin trying to thumbtack the candle to the wall, which does not work of course. Some people have the perfectly logical idea where they light the match, melt the side of the candle and try to stick it to the wall. Also does not work. Eventually, most people figure out the solution. The key is to overcome what's called Functional Fixedness. You look at that box and you see it only as a receptacle for the tacks. It can also have this other function, as a platform and drip tray for the candle - The Candle Problem.
A scientist named Sam Glucksberg, who is now at Princeton University in the U.S, conducted a similar experiment. This one shows the power of incentives. He gathered his participants and said, "I'm going to time you. How quickly can you solve this candle problem?"
To one group he said, “I'm going to time you to establish norms, averages for how long it typically takes someone to solve this sort of problem.”
To the second group he offered rewards. "If you're in the top 25 percent of the fastest times you get a hundred dollars. If you're the fastest of everyone we're testing here today you get two hundred dollars."
Question: How much faster did this group solve the problem?
Answer: It took them, on average, three and a half minutes longer.
Three and a half minutes longer!
Now this appears to make no sense, right? If you want people to perform better, you reward them with bonuses, commissions – sweet carrots. But that's not happening here. You think you have an incentive designed to sharpen thinking and accelerate creativity. It does just the opposite. It dulls thinking and blocks creativity.
What's interesting about this experiment is that it's not a single result in a series of experiments. This has been replicated over and over again, for nearly 40 years. The rule that is supposed to be - if you do this, then you get that – only works in some circumstances. This is one of the most robust findings in social science. It is also one of the most ignored.
Scientists have looked at the science of human motivation, particularly the dynamics of extrinsic motivators and intrinsic motivators. If you look at the science, there is a mismatch between what science knows and what education does. What's alarming here is that our education operating system is built entirely around these extrinsic motivators, around carrots and sticks, exam results, promotions and scholarships. That's actually fine for many kinds of 20th century tasks. But for 21st century tasks, that industrial age approach does not work and often does harm as it psychologically increases dependence on outside motivators and negates free will, creativity and thinking skills.
So, Glucksberg did another experiment similar to the first, where he presented the problem in a slightly different way. This time the tacks were lying on the table, outside the box. Attach the candle to the wall so the wax doesn't drip onto the table – same rules apply. 1st group: we're timing for normal population performance. 2nd group: we're giving you sweet carrots. What happened this time? This time, the carrot group kicked the other groups behind.
Rewards work really well for those sorts of tasks - where there is a simple set of rules and a clear destination to go to. Rewards, by their very nature, narrow our focus, concentrate the mind. For tasks like this, a narrow focus, where you just see the goal right there and zoom straight ahead to it - they work really well. But for the real candle problem, you don't want to be thinking like this. The solution is not obvious. The solution lies in the fringes of your mind. You need to be looking there, outside the box. That reward actually narrows our focus and restricts our creativity, and keeps out thinking and strategies inside the box. Those creativity and intuition skills that help solve society’s Wicked Problems.
Do the problems that you face have a clear set of rules, and a single solution? No. The rules are mystifying. The solution, if it exists at all, is surprising and not obvious. Everybody in this room is dealing with their own version of the candle problem. For candle problems of any kind, in any field, those “if-then” rewards, the things around which we've built our education system, do not work. To make matters even more complicated, in the real world we need to listen and collaborate with other people – increasing levels of complexity by the 10th degree
Dan Ariely, and American economists, did a study of some MIT students. They gave these MIT students a bunch of games that involved creativity, and motor skills, and concentration. They then offered them, depending on performance, three levels of rewards - small, medium and large reward. If you do really well you get the large reward.
What happened? As long as the task involved only mechanical skills, bonuses worked as they would be expected to: the higher the pay, the better the performance. But once the task called for even rudimentary cognitive skill, a larger reward led to poorer performance.
There is a mismatch between what science knows and what governments and education systems do. And what is worrying, as we stand here in the rubble of the economic collapse, is that educationists are making their decisions, their policies about talent and people, based on assumptions that are outdated, unexamined, and rooted more in folklore than in science. If we really want to get out of this mess, and if we really want high performance on those definitional tasks of the 21st century, the solution is not to do more of the wrong things - to entice people with a sweeter carrot, or threaten them with a sharper stick. We need a whole new approach.
Scientists who've been studying motivation have given us this new approach, built much more around intrinsic motivation. Around the desire to do things because they matter, because we like it, because they're interesting and because they are part of something important. That proposed new operating system for our education system orbits three elements: autonomy, mastery and purpose.
Autonomy - the urge to direct our own lives.
Purpose – directing our mastery into a drive to achieve in the service of something larger than ourselves because we believe in a cause that is greater than our own.
Mastery - the desire to get better and better at something that matters, derived from our own autonomous urges.
Education Systems are not trees. They are computers. Somebody invented them. It doesn't mean they are going to work forever. Traditional Education systems are great if you want compliance and people who do not know how to think. If you want engagement, and autonomy, purpose and mastery- self-direction works better.
Google has 20 Percent Time, where engineers can spend 20 percent of their time working on anything they want. They have autonomy over their time, their task, their team, their technique. Radical amounts of autonomy. At Google, about half of the new products in a typical year are birthed during that 20 Percent Time. Things like Gmail, Orkut, Google News.
Another system is the Results Only Work Environment - The ROWE. It was created by two American consultants, in place at about a dozen companies around North America. In a ROWE people don't have schedules. They show up when they want. They don't have to be in the office at a certain time, or any time. They just have to get their work done. How they do it, when they do it, where they do it, is totally up to them. Meetings in these kinds of environments are optional.
What happens? Almost across the board, productivity goes up, worker engagement goes up, worker satisfaction goes up, and turnover goes down. Autonomy, purpose and mastery- these are the building blocks of a new way of doing things and a new way of learning. Now some of you might look at this and say, "Hmm, that sounds nice. But it's Utopian."
There is proof.
The mid 1990s, Microsoft started an encyclopedia called Encarta. They had deployed all the right incentives. They paid professionals to write and edit thousands of articles. Well compensated managers oversaw the whole thing to make sure it came in on budget and on time. A few years later another encyclopedia got started. Different model and do it for fun. No one gets paid a cent, or a Euro or a Ringgit. They did it because they enjoyed doing it.
Now if you had, just 10 years ago, gone to a human being, anywhere, and said, "Hey, I've got these two different models for creating an encyclopedia. If they went head to head, who would win?" 10 years ago you could not have found a single sober person anywhere on planet Earth, who would have predicted the Wikipedia model.
There is another very important and hugely interesting experiment that was conducted in India a few years ago, called, “Hole in the wall”. Simply put, Dr. Sugata Mitra of NIIT India, placed computers and touch pads into walls all over India, stood back, and watched, recorded what happened. After replicating this experiment all over India, Dr. Mitra proposed a learning idea called Minimally Invasive Education.
“Minimally Invasive Education™ (MIE) is a solution that uses the power of collaboration and the natural curiosity of children to catalyze learning. It is defined as a pedagogic method that uses the learning environment to generate an adequate level of motivation to induce learning in groups of children, with minimal, or no, intervention by a teacher.”
The core idea behind MIE is that groups of children are able to learn on their own without any direct intervention from teachers. Dr. Mitra found that children using a Hole-in-the-wall Learning Station required little or no inputs from teachers and learnt on their own by the process of exploration, discovery and peer coaching. The idea of MIE has been fine-tuned over a period of time based on observations and educational experiments conducted at NIIT.
MIE uses the intrinsic motivations in children and provides an enabling, autonomous environment where they can learn on their own, thereby providing purpose leading to mastery. While experimenting with the Learning Station, children pick up critical problem solving skills. Most importantly, the learning occurs in a collaborative setting where children can share their knowledge and in the process, inherent group dynamics, and a process of self-selection, culminates in a highly organised educational environment.
Conventional pedagogy focuses on many teachers’ abilities to disseminate information in a classroom setting, where no autonomy and hopefully purpose leading to mastery might be achieved. MIE complements a formal schooling environment by providing a much needed balance for a child to learn on his own and self-selecting to move on to higher levels of wisdom and achievements..
This is the titanic battle between these two approaches. There is intrinsic (bottom-up) versus extrinsic (top-down) motivators. There is autonomy, purpose and mastery versus carrot and sticks.
Who wins? Intrinsic motivation, autonomy, purpose and mastery– every single time!
There is a mismatch between what science knows and what business does. And here is what science knows.
One: Those 20th century rewards, those motivators we think are a natural part of education; do work, but only in a surprisingly narrow band of circumstances. Two: Those if-then rewards often destroy creativity. Three: The secret to high performance isn't rewards and punishments, but that unseen intrinsic drive - the drive to do things for their own sake and the drive to do things because they matter.
Here's the best part. We already know this. The science confirms what we know in our minds. So, if we repair this mismatch between what science knows and what education does instead, if we bring our motivation into the 21st century, if we can get past this lazy, dangerous, ideology of carrots and sticks, we can radically transform and strengthen our education systems. We can solve a lot of those candle problems, and maybe, maybe, maybe we can change the world.
Monday, January 24, 2011
Knowledge and Knowing Managers: What Transformation?
“It is no longer affordable or intelligent for us to be satisfied with way things are,” our PM recently stated when warning that Malaysia must transform or risk becoming a failed state.
In a global climate where a failed state is an easy reality, Malaysia does need to start transforming and reinventing herself. I am not advocating the rhetorical posturing associated with “thinking about Transformation”, but the actual implementation and operationalising of transformative strategies – perhaps the most important being the objective solely focused on providing the best possible environments and learning managers for our learners. This being the age of the Knowledge Economy, developing, nurturing and retaining talent should be the prime objective of any country, Everything else that is needed will automatically follow. But…
“Mankind was evolving, and hopes were high. Then came education systems and
Managers of Knowledge”….Anonymous
We are stuck in a system where we educators envisage ourselves as Knowledge Managers, rather than as Knowing Managers.
What is the difference?
Knowledge Managers are people who think that knowledge is an independent wheel in a vehicle and does not interact with the rest of the vehicle. It can be removed, damaged modified and cease to function, and still have no causal effect on the rest of the vehicle. Knowledge Managers are also traditional teacher-centered practitioners who think that knowledge is to be disseminated in chunky bites that are to be swallowed and regurgitated by learners. Regurgitation of course, occurs at hallowed examination halls, where it will be determined how good learners are at regurgitating data.
Knowing Managers, on the other hand, are people who understand that that one insignificant wheel plays a determining role, in the overall performance of the vehicle. These managers know that the sum total of learning occurs in a multi-linked wheel where the weakest link determines the overall performance.
The overall immersions, interactions and experiences in a learning environment will determine the final outcome – the person that student will become. I have found that students, who make the effort to spend time with their lecturers outside their classrooms, engaging in chatter about things outside their areas of expertise, end up becoming much more thoughtful thinkers and are able to have a world view of things. They are quite distinct from the straight A’s scholars who studiously plug away at their assignments and books, but never really understanding where everything falls in the greater scheme of things.
Why is this so?
Many educators seem to make the mistake of falling into the role of Knowledge Managers the instant they step into formal learning spaces – this is true at schools and at universities. It is the schools and the universities job to graduate a student once they feel he has acquired a fixed quantum of knowledge that qualifies him for an exam grade or a degree. Who can blame the educators then, for wanting to become knowledge managers who teach to exams, since this is the requirement the institutions and ministries require? This would also, as expected, inform the student that it is okay to feel confident going out into the world with his fixed quantum of knowledge.
Knowing managers, on the other hand, know that learning through knowing is an infinite system of beliefs, knowledge, skills, ethics, social interactions and a million other nuances, some subtle and others in-your-face, that come together in a journey that never ends. Research and investigations, debates and discussions, presentations and defending them, all mesh into a single coherent set of skills that stimulates and builds KNOWING; and these series of orchestral maneuvers finally result in a learned person.
The environment that provides all these are almost non-existent in nearly all educational systems.
In my own students, I have found they quickly disengage from me when they cannot find relevance and synchrony between my teachings and what they need and want. This is especially true in first year students. They come to the university with grand ambitions, after having been told they are the cream of the crop, and that a fantastic education awaits them that will prepare them for a successful life. I too have been informed by the system that these students are the cream of the crop, excellent communicators with immense knowledge content, logical and precise after having undergone so many examinations – and now, I am thinking, ready for Knowing.
When we meet, the student and I find there is almost a complete mismatch in expectations.
I am there all ready to be their Knowing Manager, but students want me to be their Knowledge Manager. That is what the education system has prepared them for and brainwashed them into. They want a set amount of knowledge that will prepare them for graduation in a few years.
With the stage set by this mismatched expectations, students slowly succumb to a downward spiral where they realise that the knowledge and certainty they had, is not quite the knowing and certainty they face. They slowly start realising that the expectations that they had, to quickly quantify their achievements on examination papers and high grades, has no value. The actual expectation is for them to open their minds to new ways of thinking and knowing. They start realising that the PowerPoint lecture they expect has no value, and it is the discussions and arguments we have everywhere and every when, that provide a real understanding of knowing, and perhaps even is the actual route to understanding the world in a meaningful context.
This is the start of the mess we are in now. The system demands that I become a knowledge manager who grades students on quantified knowledge and then assign them marks and points that will determine a range of grades. At the same time, the system also demands that I become a knowing manager who will immerse students into a knowing environment.
I am reminded of my class for public speaking training for students, where the students simply could not initially grasp that a great speech is a combination of many, many components coming together. When I spoke about eye contact, everyone focused on eye contact, forgetting gestures and voice tone. When I spoke about humour, all everyone wanted to do was to become a clown, forgetting that the message was also vital. When I spoke about wrapping up a speech by going over what had been presented, everyone focused on that. They are now getting the idea that no one thing can work by itself, and it is all about knowing their speech and their audience, not knowledge of the speech and the audience – knowledge being an ineffective tangible factor; and knowing being about an intangible, powerful force.
Don’t get me wrong. We have had this problem since the beginning of education systems. We just never have had high expectations until now. The demands of the modern world - technology and for high levels of expertise - have always been served by a slip-shod education system. It is only now that problems are emerging from the cracks because current expectations are not being met. These problems were never identified before simply because expectations were low even up to 20 years ago. Even that is fine. Expectations and outcomes have evolved as we humans evolve.
The problem lies with the fact that educators and education systems are not evolving, or not evolving fast enough to meet new demands.
The other problem is also that entrance into universities and even schooling systems is a global economic game now, and all the major players believe in looking at Knowledge Grades first before looking at the Knowing Skills. Research and analytical abilities; dedication, willpower and commitment; understanding of social skills in team work, communications and leadership; we put aside the attributes that count and qualify candidates on knowledge grades that we KNOW are not true indicators of abilities and success!
Why? Why cannot we evolve from a system of Knowledge Managers with exams, to a system of Knowing Managers with non-exams?
One, we have encouraged the growth of a grading system based on student competition, where students (and educators) are forced to seek an edge over their peers. This restricts them from engaging fully with each other in a trusted manner since information that is perceived to give an edge, will be held back. In many Asian countries, this has also resulted in one of the biggest disasters - tuition centers.
Two, educators are graded on their students performances in exams, bringing us back to one.
Three, schools and administrators are graded on students’ performances in exams, bringing us back to one.
Four, higher education institutions of education insist on a prerequisite of recognized exams, bringing us back to one.
I have come to believe that the assessment based system we have created is the core catalyst for the dysfunction of our education system. Before I go on, I do realise it is absolutely useless and probably crazy for me to say that we should get rid of exams, but I will say it anyway. Exams have become a drug for us, and we are all addicts. We are addicted to knowledge of the tangibles, and have lost focus, lost faith even, on knowing the intangibles.
What is the way out?
Simplistic as it may be, and notwithstanding political implications, which Malaysia has in abundant quantities, if Malaysia truly believes that “It is no longer affordable or intelligent for us to be satisfied with way things are,” then why does Malaysia not position itself to become the champion of Knowing Managers in a Knowing System? The start point is to create meaningful and relevant alternatives to exams, and there are many – from research projects to scholarly debates to entrepreneurship – the list is endless. All are difficult to do, but then, that is the reason why it is not being done in the first place. We no longer have the option of choosing a simpler route.
There are other issues to be addressed too; automatic promotion versus ability based promotion, traditional subjects versus meaningful subjects; and I will talk about these in future articles, but these are minor issues compared to the first hurdle to overcome.
It is time to decide once and for all whether we want students who MUST go to school for grades and knowledge or students who will immerse themselves into ways of knowing and become relevant to the future that is already at our doorstep. Or are we willing to risk a failed state?
In a global climate where a failed state is an easy reality, Malaysia does need to start transforming and reinventing herself. I am not advocating the rhetorical posturing associated with “thinking about Transformation”, but the actual implementation and operationalising of transformative strategies – perhaps the most important being the objective solely focused on providing the best possible environments and learning managers for our learners. This being the age of the Knowledge Economy, developing, nurturing and retaining talent should be the prime objective of any country, Everything else that is needed will automatically follow. But…
“Mankind was evolving, and hopes were high. Then came education systems and
Managers of Knowledge”….Anonymous
We are stuck in a system where we educators envisage ourselves as Knowledge Managers, rather than as Knowing Managers.
What is the difference?
Knowledge Managers are people who think that knowledge is an independent wheel in a vehicle and does not interact with the rest of the vehicle. It can be removed, damaged modified and cease to function, and still have no causal effect on the rest of the vehicle. Knowledge Managers are also traditional teacher-centered practitioners who think that knowledge is to be disseminated in chunky bites that are to be swallowed and regurgitated by learners. Regurgitation of course, occurs at hallowed examination halls, where it will be determined how good learners are at regurgitating data.
Knowing Managers, on the other hand, are people who understand that that one insignificant wheel plays a determining role, in the overall performance of the vehicle. These managers know that the sum total of learning occurs in a multi-linked wheel where the weakest link determines the overall performance.
The overall immersions, interactions and experiences in a learning environment will determine the final outcome – the person that student will become. I have found that students, who make the effort to spend time with their lecturers outside their classrooms, engaging in chatter about things outside their areas of expertise, end up becoming much more thoughtful thinkers and are able to have a world view of things. They are quite distinct from the straight A’s scholars who studiously plug away at their assignments and books, but never really understanding where everything falls in the greater scheme of things.
Why is this so?
Many educators seem to make the mistake of falling into the role of Knowledge Managers the instant they step into formal learning spaces – this is true at schools and at universities. It is the schools and the universities job to graduate a student once they feel he has acquired a fixed quantum of knowledge that qualifies him for an exam grade or a degree. Who can blame the educators then, for wanting to become knowledge managers who teach to exams, since this is the requirement the institutions and ministries require? This would also, as expected, inform the student that it is okay to feel confident going out into the world with his fixed quantum of knowledge.
Knowing managers, on the other hand, know that learning through knowing is an infinite system of beliefs, knowledge, skills, ethics, social interactions and a million other nuances, some subtle and others in-your-face, that come together in a journey that never ends. Research and investigations, debates and discussions, presentations and defending them, all mesh into a single coherent set of skills that stimulates and builds KNOWING; and these series of orchestral maneuvers finally result in a learned person.
The environment that provides all these are almost non-existent in nearly all educational systems.
In my own students, I have found they quickly disengage from me when they cannot find relevance and synchrony between my teachings and what they need and want. This is especially true in first year students. They come to the university with grand ambitions, after having been told they are the cream of the crop, and that a fantastic education awaits them that will prepare them for a successful life. I too have been informed by the system that these students are the cream of the crop, excellent communicators with immense knowledge content, logical and precise after having undergone so many examinations – and now, I am thinking, ready for Knowing.
When we meet, the student and I find there is almost a complete mismatch in expectations.
I am there all ready to be their Knowing Manager, but students want me to be their Knowledge Manager. That is what the education system has prepared them for and brainwashed them into. They want a set amount of knowledge that will prepare them for graduation in a few years.
With the stage set by this mismatched expectations, students slowly succumb to a downward spiral where they realise that the knowledge and certainty they had, is not quite the knowing and certainty they face. They slowly start realising that the expectations that they had, to quickly quantify their achievements on examination papers and high grades, has no value. The actual expectation is for them to open their minds to new ways of thinking and knowing. They start realising that the PowerPoint lecture they expect has no value, and it is the discussions and arguments we have everywhere and every when, that provide a real understanding of knowing, and perhaps even is the actual route to understanding the world in a meaningful context.
This is the start of the mess we are in now. The system demands that I become a knowledge manager who grades students on quantified knowledge and then assign them marks and points that will determine a range of grades. At the same time, the system also demands that I become a knowing manager who will immerse students into a knowing environment.
I am reminded of my class for public speaking training for students, where the students simply could not initially grasp that a great speech is a combination of many, many components coming together. When I spoke about eye contact, everyone focused on eye contact, forgetting gestures and voice tone. When I spoke about humour, all everyone wanted to do was to become a clown, forgetting that the message was also vital. When I spoke about wrapping up a speech by going over what had been presented, everyone focused on that. They are now getting the idea that no one thing can work by itself, and it is all about knowing their speech and their audience, not knowledge of the speech and the audience – knowledge being an ineffective tangible factor; and knowing being about an intangible, powerful force.
Don’t get me wrong. We have had this problem since the beginning of education systems. We just never have had high expectations until now. The demands of the modern world - technology and for high levels of expertise - have always been served by a slip-shod education system. It is only now that problems are emerging from the cracks because current expectations are not being met. These problems were never identified before simply because expectations were low even up to 20 years ago. Even that is fine. Expectations and outcomes have evolved as we humans evolve.
The problem lies with the fact that educators and education systems are not evolving, or not evolving fast enough to meet new demands.
The other problem is also that entrance into universities and even schooling systems is a global economic game now, and all the major players believe in looking at Knowledge Grades first before looking at the Knowing Skills. Research and analytical abilities; dedication, willpower and commitment; understanding of social skills in team work, communications and leadership; we put aside the attributes that count and qualify candidates on knowledge grades that we KNOW are not true indicators of abilities and success!
Why? Why cannot we evolve from a system of Knowledge Managers with exams, to a system of Knowing Managers with non-exams?
One, we have encouraged the growth of a grading system based on student competition, where students (and educators) are forced to seek an edge over their peers. This restricts them from engaging fully with each other in a trusted manner since information that is perceived to give an edge, will be held back. In many Asian countries, this has also resulted in one of the biggest disasters - tuition centers.
Two, educators are graded on their students performances in exams, bringing us back to one.
Three, schools and administrators are graded on students’ performances in exams, bringing us back to one.
Four, higher education institutions of education insist on a prerequisite of recognized exams, bringing us back to one.
I have come to believe that the assessment based system we have created is the core catalyst for the dysfunction of our education system. Before I go on, I do realise it is absolutely useless and probably crazy for me to say that we should get rid of exams, but I will say it anyway. Exams have become a drug for us, and we are all addicts. We are addicted to knowledge of the tangibles, and have lost focus, lost faith even, on knowing the intangibles.
What is the way out?
Simplistic as it may be, and notwithstanding political implications, which Malaysia has in abundant quantities, if Malaysia truly believes that “It is no longer affordable or intelligent for us to be satisfied with way things are,” then why does Malaysia not position itself to become the champion of Knowing Managers in a Knowing System? The start point is to create meaningful and relevant alternatives to exams, and there are many – from research projects to scholarly debates to entrepreneurship – the list is endless. All are difficult to do, but then, that is the reason why it is not being done in the first place. We no longer have the option of choosing a simpler route.
There are other issues to be addressed too; automatic promotion versus ability based promotion, traditional subjects versus meaningful subjects; and I will talk about these in future articles, but these are minor issues compared to the first hurdle to overcome.
It is time to decide once and for all whether we want students who MUST go to school for grades and knowledge or students who will immerse themselves into ways of knowing and become relevant to the future that is already at our doorstep. Or are we willing to risk a failed state?
Autonomy, Purpose & Mastery
Autonomy, Purpose & Mastery
Theva Nithy
There is this very important and hugely interesting experiment that was conducted in India a few years ago, called, “Hole in the wall”. Simply put, Dr. Sugata Mitra of NIIT India, placed computers and touch pads into walls all over India, stood back, and watched, recorded what happened. After replicating this experiment all over India, Dr. Mitra proposed a learning idea called Minimally Invasive Education.
“Minimally Invasive Education™ (MIE) is a solution that uses the power of collaboration and the natural curiosity of children to catalyze learning. It is defined as a pedagogic method that uses the learning environment to generate an adequate level of motivation to induce learning in groups of children, with minimal, or no, intervention by a teacher.”
The core idea behind MIE is that groups of children are able to learn on their own without any direct intervention from teachers. Dr. Mitra found that children using a Hole-in-the-wall Learning Station required little or no inputs from teachers and learnt on their own by the process of exploration, discovery and peer coaching. The idea of MIE has been fine-tuned over a period of time based on observations and educational experiments conducted at NIIT.
MIE uses the intrinsic motivations in children and provides an enabling, autonomous environment where they can learn on their own, thereby providing purpose leading to mastery. While experimenting with the Learning Station, children pick up critical problem solving skills. Most importantly, the learning occurs in a collaborative setting where children can share their knowledge and in the process, inherent group dynamics, and a process of self-selection, culminates in a highly organised educational environment.
Conventional pedagogy focuses on many teachers’ abilities to disseminate information in a classroom setting, where no autonomy and hopefully purpose leading to mastery might be achieved. MIE complements a formal schooling environment by providing a much needed balance for a child to learn on his own and self-selecting to move on to higher levels of wisdom and achievements..
Focused areas of the research were Academic Performance, Correlation with Educational Facilities, Comparison with Formal Computer Education, Performance of Dropouts and Peer-to-Peer Learning Patterns. (http://www.hole-in-the-wall.com/ )
In the Hole-in-the-wall study, Sociometric surveys were implemented to determine the composition of users and to identify the leaders. The focus was on social networking, self-regulation and collaboration, patterns of knowledge flow from key leaders (who were identified and provided with targeted input) to other children at the Learning Station.
Some of the findings of this experiment are:
• There quickly came about groups of Self-organizing children who organize themselves into Leaders (experts), Connectors and Novice groups.
• Key leaders, on receiving targeted intervention, play a key role in bringing about a “multiplier effect in learning” within the community.
We come now to the reason I am discussing this topic, the focus being Self Selection and Decision Making. This is my statement.
“We, parents and educators, are not allowing our students to become self-selecting, autonomous decision makers and thus, are not allowing them to find autonomy, purpose and mastery in a real world setting”
This statement does not call for a defense. We must surely acknowledge that the implications for my statement are causing many prominent thinkers, stakeholders and societies to be very uncomplimentary, and downright angry, over the way education is being CONDUCTED now. A conductor waves his baton and the students are expected to live, learn and breathe according to the movements of that baton.
So what is our proposal for the dynamics of a transformed education system?
The singular problem that must be addressed is a decentralised power center that makes all decisions, and one wonders if perhaps many of these decisions are based on impacts on voting trends. Current centers of power radiate out beginning at the government levels, then at the state directors’ levels, at principals’ levels and finally, the teachers’ themselves. The big picture is that in order for students to become autonomous learners, power has to be shifted to them. Autonomy HAS to be the starting point, otherwise no ownership of learning will take place and the final objectives of purpose and mastery will not happen.
Our education system and everyone else’s too, are based on standards that learners have to meet.
“No deviations young boys and girls. Listen up; we the almighty educators do not want to see or hear you. This is what you must learn, this is what you must know, and don’t try to be funny about it. We don’t give a damn if you don’t understand, just memorise it. We don’t really care if you get the meaning of it, just realise that you will be tested for this on our beautiful standardised exams. Ha, Ha, Ha…you think our exams are useless? Too bad, get A’s or you will not be placed in a good school and you can forget about scholarships!”
Wake up old people!
This is the 21st century, and technology has changed our outlooks, and I dare say it has physically changed our brains, and our thought processes. Young people want to know the “why’s” first before they make decisions. They are not interested in learning things because it is in a book - they want to know why they should be asked to do anything before they take full ownership of it. They want there to be relevance and meaning to the things they do and the knowledge they are asked to master, only then will they be willing to see the purpose of education and to then master it.
Young people want to see the impact of stuff they are asked to master. This is a generation growing up angry at their elders for destroying the world and then handing it over to them on a platter and saying, “Here you go. Do what you can to repair the world or not. Either way, it’s yours!” This is a generation growing up with the knowledge and foresight of global warming and the inevitable global flooding that will cause huge upheavals during their lifetimes.
How can they enter their classrooms with all this knowledge, and then be told to shut up and listen!?
Education has to change so that the learners and educators of the world speak a common language. It has to start with learners seeing that educators are willing to hand over the power to enable autonomous learning. Educators must ask the all-important questions, “What do you want to do? What is important to you?”
Try to see folks, that learners are not standardised. How could we possibly still be harping on a glorious undertaking of standardised education for all till Form 5 and too bad if you can’t handle it? It has already gone way past the point where we should be creating different types of education for different types of learners and yes, of course it will be difficult. Anything that is worth achieving is always difficult. Otherwise we would be doing it and would have achieved it.
The point is to create environments where students can find purpose for themselves in a rich, supportive and talent-enabling environment. So what if there are amongst these students, human beings who will never make heads or tails of science and math? They might instead become national treasures who create the greatest paintings and sculptures the world has ever known. They will learn to think along the way simply because they have become autonomous learners who found their purpose in life and have decided to master their purpose. THEY decided; not someone else making that decision for them.
In the end, I suppose we all have good intentions but pressure from above, below, sideways and every which way cause many of us to become misguided. Misguided guides and unthinking thinkers have been the cause of many avoidable disasters, and for me personally, the greatest disaster is not enabling learners who are autonomous, who have purpose and who become masters of their purpose.
Isn’t it a joke that market places and industry demand employable graduates who are wise decision makers and who are able to critically address problems and solve them, but yet we do everything we can to prevent this from happening in schools and universities? Think about it – from Kindergarten to high school, we tell students to shut up and stop thinking and to study for exams, and we only slightly lighten the pressure in universities and yet, we want independent, mature and employable, thinking graduates?
The “Hole in the wall” and “Candle Experiment” have shown us very clearly what learners need and want. These experiments have also told us what we need to transform to and how to enable the transformation, and we still choose to ignore the science. If governments cannot handle the truth, though I am convinced that they do accept it, then it is up to stakeholders to help them “handle” it.
We have to have an ideal system that will create global citizens that are internationally acknowledged to be useful for the 21st century. The nature of 21st century education demands that we create ideal systems, settings and outcomes for our learner; for what are autonomy, purpose and mastery if not ideal qualities for every learner to grow into? We want our learners to be a Learning Community of Self Selecting, Decision Making individuals who are capable of living successfully and sustainably on this planet. We want learners who know who they are and who have confidence in who they are, simply because they have autonomously self-selected their chosen pathways, and who have, because of this, mastered their purpose on this planet
Theva Nithy
There is this very important and hugely interesting experiment that was conducted in India a few years ago, called, “Hole in the wall”. Simply put, Dr. Sugata Mitra of NIIT India, placed computers and touch pads into walls all over India, stood back, and watched, recorded what happened. After replicating this experiment all over India, Dr. Mitra proposed a learning idea called Minimally Invasive Education.
“Minimally Invasive Education™ (MIE) is a solution that uses the power of collaboration and the natural curiosity of children to catalyze learning. It is defined as a pedagogic method that uses the learning environment to generate an adequate level of motivation to induce learning in groups of children, with minimal, or no, intervention by a teacher.”
The core idea behind MIE is that groups of children are able to learn on their own without any direct intervention from teachers. Dr. Mitra found that children using a Hole-in-the-wall Learning Station required little or no inputs from teachers and learnt on their own by the process of exploration, discovery and peer coaching. The idea of MIE has been fine-tuned over a period of time based on observations and educational experiments conducted at NIIT.
MIE uses the intrinsic motivations in children and provides an enabling, autonomous environment where they can learn on their own, thereby providing purpose leading to mastery. While experimenting with the Learning Station, children pick up critical problem solving skills. Most importantly, the learning occurs in a collaborative setting where children can share their knowledge and in the process, inherent group dynamics, and a process of self-selection, culminates in a highly organised educational environment.
Conventional pedagogy focuses on many teachers’ abilities to disseminate information in a classroom setting, where no autonomy and hopefully purpose leading to mastery might be achieved. MIE complements a formal schooling environment by providing a much needed balance for a child to learn on his own and self-selecting to move on to higher levels of wisdom and achievements..
Focused areas of the research were Academic Performance, Correlation with Educational Facilities, Comparison with Formal Computer Education, Performance of Dropouts and Peer-to-Peer Learning Patterns. (http://www.hole-in-the-wall.com/ )
In the Hole-in-the-wall study, Sociometric surveys were implemented to determine the composition of users and to identify the leaders. The focus was on social networking, self-regulation and collaboration, patterns of knowledge flow from key leaders (who were identified and provided with targeted input) to other children at the Learning Station.
Some of the findings of this experiment are:
• There quickly came about groups of Self-organizing children who organize themselves into Leaders (experts), Connectors and Novice groups.
• Key leaders, on receiving targeted intervention, play a key role in bringing about a “multiplier effect in learning” within the community.
We come now to the reason I am discussing this topic, the focus being Self Selection and Decision Making. This is my statement.
“We, parents and educators, are not allowing our students to become self-selecting, autonomous decision makers and thus, are not allowing them to find autonomy, purpose and mastery in a real world setting”
This statement does not call for a defense. We must surely acknowledge that the implications for my statement are causing many prominent thinkers, stakeholders and societies to be very uncomplimentary, and downright angry, over the way education is being CONDUCTED now. A conductor waves his baton and the students are expected to live, learn and breathe according to the movements of that baton.
So what is our proposal for the dynamics of a transformed education system?
The singular problem that must be addressed is a decentralised power center that makes all decisions, and one wonders if perhaps many of these decisions are based on impacts on voting trends. Current centers of power radiate out beginning at the government levels, then at the state directors’ levels, at principals’ levels and finally, the teachers’ themselves. The big picture is that in order for students to become autonomous learners, power has to be shifted to them. Autonomy HAS to be the starting point, otherwise no ownership of learning will take place and the final objectives of purpose and mastery will not happen.
Our education system and everyone else’s too, are based on standards that learners have to meet.
“No deviations young boys and girls. Listen up; we the almighty educators do not want to see or hear you. This is what you must learn, this is what you must know, and don’t try to be funny about it. We don’t give a damn if you don’t understand, just memorise it. We don’t really care if you get the meaning of it, just realise that you will be tested for this on our beautiful standardised exams. Ha, Ha, Ha…you think our exams are useless? Too bad, get A’s or you will not be placed in a good school and you can forget about scholarships!”
Wake up old people!
This is the 21st century, and technology has changed our outlooks, and I dare say it has physically changed our brains, and our thought processes. Young people want to know the “why’s” first before they make decisions. They are not interested in learning things because it is in a book - they want to know why they should be asked to do anything before they take full ownership of it. They want there to be relevance and meaning to the things they do and the knowledge they are asked to master, only then will they be willing to see the purpose of education and to then master it.
Young people want to see the impact of stuff they are asked to master. This is a generation growing up angry at their elders for destroying the world and then handing it over to them on a platter and saying, “Here you go. Do what you can to repair the world or not. Either way, it’s yours!” This is a generation growing up with the knowledge and foresight of global warming and the inevitable global flooding that will cause huge upheavals during their lifetimes.
How can they enter their classrooms with all this knowledge, and then be told to shut up and listen!?
Education has to change so that the learners and educators of the world speak a common language. It has to start with learners seeing that educators are willing to hand over the power to enable autonomous learning. Educators must ask the all-important questions, “What do you want to do? What is important to you?”
Try to see folks, that learners are not standardised. How could we possibly still be harping on a glorious undertaking of standardised education for all till Form 5 and too bad if you can’t handle it? It has already gone way past the point where we should be creating different types of education for different types of learners and yes, of course it will be difficult. Anything that is worth achieving is always difficult. Otherwise we would be doing it and would have achieved it.
The point is to create environments where students can find purpose for themselves in a rich, supportive and talent-enabling environment. So what if there are amongst these students, human beings who will never make heads or tails of science and math? They might instead become national treasures who create the greatest paintings and sculptures the world has ever known. They will learn to think along the way simply because they have become autonomous learners who found their purpose in life and have decided to master their purpose. THEY decided; not someone else making that decision for them.
In the end, I suppose we all have good intentions but pressure from above, below, sideways and every which way cause many of us to become misguided. Misguided guides and unthinking thinkers have been the cause of many avoidable disasters, and for me personally, the greatest disaster is not enabling learners who are autonomous, who have purpose and who become masters of their purpose.
Isn’t it a joke that market places and industry demand employable graduates who are wise decision makers and who are able to critically address problems and solve them, but yet we do everything we can to prevent this from happening in schools and universities? Think about it – from Kindergarten to high school, we tell students to shut up and stop thinking and to study for exams, and we only slightly lighten the pressure in universities and yet, we want independent, mature and employable, thinking graduates?
The “Hole in the wall” and “Candle Experiment” have shown us very clearly what learners need and want. These experiments have also told us what we need to transform to and how to enable the transformation, and we still choose to ignore the science. If governments cannot handle the truth, though I am convinced that they do accept it, then it is up to stakeholders to help them “handle” it.
We have to have an ideal system that will create global citizens that are internationally acknowledged to be useful for the 21st century. The nature of 21st century education demands that we create ideal systems, settings and outcomes for our learner; for what are autonomy, purpose and mastery if not ideal qualities for every learner to grow into? We want our learners to be a Learning Community of Self Selecting, Decision Making individuals who are capable of living successfully and sustainably on this planet. We want learners who know who they are and who have confidence in who they are, simply because they have autonomously self-selected their chosen pathways, and who have, because of this, mastered their purpose on this planet
21st Century Knowing
21st Century Knowing Part 1
Theva Nithy
Can we afford to be stuck in current Education Systems, regardless whether they are the much hyped International School Systems, or the multitudes of National School systems used worldwide? What must happen to ensure not just the success and sustainability of our students, but also countries, and ultimately, the planet and all its life?
The global advocacy movement for new curriculums and standards is growing daily, with some of the strongest advocates coming from The UK and US. In Malaysia, it remains in the rhetorical stages, and this is jeopardizing the future and potentials of the diverse talents of our learners. They are becoming irrelevant even as they climb the educational ladder to greater heights of knowledge – knowledge that is already irrelevant as they “learn” it. Outdated and meaningless approaches to Learning and Knowing, and the exposure of our learners to non-existent classroom representations of real world learning models; are taking us backwards instead of forwards.
A major part of the problem is that education systems are preparing students for higher education only, when they should actually be preparing students for higher education, life and the workplace – which together constitute the real world. There remains the old problem of there being no clear link between educational content in schools, with workplace skills and requirements. Even more disturbing, education is no longer developing citizens with strong values and principles, who are ethical and morally upright. Is this a trend for the human race or is this simply an indication that education systems have taken a wrong turn somewhere?
The big question is – is it the core content of knowledge that is the vital component of intelligence or is it the ways of knowing of content that is crucial? It might look as if there is a play of words here, but the basis of the questions I pose is this.
The traditional way of doing things in schools globally is to provide the industrial age based, so called core subjects that provide a fixed quantum of knowledge. These are languages, the sciences, math, accounting, commerce subjects, religion even, country based-agendas of versions of history, geography, general knowledge that the powers that be decide SHOULD be general knowledge, with some music and the arts thrown in.
I would propose that no student in any country anywhere needs to be told about general knowledge, religion, morals, personal histories and on top of that, memorise facts of science, ways of doing math which should be based upon understanding but is more usually based on memory, and after all this, be brainwashed into believing one sided perspectives of history and geography – crucial topics that affect learners’ acceptance of diversity and inclusivity in all its forms and glories. The most important of these is to be able to see through clear eyes and minds that treat everyone as equal human beings.
One of the big objectives for me as far as a learner’s life is concerned, is that it should be full of Eureka moments, when all the learning and knowing he has been exposed to come together and he goes into high gear, ready to take on the world. Educators must come to realise that it is important that they understand how learning occurs for every one of their students, so that every student will experience that Eureka moment. Neuroscience and Educational psychology has taught us that, at the very least.
Our world is transforming at a breakneck speed that should be forcing us to ask the question, “Is our Education system working for our children?” Revolutionary ways of conducting life requires radical changes in education, and these will happen whether education changes or not. The only people who will suffer should changes not occur are our children.
In this crazy, crazy world where information and knowledge is changing every second, we must educate students to know how to know, to know how to learn, and to know how to turn the data that is now completely and freely accessible and ubiquitous, into wisdom, and how to track and research their own learning with a critical eye.
I would also propose that everyone asks the following questions:
1. If moral and religious subjects that have been taught the past 50 years are being taught for the sake of our morality and piousness, why is it that these are the very qualities that are missing in the world we live in today?
2. If history and geography has been taught to enable us to see different perspectives and to understand the world we live in, and even more so the countries we live in, why is it we do not see and certainly do not accept the diversity of the world, and even more so, the diversity of our country?
3. If the Sciences, Math and Arts are supposed to have been taught to stimulate creativity, innovation and thoughtful, reflective thinkers, why is it that the graduating learners are becoming dull, unthinking robots who wait for instructions, unable to think and behave independently?
AND FINALLY, ASSUMING THE ABOVE ARE TRUE…
4. If the rule of the day - in research, government, organisations and other units of administration – is to throw out concepts, things and rules that have been proven not to work, why are we still using the same education system?
Assuming that I am in the general vicinity of hitting the nail on the head, then what might be the alternative to a new education system? I will try to present a logical progression of ideas to a conclusion and construct a final list of the 21st century subjects that might function to form bridges to knowing. Needless to say, a huge basis of the problem is that we are already in the 21st century, and it is almost too late for us.
The core attributes that every learner must come to be ingrained with, would be the following.
• independent enquirers who are able to make wise, fully informed and real time decisions, thus enabling personal belief and willingness to participate not just in lifelong learning, but also the creation of new knowledge through lifelong generation of ways of knowing
• creative thinkers with a view of global dimensions and sustainable development
• reflective learners who apply creativity, critical thinking, ethics and morals to constantly self-evaluate and self-correct
• teachers of fellow students and their own teachers, as teaching represents the highest order of understanding meaning behind facts, and represents a selfless and service oriented belief
• team workers who believe in community participation and service
• self-managers who create healthy lifestyles for themselves, and have real acceptance and understanding of diversity in religion, race, culture and beliefs, with none advocating supremacy over another
• effective, action-oriented participators in national and international events and issues, and a willingness to be counted in developing and implementing the difficult but right policies and actions
• expert communicators in THE global language, that will enable them to present, discuss, debate and defend ideas and thoughts, and be influenced and influence other knowers of the world (whatever that language might be – it is no country’s, government’s or man’s decision. Global communities will decide by consensus)
The important dimensions that would contribute to the above would then be woven into and across the whole curriculum and would then become the guide-light to the creation of items that make up a learning environment. The educating and learning environment would stimulate and demonstrate the development of the following:
• a clear division between the political and educational systems, with the biggest, perfectly defined wall, barrier and border built between the two
• new ways of thinking and knowing based on new knowledge and technologies that are constantly evolving, ensuring the structure and content stays dynamic and able to change and inform of changes in a understandable manner
• programmes of professional development that help educators and administrators cope with and master new ways of knowing, and the ability to facilitate learner’s autonomy, purpose and mastery
• revolutionary approaches to content knowledge mastery that exist to provide learners stepping stones to thinking and knowing, and the mastery of which is not the expected final outcome
• brand new content that mirror the workings and demands of the real world, and not compartmentalised subject based curricula that are the norm now
• acceptable and measurable ways to collect evidence of pupils’ relevant knowledge, skills and understanding as seen in their talk, actions and outcomes
• models of manageable ways of collecting evidence that give meaning to learners and educators, at the same time meaningful and relevant to industry, citizenship and sustainability
• inclusive, individually unbiased, individually stimulating knowing environments (classrooms) that cater to the creation of a thinker and a knower
Having said all this, let’s get to the core of the issue – what would this new education system be composed off? What would be the actual material encountered by students as they sit down at their desks in school?
I am proposing that we realign our thinking so that the start point of our educational strategy is the outcomes we require in real life, the workplace and in academics. In that case, current subjects would be replaced by competencies, an example of which follows.
1. Research and Problem Solving using Logical and Creativity based Thinking and Knowing
2. Wise Decision making using real-time, accurate, meaningfully connected and relevant Knowing, enabling Leaps of Logic and Intuition.
3. Developing, Proposing, Presenting, Recording, Evaluating and Concluding Projects
4. Living with, developing, applying and shaping technology hardware and software
5. Coordinating and Teamwork in Project Scheduling and Implementation within the framework of Adaptability, Ethics, Morals and Inclusivity
6. Financial, Business, Economic and Accounting fundamentals in Planning
7. Developing optimum Minds, Health, Life and Fitness through Diet and Exercise
8. Shaping and developing futures for a sustainable financial and living model for the planet
Reflect upon the above, and we will carry on discussing this issue in the next article. In the meanwhile, we Malaysians should start realising that when everything is coming AT us, we are driving in the wrong lane, and it is time to turn around and change the direction we are heading into.
As part of the reflection process, study the evolution of Knowing diagram below, and try to make sense of it. Does it bring meaning to what you have experienced in your own lives? Shouldn’t this be what our children are experiencing in school now?
Figure 1: The Evolution of Knowing – from meaningless data to wise, informed, real time decision making. The triangle represents the learning environment of a proposed ideal field of interaction in a new Learning Space that forms a learner’s digital portfolio. A3 Knowledge is Anytime & Anywhere Access to Knowledge
Theva is a senior lecturer at The School of Educational Studies, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang, Malaysia. The School is working to contribute towards the transformation of the landscapes of the Malaysian schooling and higher education systems, to enable a world class 21st century system. He can be contacted at ntheva@gmail.com.
21st Century Knowing Part 2
Theva Nithy
Let’s get right into the heart of the matter, after considering the new ways of knowing and thus the related new competencies that I proposed in the last article. These competencies would form the basis of content material to be presented, instead of subjects being presented and learners wondering how these subjects relate to and bring meaning to their own lives. Here is an example.
A teacher walks into the classroom and starts on a “subject” I proposed last week - Research and Problem Solving using Logical and Creativity based Thinking and Knowing. Teacher introduces a problem faced by the world now, pollution and global warming. In the course of introducing the problem, teacher will talk about the involvement of Biology, Chemistry, Physics and Math – in addressing and solving the problem. It might even be that the problem statement has been so expertly arranged that the chapters covered in the various disciplines, represents fundamental knowledge and are all Chapters 1 in the various books.
If this was being done at the Kindergarten stage, then the academics involved would be at an introductory level and the skills being trained would be the first steps in the process. The point is that interdisciplinary connections would be established immediately and relevance to and use in skills would also be clearly shown, together with impact on the real world.
Another example.
My 12 year old son came up me saying he had somehow removed the video device driver, and was not getting a clear display. I could have solved the problem for him in 2 minutes, but I asked him what he was going to do. He said he would look up YouTube and find out what to do. He did, and solved the problem 10 minutes later.
It is a common enough occurrence in many homes, but I wonder if you see the implications for this.
Here we have a 12 year old kid who, though tech savvy, has no real technical knowledge in software and hardware, and certainly not in solving a problem in a laptop. He is a 21st century learner though, and knew that there was bound to be a solution online. He looked at the VIDEO, learnt to understand it, and applied his new knowledge. My son's story is a powerful example of how online videos have transformed learning, as well as the role of formal education in the 21st century. We don’t need schools and teachers to be “information or content suppliers” anymore.
Think about this.
Schools and education systems were developed in the industrial age to transmit information, down a one-way street, to students. This was done at a time when knowledgeable “factory workers” were needed who really only needed to have specific skills, and were mostly required to not think too much.Now that all knowledge is ubiquitous, and in a medium that is far richer than what classrooms can offer, what is the purpose of schools and formal education?
I have already stated my belief that our learners today do not know how to research, analyse, filter and make wise decisions about issues and problems they have to deal with. The do not know how to process data and information, the very basic building blocks for the knowledge pool of the human race, and which is all displayed openly on the www.
Has the internet replaced the need for teachers? No, but our purpose and function have changed.
Teaching is no longer about Content Knowing; it is about facilitating Knowing and the building of associated skills.
We often grouse about exams that have no purpose and meaning, and that alternate means of assessment are needed. Why not consider the possibility that we don’t need assessments at all, since we are not educating students in order to judge them, but to facilitate learning. We have instead turned education systems into competitions for placements in universities and certainly in life itself too. Is that we still mean to do? I would go so far as to say that current examination systems are a form of education and economics apartheid, especially since research has shown a clear link between increased wealth, status, facilities and family reputations; and educational and career success – to put it bluntly – the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. Is that what education systems are geared to do?
A digital portfolio system, replacing exams and assessments, would offer learners themselves, and their learning guides, a means to facilitate the process of learning. The digital portfolio could be evaluated anytime not for the purpose of assigning grades, but to ensure the completion of learning objectives and off ensuring that readiness for a promotion to a next academic level is primed for success. The real outcome of a portfolio would be learners are able to reflect on the process and outcomes of their works, and to pinpoint wrong turns and right ones too. They would be trained to success in the 21st century where analysis of mistakes and knowing of correct actions are the basic necessities to continuous learning.
Yes, it would be hard - rewriting the curriculum and retraining the professionals
Yes, it would be expensive – supplying new material and technology to enable the process
Yes, it would be long term – no votes to be gained because impact will not be seen for a long time
Yes, there would be sensitive issues – but everything is already “way too racial” anyway nowadays and we want to change that.
Is it worth doing? A “failed state” is at stake, and that is something real and not a metaphor. The emigration of our talents is progressing well much to Malaysia’s dismay, and getting worse and it is happening as your read this article.
Is it still worth doing? Who would be involved in the steps leading to a transformed education system and what would their responsibilities be? A structure for the delegation of responsibilities might look something like this.
Federal Government: Federal legislation will have to be enacted that will require alignment of existing education laws to support the establishment of a world-class curriculum, new ways of assessments, systems of accountability and teacher accreditation requirements; all with no political affiliations and with top management having a public-access file with proven, mandatory zero political affiliation.
State Governments: States will support and guarantee a continuous and transparent public education system for all students from preschool through postsecondary graduation, with transparent and public accountability systems by school heads in all matters pertaining to academic, leadership and co-curricular decision making. Real world learning will be incorporated into school curriculum, connecting education programs to the state’s economic activities.
Public and Private Communities and Industries: PPCIs will provide education leaders and students with access to short-term job opportunities in which they can experience knowing, knowledge and skill requirements of the 21st century economy. PPCIs will periodically assess changes and progress made by schools within their local region. PPCIs will be engaged by the Federal and State Governments as advisors and consultants to reforms and a check and balance system will be established where federal and state governments are accountable to and can be publicly taken to task by PPCIs.
Under ideal circumstances, this could be new policy that might be implemented easily, but the reality of the many unnecessary political interferences and considerations in Malaysian education will complicate matters. Straight thinking and steadfast political will will be needed to force implementation and operationalising.
If the health system is tasked to save lives, then the education system’s task is to save minds. Speaking just for Malaysia, this is one rescue mission that needs doing right this instant, because minds are being lost daily!
Theva is a senior lecturer at The School of Educational Studies, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang, Malaysia. The School is working to contribute towards the transformation of the landscapes of the Malaysian Schooling and Higher Education Systems, to enable a world class 21st century system. He can be contacted at ntheva@gmail.com.
Theva Nithy
Can we afford to be stuck in current Education Systems, regardless whether they are the much hyped International School Systems, or the multitudes of National School systems used worldwide? What must happen to ensure not just the success and sustainability of our students, but also countries, and ultimately, the planet and all its life?
The global advocacy movement for new curriculums and standards is growing daily, with some of the strongest advocates coming from The UK and US. In Malaysia, it remains in the rhetorical stages, and this is jeopardizing the future and potentials of the diverse talents of our learners. They are becoming irrelevant even as they climb the educational ladder to greater heights of knowledge – knowledge that is already irrelevant as they “learn” it. Outdated and meaningless approaches to Learning and Knowing, and the exposure of our learners to non-existent classroom representations of real world learning models; are taking us backwards instead of forwards.
A major part of the problem is that education systems are preparing students for higher education only, when they should actually be preparing students for higher education, life and the workplace – which together constitute the real world. There remains the old problem of there being no clear link between educational content in schools, with workplace skills and requirements. Even more disturbing, education is no longer developing citizens with strong values and principles, who are ethical and morally upright. Is this a trend for the human race or is this simply an indication that education systems have taken a wrong turn somewhere?
The big question is – is it the core content of knowledge that is the vital component of intelligence or is it the ways of knowing of content that is crucial? It might look as if there is a play of words here, but the basis of the questions I pose is this.
The traditional way of doing things in schools globally is to provide the industrial age based, so called core subjects that provide a fixed quantum of knowledge. These are languages, the sciences, math, accounting, commerce subjects, religion even, country based-agendas of versions of history, geography, general knowledge that the powers that be decide SHOULD be general knowledge, with some music and the arts thrown in.
I would propose that no student in any country anywhere needs to be told about general knowledge, religion, morals, personal histories and on top of that, memorise facts of science, ways of doing math which should be based upon understanding but is more usually based on memory, and after all this, be brainwashed into believing one sided perspectives of history and geography – crucial topics that affect learners’ acceptance of diversity and inclusivity in all its forms and glories. The most important of these is to be able to see through clear eyes and minds that treat everyone as equal human beings.
One of the big objectives for me as far as a learner’s life is concerned, is that it should be full of Eureka moments, when all the learning and knowing he has been exposed to come together and he goes into high gear, ready to take on the world. Educators must come to realise that it is important that they understand how learning occurs for every one of their students, so that every student will experience that Eureka moment. Neuroscience and Educational psychology has taught us that, at the very least.
Our world is transforming at a breakneck speed that should be forcing us to ask the question, “Is our Education system working for our children?” Revolutionary ways of conducting life requires radical changes in education, and these will happen whether education changes or not. The only people who will suffer should changes not occur are our children.
In this crazy, crazy world where information and knowledge is changing every second, we must educate students to know how to know, to know how to learn, and to know how to turn the data that is now completely and freely accessible and ubiquitous, into wisdom, and how to track and research their own learning with a critical eye.
I would also propose that everyone asks the following questions:
1. If moral and religious subjects that have been taught the past 50 years are being taught for the sake of our morality and piousness, why is it that these are the very qualities that are missing in the world we live in today?
2. If history and geography has been taught to enable us to see different perspectives and to understand the world we live in, and even more so the countries we live in, why is it we do not see and certainly do not accept the diversity of the world, and even more so, the diversity of our country?
3. If the Sciences, Math and Arts are supposed to have been taught to stimulate creativity, innovation and thoughtful, reflective thinkers, why is it that the graduating learners are becoming dull, unthinking robots who wait for instructions, unable to think and behave independently?
AND FINALLY, ASSUMING THE ABOVE ARE TRUE…
4. If the rule of the day - in research, government, organisations and other units of administration – is to throw out concepts, things and rules that have been proven not to work, why are we still using the same education system?
Assuming that I am in the general vicinity of hitting the nail on the head, then what might be the alternative to a new education system? I will try to present a logical progression of ideas to a conclusion and construct a final list of the 21st century subjects that might function to form bridges to knowing. Needless to say, a huge basis of the problem is that we are already in the 21st century, and it is almost too late for us.
The core attributes that every learner must come to be ingrained with, would be the following.
• independent enquirers who are able to make wise, fully informed and real time decisions, thus enabling personal belief and willingness to participate not just in lifelong learning, but also the creation of new knowledge through lifelong generation of ways of knowing
• creative thinkers with a view of global dimensions and sustainable development
• reflective learners who apply creativity, critical thinking, ethics and morals to constantly self-evaluate and self-correct
• teachers of fellow students and their own teachers, as teaching represents the highest order of understanding meaning behind facts, and represents a selfless and service oriented belief
• team workers who believe in community participation and service
• self-managers who create healthy lifestyles for themselves, and have real acceptance and understanding of diversity in religion, race, culture and beliefs, with none advocating supremacy over another
• effective, action-oriented participators in national and international events and issues, and a willingness to be counted in developing and implementing the difficult but right policies and actions
• expert communicators in THE global language, that will enable them to present, discuss, debate and defend ideas and thoughts, and be influenced and influence other knowers of the world (whatever that language might be – it is no country’s, government’s or man’s decision. Global communities will decide by consensus)
The important dimensions that would contribute to the above would then be woven into and across the whole curriculum and would then become the guide-light to the creation of items that make up a learning environment. The educating and learning environment would stimulate and demonstrate the development of the following:
• a clear division between the political and educational systems, with the biggest, perfectly defined wall, barrier and border built between the two
• new ways of thinking and knowing based on new knowledge and technologies that are constantly evolving, ensuring the structure and content stays dynamic and able to change and inform of changes in a understandable manner
• programmes of professional development that help educators and administrators cope with and master new ways of knowing, and the ability to facilitate learner’s autonomy, purpose and mastery
• revolutionary approaches to content knowledge mastery that exist to provide learners stepping stones to thinking and knowing, and the mastery of which is not the expected final outcome
• brand new content that mirror the workings and demands of the real world, and not compartmentalised subject based curricula that are the norm now
• acceptable and measurable ways to collect evidence of pupils’ relevant knowledge, skills and understanding as seen in their talk, actions and outcomes
• models of manageable ways of collecting evidence that give meaning to learners and educators, at the same time meaningful and relevant to industry, citizenship and sustainability
• inclusive, individually unbiased, individually stimulating knowing environments (classrooms) that cater to the creation of a thinker and a knower
Having said all this, let’s get to the core of the issue – what would this new education system be composed off? What would be the actual material encountered by students as they sit down at their desks in school?
I am proposing that we realign our thinking so that the start point of our educational strategy is the outcomes we require in real life, the workplace and in academics. In that case, current subjects would be replaced by competencies, an example of which follows.
1. Research and Problem Solving using Logical and Creativity based Thinking and Knowing
2. Wise Decision making using real-time, accurate, meaningfully connected and relevant Knowing, enabling Leaps of Logic and Intuition.
3. Developing, Proposing, Presenting, Recording, Evaluating and Concluding Projects
4. Living with, developing, applying and shaping technology hardware and software
5. Coordinating and Teamwork in Project Scheduling and Implementation within the framework of Adaptability, Ethics, Morals and Inclusivity
6. Financial, Business, Economic and Accounting fundamentals in Planning
7. Developing optimum Minds, Health, Life and Fitness through Diet and Exercise
8. Shaping and developing futures for a sustainable financial and living model for the planet
Reflect upon the above, and we will carry on discussing this issue in the next article. In the meanwhile, we Malaysians should start realising that when everything is coming AT us, we are driving in the wrong lane, and it is time to turn around and change the direction we are heading into.
As part of the reflection process, study the evolution of Knowing diagram below, and try to make sense of it. Does it bring meaning to what you have experienced in your own lives? Shouldn’t this be what our children are experiencing in school now?
Figure 1: The Evolution of Knowing – from meaningless data to wise, informed, real time decision making. The triangle represents the learning environment of a proposed ideal field of interaction in a new Learning Space that forms a learner’s digital portfolio. A3 Knowledge is Anytime & Anywhere Access to Knowledge
Theva is a senior lecturer at The School of Educational Studies, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang, Malaysia. The School is working to contribute towards the transformation of the landscapes of the Malaysian schooling and higher education systems, to enable a world class 21st century system. He can be contacted at ntheva@gmail.com.
21st Century Knowing Part 2
Theva Nithy
Let’s get right into the heart of the matter, after considering the new ways of knowing and thus the related new competencies that I proposed in the last article. These competencies would form the basis of content material to be presented, instead of subjects being presented and learners wondering how these subjects relate to and bring meaning to their own lives. Here is an example.
A teacher walks into the classroom and starts on a “subject” I proposed last week - Research and Problem Solving using Logical and Creativity based Thinking and Knowing. Teacher introduces a problem faced by the world now, pollution and global warming. In the course of introducing the problem, teacher will talk about the involvement of Biology, Chemistry, Physics and Math – in addressing and solving the problem. It might even be that the problem statement has been so expertly arranged that the chapters covered in the various disciplines, represents fundamental knowledge and are all Chapters 1 in the various books.
If this was being done at the Kindergarten stage, then the academics involved would be at an introductory level and the skills being trained would be the first steps in the process. The point is that interdisciplinary connections would be established immediately and relevance to and use in skills would also be clearly shown, together with impact on the real world.
Another example.
My 12 year old son came up me saying he had somehow removed the video device driver, and was not getting a clear display. I could have solved the problem for him in 2 minutes, but I asked him what he was going to do. He said he would look up YouTube and find out what to do. He did, and solved the problem 10 minutes later.
It is a common enough occurrence in many homes, but I wonder if you see the implications for this.
Here we have a 12 year old kid who, though tech savvy, has no real technical knowledge in software and hardware, and certainly not in solving a problem in a laptop. He is a 21st century learner though, and knew that there was bound to be a solution online. He looked at the VIDEO, learnt to understand it, and applied his new knowledge. My son's story is a powerful example of how online videos have transformed learning, as well as the role of formal education in the 21st century. We don’t need schools and teachers to be “information or content suppliers” anymore.
Think about this.
Schools and education systems were developed in the industrial age to transmit information, down a one-way street, to students. This was done at a time when knowledgeable “factory workers” were needed who really only needed to have specific skills, and were mostly required to not think too much.Now that all knowledge is ubiquitous, and in a medium that is far richer than what classrooms can offer, what is the purpose of schools and formal education?
I have already stated my belief that our learners today do not know how to research, analyse, filter and make wise decisions about issues and problems they have to deal with. The do not know how to process data and information, the very basic building blocks for the knowledge pool of the human race, and which is all displayed openly on the www.
Has the internet replaced the need for teachers? No, but our purpose and function have changed.
Teaching is no longer about Content Knowing; it is about facilitating Knowing and the building of associated skills.
We often grouse about exams that have no purpose and meaning, and that alternate means of assessment are needed. Why not consider the possibility that we don’t need assessments at all, since we are not educating students in order to judge them, but to facilitate learning. We have instead turned education systems into competitions for placements in universities and certainly in life itself too. Is that we still mean to do? I would go so far as to say that current examination systems are a form of education and economics apartheid, especially since research has shown a clear link between increased wealth, status, facilities and family reputations; and educational and career success – to put it bluntly – the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. Is that what education systems are geared to do?
A digital portfolio system, replacing exams and assessments, would offer learners themselves, and their learning guides, a means to facilitate the process of learning. The digital portfolio could be evaluated anytime not for the purpose of assigning grades, but to ensure the completion of learning objectives and off ensuring that readiness for a promotion to a next academic level is primed for success. The real outcome of a portfolio would be learners are able to reflect on the process and outcomes of their works, and to pinpoint wrong turns and right ones too. They would be trained to success in the 21st century where analysis of mistakes and knowing of correct actions are the basic necessities to continuous learning.
Yes, it would be hard - rewriting the curriculum and retraining the professionals
Yes, it would be expensive – supplying new material and technology to enable the process
Yes, it would be long term – no votes to be gained because impact will not be seen for a long time
Yes, there would be sensitive issues – but everything is already “way too racial” anyway nowadays and we want to change that.
Is it worth doing? A “failed state” is at stake, and that is something real and not a metaphor. The emigration of our talents is progressing well much to Malaysia’s dismay, and getting worse and it is happening as your read this article.
Is it still worth doing? Who would be involved in the steps leading to a transformed education system and what would their responsibilities be? A structure for the delegation of responsibilities might look something like this.
Federal Government: Federal legislation will have to be enacted that will require alignment of existing education laws to support the establishment of a world-class curriculum, new ways of assessments, systems of accountability and teacher accreditation requirements; all with no political affiliations and with top management having a public-access file with proven, mandatory zero political affiliation.
State Governments: States will support and guarantee a continuous and transparent public education system for all students from preschool through postsecondary graduation, with transparent and public accountability systems by school heads in all matters pertaining to academic, leadership and co-curricular decision making. Real world learning will be incorporated into school curriculum, connecting education programs to the state’s economic activities.
Public and Private Communities and Industries: PPCIs will provide education leaders and students with access to short-term job opportunities in which they can experience knowing, knowledge and skill requirements of the 21st century economy. PPCIs will periodically assess changes and progress made by schools within their local region. PPCIs will be engaged by the Federal and State Governments as advisors and consultants to reforms and a check and balance system will be established where federal and state governments are accountable to and can be publicly taken to task by PPCIs.
Under ideal circumstances, this could be new policy that might be implemented easily, but the reality of the many unnecessary political interferences and considerations in Malaysian education will complicate matters. Straight thinking and steadfast political will will be needed to force implementation and operationalising.
If the health system is tasked to save lives, then the education system’s task is to save minds. Speaking just for Malaysia, this is one rescue mission that needs doing right this instant, because minds are being lost daily!
Theva is a senior lecturer at The School of Educational Studies, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang, Malaysia. The School is working to contribute towards the transformation of the landscapes of the Malaysian Schooling and Higher Education Systems, to enable a world class 21st century system. He can be contacted at ntheva@gmail.com.
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