Real learning; Real memory
by Roger Schank
What do people need to learn and how can they learn it?
Every curriculum committee and every training organization has at one time or another convened a committee to answer this question. Their answers are always given in terms of telling about subjects: “more math,” “leadership,” “risk management,” “company policies.” But subject matter is far less important in learning than one might think.
“Instead of using these tools to teach centuries-old subject matter, perhaps we should instead use them to help us develop meaningful skills and personal knowledge — and to enhance our capacities to imagine, create, and innovate.“
As we shared earlier, Project Dream School started with a simple question: If you could build a dream school, what would you do?
This morning, I received some inspiring ideas. [...]
Make no mistake. Adobe makes great products. But, it is hard for educators and students to connect with them. First, the company produces professional-grade tools (Photoshop, Premiere Pro, After Effects, etc.), and, as a result, they are very expensive for resource-starved institutions to purchase (even with discounted education pricing). Second, these professional-grade tools often come [...]
The purpose of the Invisible Learning Tour was to raise awareness for the need for innovation in education. Mainstream teaching focuses mainly on the preparation of students for compartmentalized roles and jobs (mainly factory workers and bureaucrats) that contrast sharply with the needs of the modern economy, which requires people that are imaginative, creative, and innovative. We explored ideas, existing options, and new pathways for learning that is relevant for the 21st century.
This morning, MPR’s Midmorning aired a forum on the role of social media and education.
Milton Chen deviates from the change manifesto genre somewhat by reflecting on his own experiences and the work undertaken by Edutopia, which he previously directed. The book is so deeply oriented toward the work of Edutopia and its key source of income (George Lucas), that, prima facie, it nearly comes across as a swan song of their accomplishments. Reading beyond this, however, the book emerges as another list of indictments of many of the things wrong with the U.S. education system. Where Chen shines, is in making a case for changing our mindsets so that we can find remedies.
Last Sunday, Jeffrey Young wrote about the use of the Internet to deliver lectures in the Chronicle of Higher Education. The article centered on the work of Salman Khan, who posts home-made lectures on YouTube: The lo-fi videos seem to work for students, many of whom have written glowing testimonials or even donated a few [...]
In a TEDxNYED talk that is destined to become a classic, Jeff Jarvis takes on the industrialization of education and the irrelevance of lectures in an innovation-powered world (Knowmad Society!): From his notes: One more from him: “It’s easy to educate for the routine, and hard to educate for the novel.” Google sprung from seeing [...]
When most people mention the word “pedagogy,” they are likely to think of it within a temponormative framework. It is a framework that embraces linear time and Cartesian thinking. This continues to be the most prevalent framework within Western educational contexts. A linear conceptualization of time ensures that the learning process has a beginning and [...]
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