3 Ways "We" Have Destroyed Young People's Ability to Think
Here are three ways education has undermined thinking in theyounger generations:
The primary education system has changed quite a bit in thelast 50 years and many of those changes have resulted in young people'sinability to think critically and instead to rely on cues and memorization.
1 - Memorization
For decades we’ve been lulled into believing that memorizingand recalling information is learning. And perhaps, in anindustrialized world, recall was all that was necessary. When theindustrial age was ruled by manufacturing and work was repetitive, perhapsremembering the steps in a process and executing them properly was "theskill." We are now in a knowledge economy (and have been for at least 20years!). We pay people to think. We pay people to make decisions,solve problems, innovate and synthesize. In direct opposition to this, oureducational system (and generally our corporate training system) focuses onteaching learners to memorize information so that, with the proper prompt, itcan be recalled; educating/training does not teach us how to useinformation in a variety of ways and circumstances or (heavens!) use it in away that wasn’t taught at all (extrapolating).
2 - Cramming
Somewhere along the line, we have lured young learners intobelieving that “cramming” is a proper methodology for learning. Duringexam week at colleges, the libraries and dining halls stay open around theclock to accommodate the learners who are staying up around the clock studying– this only reinforces the idea that the last-push to learn is a crucial time.
Typically young people prepare for a test or exam the day beforethe exam – which means that they are simply working from short term memory,which generally is good enough if the measure of one’s learning is being ableto spot the right answer on a multiple-choice test - but not enough if weexpect them to use that knowledge "out in the real world."
Real-world application is built from learning over multipleexposures to a concept or process, not a cursory review of the keypoints.
3 - Testing
Thanks to the introduction of Scantron Bubble Sheets in the50's and 60's - everything became a multiple-choice test. The bubble sheetswere extremely helpful to teachers and administrators as class sizes grew andrecord-keeping became more stringent. Unfortunately, they took morethan they gave. This type of testing fueled the usage of the 2"learning" strategies discussed above AND undermined the value of theteacher's input into student's testing.
Prior to a machine grading tests, teachers had to read eachresponse, giving the answer critical thought. Very often they would addcommentary to the grade, rather than simply marking an answer wrong. They mightremind the student where the correct information was found or help them toremember how the concept they got wrong was similar to what they werethinking. Sometimes they would give partial credit if the student was onthe right track but then veered off before their final summation (this is theonly way I passed geometry, believe me).
Prior to a machine grading tests, even when a student got ananswer wrong - they were learning. They had coaching, correction andrefinement from their teacher based on how the teacher graded thetest. Once the Scantron bubble sheet became de rigueur in public schooleducation, students simply received their grade with little to no explanationor intervention.
Unfortunately, I can spot factors that led to the demise of thinking skills (and there may well be more that you are thinking of!) but I am not sure what the remedy should be to reverse the trend. Given class-size and teacher pay, it's not reasonable to take efficiencies away from public school teachers. Instituting "study skills" classes in college is smart - but it's usually an elective and addresses a small population of the students (plus, by the time students are in college, it is remedial - we should be teaching study skills at about age 11 and continue it until the end of high school - see my article on 3 Keys to Ensuring Learning for more on this topic).
I think the rise of AI and machine learning will make theseshortcomings even more apparent in coming years, as all of the "easy tospot" answers will be gobbled up by robots and the critical thinking willbe the domain of humans.
Your thoughts?
Note: This article was originally published on LinkedIn.
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/3-ways-we-have-destroyed-young-peoples-ability-think-miner-ed-d-
If Colleges Don't Teach Thinking - Who Will (us)
According to a Wall Street Journal analysis of 200 nonpublic colleges: Many Colleges Fail to Improve Critical-Thinking Skills
At The Training Doctor, sadly, we are not surprised. It's why we have an entire curriculum dedicated to teaching thinking skills.
Here are a couple of highlights (lowlights?) found in the WSJ analysis :
At more than half of schools, at least a third of seniors were unable to make a cohesive argument, assess the quality of evidence in a document or interpret data in a table
Test results indicate the average graduate shows little or no improvement in critical thinking over four years
Some academic experts, education researchers and employers say the Journal's findings are a sign of the failure of America's higher-education system to arm graduates with analytical reasoning and problem-solving skills needed to thrive in a fast-changing, increasingly global job market
You can see the full article here.
And we can help you to overcome this problem – if your incoming employees are suffering from an education that hasn’t actually educated them - by clicking here. At The Training Doctor, we teach thinking skills.
Interview with Karl Kapp re: Gamification
hardbackcoverlaying
kapp_book_image
What inspired you to write this book? T
wo things compelled me to write the book. The first is that I had been working on the concept of "gamification" before I even knew the word. I was/am a big video game fan and wanted to try to bring game concepts into the learning I was designing. I had started to do that but never had a word for it. Then, one day, I saw the word gamification and I said "that's it, that's what I've been trying to do." So I started researching the concept and learning more and more about it.
However, so many people, in my opinion, were getting gamification wrong. People were focused on the least exciting elements of games (points, badges and leaderboards) and they were focused only on making learning fun.
So the second reason I wrote the book was to try to provide research-based explanations and techniques of why gamification should be about engagement and not about "fun." I always say, "if you want someone to have fun...give them the day off." If you want them to learn, create engaging instruction.
If you could distill your message down to just one - what would it be?
Gamification is about engagement. The elements from games that make them engaging and interesting are the elements we should use in gamification of learning and instruction. We should not take a superficial dive into gamification, we need to really explore the elements of games that lead to engagement and learning. And, if I could sneak one more message in here it would be that gamification is based on research-backed principles. The ideas of learner motivation, spaced practice and spaced retrieval used in gamification have been shown to lead to positive learning outcomes. It's not bells and whistles, it's based on sound scientific methodology.
How would a learning professional best use your book?
I've written two books about gamification. One has a white cover (Gamification of Learning and Instruction: Game-based Methods and Strategies for Training and Education) and one has a black cover (Gamification of Learning and Instruction Fieldbook: Ideas into Practice).
The book with the white cover is designed to describe why gamification is effective, to highlight the research behind gamification and to explain how to match instructional content to certain types of games. It is more on the theory and justification of gamification.
The book with the black cover, the field book, is more about the implementation, it explains how to design interactive learning with gamification, games and simulations. It's the "how to book."
Do you have a personal motto related to the book?
My motto is to help people understand the convergence of learning, technology, games and gamification through engagement, fun, laughter and insight.
Bio
Karl M. Kapp, Professor of Instructional Technology, Bloomsburg University, Lynda.com author and author of six books including the Gamification of Learning series.
Online learning is gaining in "popularity"
Interest in online learning is growing rapidly, while interest in traditional education is waning. From 2012 - 2013, distance education enrollment rose 1.8% compared with a drop of 4% in overall higher education enrollment according to the US Department of Education.
What does this mean for us? As trainers? It means our new hires are coming to us already equipped to be successful while learning virtually.
Why We Should Ban Cell Phones During Training Classes
Gloria Mark, of the University of California, Irvine, has shown that workers typically attend to a task for about three minutes before switching to something else (usually an electronic communication) and that it takes about 20 minutes to return to the previous task.
Source: Harvard Business Review, June 2015, Conquering Digital Distraction
Higher Ed Students are Used to Online Learning
About one-eighth of students enrolled in higher education institutions take all their coursework at a distance (online or through video, satellite or correspondence work), while another one-eighth take at least some classes at a distance according to the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education which focuses on best practices and technology for distance learning.
Quotable: Jay Titus
Millennials will account for close to 50 percent of the workforce within the next five years. Corporate learning leaders need to be the champion for making professional development an organizational priority. We need to be taking educational benefits out of the last page of the employee handbook and shining a spotlight on it. In the next five to 10 years it’s going to be a key differentiator for employers who do it well.
Jay Titus, EdAssist
Excerpted from: http://www.clomedia.com/blogs/1-ask-a-gen-y/post/6303-millennials-will-work-for-knowledge
The Traditional "Education" Model is Waning
Interest in online learning is growing rapidly, while interest in traditional education is waning. From 2012 to 2013, distance education enrollment rose 1.8 percent, compared with a drop of 4% in overall higher education enrollment, according to the US Department of Education.
About one-eighth of students take all their higher education courses at a distance (online or through video, satellite or correspondence work), while another eighth take at least some classes at a distance, according to Russell Poulin, director, policy and analysis for the Eastern Interstate Comission for Higher Education Cooperative for Educational Technologies, a Boulder, CO, based organizations that focuses on best practices and technology for distance learning.
Source: HR Magazine, May 2015
Residential Education is the "new" College?
Heard Round the Watercooler: Residential Education
Residential Education is used when referring to college and university campuses.
As opposed to MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) which are offered by elite colleges and universities, but the courses are taken online.
Why We Need to Reform Education in America
You MUST invest 20 minutes in this TedTalk on Education featuring Sir Ken Robinson on Why We Need to Reform Education in America.
Why don't we use tuition reimbursement more?!
"After several years of in-depth measurement we found that participation in our company's tuition assistance program resulted in reduced turnover, increased job performance, and enhanced career mobility," says Dorothy Martin, Verizon Learning LINK National Program Manager.