can someone help me out with the definition here?

I’m a bit confused

But hey! I’m not heavily medicated today guys so no jokes!

1. If students’ goals for their education are all about rule-based facts-and-techniques drills, they don’t have very high aspirations. Unfortunately, it’s so easy to standardize, scale, and automate education along the lines of rule-based facts-and-techniques drills that most schools, especially K-12, have decided that’s how they’ll structure the curriculum, the learning, the learning spaces, and the whole kit and kaboodle. So any student desiring more will have her work cut out for her, in several ways.

2. Mindless “get in a group” stuff, all the rage with “de-centered” and “student-centered” and “un-hierarchicalized” and zub zub zub pedagogical “thinking,” is just as bad. Students must cooperate actively in the scaffold-building, but if they could magically do it all themselves, why would they need a teacher at all? (On the other hand, to be honest, I’m not always sure everyone needs as many teachers as we thrown at them.) It’s important to have an expert with authority helping the students understand the structure of a discipline, a set of questions, a domain of knowledge. That structure is always changing and contested, sure, but then so is language–and we use that every day.

3. I am sick of the sage-on-the-stage / guide-at-the-side dichotomy. You didn’t mention it specifically, but I wanted to on the record with my dismay because I think the dichotomy reflects considerable confusion about education and its many varieties. Just an interjection on my part. I suppose I feel a little better now.

4. I am delighted you’re reading Bruner’s book and hope you will find your continued reading of him as rewarding as I have. I don’t think I’ll get close to exhausting his insights in the rest of the life I have available to me. It doesn’t do us any good busily to solve upper-level problems or ask easy questions and provide easy answers if we’re hopelessly muddled about the basics. Bruner is very clear about the basics, and the basics are where the real depths are, in my view.

5. Thank you for a most stimulating post.

Believe me, I get that question a lot; actually, I ask that question a lot.

@Bill - I think relevancy is there if understand the subject enough, this is where professors come in. It may not necessarily be a one to one connection or even easy, but if what is being taught has no purpose or relevancy (again not current events relevancy, but learning and life relevancy) then we shouldn’t be teaching it. Students can’t do this on their own, but just because it might be difficult to do such a thing doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be done.

@Gene - Thanks for the link to contracts. I think you hit the nail on the head, in fact I exclaimed, “Gene you are awesome!” to which my brother responded, “Who is Gene?” haha. “Learning how to learn” is not necessarily easy and I’ll admit to wanting to take the easy road on many occasions, but it is something that needs to be addressed. Covering material without an idea of structure or how to actually learn it means nothing because more than likely the average student will forget it.

Very thoughtful piece, as usual. I think one of the most valuable tools for helping students become more involved in shaping their own goals is the learning contract. I’ve never taught in the humanities, but I’ve been using contracts as a tool for years now in the social sciences. A good summary of contracts is at:

http://www.wpi.edu/Academics/ATC/Collaboratory/Idea/contractbenefits.html

Many students don’t like the contract process much at first, since learning to use them effectively requires learning new skills in defining goals, clarifying objectives, choosing the right mix of activities, and the like. Developing those skills is hard work, involving different kinds of honest conversations among faculty and students.

Their biggest complaint is that we’re taking too much time working on the the process–time that should be spent in “covering the material”. My own philosophy is that “learning how to learn” is the most important goal of education–and it’s the best investment we can make in preparing for the future. (How Bruner.)

From the student perspective, though, I’d be very surprised if most are able to voice their goals, let alone chart a course to acheive them. This is not a slam against students — I simply doubt that most even know what they *want*, other than a good job when they get out. How can they? They’ve not seen the ‘real world’ yet — which is an argument for a gap year, before or during college.

Do schools ever go back and do ‘customer surveys’ with their graduates? I’d bet, damn few.