Teaching - Can we eliminate the generational divide?

For decades, the concept of self-directed learning was central to what adult education was all about (Mezirow, 1985). At the time, an estimated 70% of adult learning was self-directed. I assume it is much higher now, but have not seen figures.

Self-directed learning has been described as “a process in which individuals take the initiative, with or without the help of others” to diagnose their learning needs, formulate goals, identify resources for learning, and evaluate learning outcomes (Knowles, 1975).

More modern philosophy involves adults participating in collaborative settings and fostering peer-to-peer exchange of expertise and knowledge, which can be very powerful. It is helpful to have a facilitator to guide the exchange, but that person need not lead the discussion. Adult learning pedagogy theory indicates that adults learn more and retain knowledge for a longer period of time if they are in charge of their learning rather than being a passive consumer.

The concepts and theories that define SDL are decades old, but open source textbooks and open source curriculum? Who would have imagined that in 2009, we can attend graduate schools like MIT, Yale, or Stanford online – for free. We can watch the individual lectures, take the tests, get the course materials and attend every class offered in the finest grad schools in the world! If the piece of paper is what matters, and you want a degree, you still must attend. But every day we see more and more open source opportunities, not only from Universities but from sources everywhere - from TED lectures to The Big Think where we can see mini lectures by fantastic thinkers.

The critical collaboration component is missing, but everything is there for the self-motivated. More and more, our resources make learning part of a continuum that naturally becomes a lifelong process. If we seek it out, it is there for us - although I hope more collaboration tools will be available to take full advantage of these resources. Adults need to discuss topics and have critical peer-to-peer exchange amongst themselves because it usually means they will learn and retain more. 

Here, then, is the big disconnect. Why are most of our Universities teaching the most natural self-directed learners – our “digital natives” – the same way kids have been taught for hundreds of years? They have grown up in an environment of self-directed learning, and they know a lot – about a lot. In a classroom, they can still have the advantage of collaboration and peer-to-peer exchange if it is encouraged and ideas are accepted openly. Many of them are true experts (thanks to their personal interests and the motivation they had to seek out niche communities online, where they have pursued them). Why are kids still sitting in classrooms while teachers or professors lecture, instruct them and give them tests to measure ability? Why not shift the pedagogical role here too? Won’t they retain the knowledge for a longer period of time if they are not merely passive consumers fulfilling a requirement? I emphasize “most” because forward thinking learning institutions are experimenting and even executing methods that will ultimately change this. There are grants and foundations with fascinating research going on (The MacArthur Foundation’s Digital Youth Project is particularly interesting).

The gap between how we teach and how kids learn today is just too wide to ignore any more. And the need for collaboration tools to help adults take full advantage of the learning opportunities that are increasing exponentially is growing daily.

Seth Godin's "Education at the crossroads"

Seth Godin's post is so fantastic, I'm going to re-post it entirely instead of linking. I love this article, and agree with it 100%. Seems there is tremendous opportunity here.

<<

Education at the crossroads

Actually, there isn't one, there are three choices that anyone offering higher education is going to have to make.

Should this be scarce or abundant?

MIT and Stanford are starting to make classes available for free online. The marginal cost of this is pretty close to zero, so it's easy for them to share. Abundant education is easy to access and offers motivated individuals a chance to learn.

Scarcity comes from things like accreditation, admissions policies or small classrooms.

Should this be free or expensive?

Wikipedia offers the world's fact base to everyone, for free. So it spreads.

On the other hand, some bar review courses are so expensive the websites don't even have the guts to list the price.

The newly easy access to the education marketplace (you used to need a big campus and a spot in the guidance office) means that both the free and expensive options are going to be experimented with, because the number of people in the education business is going to explode (then implode).

If you think the fallout in the newspaper business was dramatic, wait until you see what happens to education.

Should this be about school or about learning?

School was the big thing for a long time. School is tests and credits and notetaking and meeting standards. Learning, on the other hand, is 'getting it'. It's the conceptual breakthrough that permits the student to understand it then move on to something else. Learning doesn't care about workbooks or long checklists.

For a while, smart people thought that school was organized to encourage learning. For a long time, though, people in the know have realized that they are fundamentally different activities.

The combinations...

Imagine a school that's built around free, abundant learning. And compare it to one that's focused on scarce, expensive schooling. Or dream up your own combination. My recent MBA program, for example, was scarce (only 9 people got to do it) and it was free and focused on learning.

Just because something is free doesn't meant there isn't money to be made. Someone could charge, for example, for custom curricula, or focused tutoring, or for a certified (scarce) degree. When a million people are taking your course, you only need 1% to pay you to be happy indeed.

Eight combinations of the three choices are available and my guess is that all eight will be tried. If I were going to wager, I'd say that the free, abundant learning combination is the one that's going to change the world. >>

Teaching Digital Natives

This generation is coming of age at a unique historical moment tied to a systemic change in culture. According to a study being done by the MacArthur Foundation, their generational identity is tied to their technological identity, which distinguishes them from their elders. New media empowers these "digital natives" to challenge social norms and educational agendas of elders in unique ways. What makes this group unique is that while adults participate, they are not automatically the experts because of their age. Traditional markers of status and authority are erased. Kids are active innovators using digital media rather than static consumers of pop culture or academic knowledge.

Adaptation to teaching the digital youth culture is essential to any learning institution, because there is a growing disparity between how they educate and how this new generation learns. Without adapting new media practices, hypodermic methods of teaching will become less and less effective.

Digital natives live most of their lives online, without distinguishing between the online and the offline. They share the common practice of relating to each other in ways mediated by digital technologies. They don't know anything but a life in which they are constantly connected to others.

We need to mobilize our institutions to envision formal, higher education as part of a continuum of learning within the collaborative, networked environments that students participate in online today. This will not only serve to increase student's interest and motivation, but to reinforce the fact that learning is a lifelong process. Do we believe that learning institutions can continue in their current form? Around the world, learning is continuously happening virtually, globally, and collaboratively.

David Buckingham describes the growing gap between kid's everyday life out of school and the emphasis of many educational systems. The future of conventional learning institutions could be over unless they realize the necessity of both fundamental and foundational change.

The first step toward fundamental change is already in motion. Open source education is becoming more than a concept, its reality has taken hold and great thinkers are making it a priority. Open source course management, open access, collaborative textbooks, and other open source tools break down the limitations of a static curriculum. Students can embrace the capabilities of the Internet for virtual collaboration, viral dissemination, and feedback loops. We are seeing more and more of these web based opportunities with efforts such as Creative Commons and Connexions.

This is just the beginning. We are losing student's interest by presenting them with textbooks and hypodermically presenting information in lectures. By evolving to an ecosystem of education that conforms to the reality they interact with outside of school, we have a better chance at success and participation in their learning process. We need to close Buckingham's "digital divide".