Education Forum Timey!!

I know that you guys aren't as interested in pedagogy as I am, but I thought that I might as well try.

Right now I am debating whether studying a subject in an advanced course is more worthwhile than studying it independently. Most courses of this kind require a great deal of reading/information absorption, and then you are expected to make some draw some kind of revolutionary conclusions from it.

For example, let's say that you are in a class on baking cookies. You read hundreds of recipes as an assignment (and bake a few, too). This would be the 'information absorption' part of the class. The 'conclusions' part of the class might be an assignment, perhaps to write your own successful cookie recipe.

Following this formula, we can represent the learning experience thus:
information absorption ➔ drawing conclusions
This is how I think that most classes are structured. However, it misses out on a key element that should act as a go-between, which is a development of understanding. Without understanding the information, any conclusions drawn will be faulty. So, the new flow would go something like:
information absorption ➔ developing understanding ➔ drawing conclusions
Ideally, we should develop understanding on our own, and discuss what we think during in-class discussions. I see at least two problems with this:
  1. Most students would rather do other things (like mingle, sleep, or play music) rather than develop and understanding of their schoolwork.
  2. In-class discussions designed to develop understanding do not often work out well, because of mixed skill levels. If some students are trying to build a remedial understanding, and others are trying to build understanding, the class will be dichotomised and a compensation (where nobody is completely satisfied) will result.
I think that by studying things independently of school, even at a higher skill level, we eliminate these two problems because:
  1. The student will be self-motivated to study
  2. The student will develop understanding at his or her own pace
What do you guys think? Is classroom understanding superior to independent study?
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2 comments:

  1. The GrizzlyNovember 21, 2009 at 5:05 PM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

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  2. shelNovember 21, 2009 at 6:16 PM

    DAMN, son. rainbow-coloured water == best criticism mentioned.

    i think that a lot of what you said doesn't constructively apply to my current mode of thought. the "concrete level" you have described i have purposely ignored here because it is not what is currently on the table. you are completely correct in assuming that i am making vast generalisations in favour of abstraction.

    part of the problem here is that i have already thought a great deal about what all of the terms that i am using, i.e., "understanding", "development", "class discussion" (and cooperative learning). and you have not and so you are in the dark, a bit. this is also why i am using diagrams.

    perhaps it is a dumbing-down of the ideas, but i didn't feel like writing another paper for the sake of a pansy little blog named Film Punk.

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