Theory of Education: Lecture v. In-Class Activities v. Independent Study

[r3volution 3.0]

I'm of the view that people learn best through independent study, specifically by reading, but this runs contrary to prevailing theories of education, which emphasize the need for student-teacher (or student-student) interaction. This latter school of thought is the source of the obsession with student-teacher ratios and of the increasing use of in-class "activities" in lieu of the traditional lecture. I'd call that fluff, with very little educational value, which serves primarily to justify astronomical and ever-increasing educational costs, driven by over-staffed schools. But the traditional lecture format is also flawed. It's a relic of the medieval period, when - before the advent of the printing press - books were extremely expensive, and so it was economical for a professor to read a book, with or without adding his own commentary, to an audience, contra each student purchasing his own copy. This system was obsolete with the advent of cheaply printed paper books, not to mention the ebook and the internet. If reading is truly the essence of education, there is no need for "classes" at all, and the cost of education can be reduced to virtually nothing.

So, we can think of three categories of education:

1. The traditional, lecture-based class
2. The new age activities-based class
3. Independent study, with no class at all

Which method do you favor?

Vote and comment.

*N.B. I'm proposing the abolition of "class" only for non-hands-on subjects like history or math, contra e.g. spoken languages or lab chemistry

[PierzStyx]

Needs a new choice: All of them.

All of them activate different parts of the brain and build more neural connections to the areas of the brain that specific information is stored in. The more connections, the more ways someone knows something, the better.

[specsaregood]

Needs a new choice: All of them.

All of them activate different parts of the brain and build more neural connections to the areas of the brain that specific information is stored in. The more connections, the more ways someone knows something, the better.

Indeed and people learn differently.

[r3volution 3.0]

To add a little meat to the bones, what would you say to the following method:

There's still a teacher, but his job in neither to lecture nor drink coffee while the students gossip while trying to look busy do an in-class activity. Rather, his job would be to (a) assign readings based on his expertise in the subject, (b) moderate an online forum, where students could ask questions or discuss things among themselves [I expect we here would agree this is a good format for the exchange of ideas], and (c) create and grade whatever assessments he thinks are appropriate (exams, essays, etc).

What's cut out is class time itself, as well as the pure waste that is the time going to/from class or doing related administrative tasks. The teacher:student ratio would be much lower, with the result that costs would be lower and/or the school could pay higher salaries per teacher, to obtain better teachers. And of course the time not spent in class makes possible more reading, lengthier/more complex reading assignments from the teacher. For instance, instead of 3 hours in-class and 6 hours of independent reading, you would have 9 hours of independent reading.

[not.your.average.joe]

*N.B. I'm proposing the abolition of "class" only for non-hands-on subjects like history or math, contra e.g. spoken languages or lab chemistry

As a student at a vocational education school, in class (and especially hands on) activities are more helpful in learning. I can't become a good ACAD drafter without practice.
In math, independent study is most helpful. Lectures are boring and learning does not take place.
My history teacher teaches most like the example in your second post. Readings assigned every night, a lot of debate and conversation in class, all grades are either tests, pop quizzes, or presentations.

[DamianTV]

Return to the Trivium.

Standard Education today has nothing to do with learning. What has happened is the Logic portion of learning has been fully eliminated. The Trivium is how we learn. It has three parts which puts the Tri in Trivium. Input, Logic, Output. Logic has been fully eliminated, and as long as the elite control the way information is presented, you will never have a Trivium in Public Schools.

The Trivium: Input -> Logic -> Output
Education: Input -> Output

What people are seeing as a typical solution is the Illusion of Choice. They do not care how people are educated so long as the end result is that people do not practice the application of Logic to find solutions. So lets spell it out clearly. Also notice that I do not use the word Learning in place of Education.

• Choice A - Retain the old ways of Education such as Lectures, which are known to not stimulate the application of Logic
• Choice B - Change the ways of Education partly by abandoning Lectures, in which the new way does not stimulate the application of Logic

Either choice does not cause people to apply Logic, thus, making a choice between one or the other, while not being given an option to encourage the application of Logic is meaningless.

We all learn in different ways. Different subjects also require the information to be presented in different ways as well. All of our efforts to "fix education" may be well intentioned, but we are creatures of habit and tend to perform what we have already seen instead of going off of the trodden path and taking big chances when we explore completely new ways, some of which are bound to fail. That failure is critically important as we do learn that the efforts that have been made did not result in what we wanted. We learn that something does not work. But that in and of itself does not cause application of Logic simply by allowing failure, so even this solution is self defining as how not to help students to truly learn through the Trivium.

I think perhaps the best solution is to ask the right questions. How do we cause people to apply Logic? Perhaps a better method is by displaying failure and NOT by providing the solution, then asking students to apply what they know about how something doesnt work and use that to arrive an inescapable conclusion that can only be achieved by the application of Logic? Perhaps that is a better question? A question that also can be improved upon?

Since even this idea needs to fail to understand how to arrive at a conclusion that works, I have to present this idea with an unbiased self perspective and invite challenges to the idea.

[Ender]

How about a system where students are allowed to pursue the things they have actual interest in.

When someone becomes good in one subject they become much more interested in others, their brains are more connected & they begin to love to learn.

[r3volution 3.0]

As a student at a vocational education school, in class (and especially hands on) activities are more helpful in learning. I can't become a good ACAD drafter without practice.
In math, independent study is most helpful. Lectures are boring and learning does not take place.
My history teacher teaches most like the example in your second post. Readings assigned every night, a lot of debate and conversation in class, all grades are either tests, pop quizzes, or presentations.

QED

[Original_Intent]

How about a system where students are allowed to pursue the things they have actual interest in.

When someone becomes good in one subject they become much more interested in others, their brains are more connected & they begin to love to learn.

Yeah I think this is true. I do think there is something to be said for self-guided learning, and so I think independent study is the best answer. BUT...

From my own experience, I do see some advantages to at least a smidge of the other two options. I little bit of directed study can open up areas of interest for self guided study, but left completely on my own I likely would not have been interested enough to gain that basic knowledge that led to other things that I was surprised and pleased to find myself interested in.

There's also something to be said for similarly learning to do things with your hands that you might not be inclined to try on your own for whatever reason. Same as the above, sometimes I have found both and interest and something I had some natural talent at which surprised me.

I would definitely put it at something like 80% self directed, 10% lectures on something not necessarily of my choosing, and 10% of learning a skill, art, etc.

Of course, you could say that me making those choices is ALL self directed (i.e. at this stage of my life I see the value of being exposed to things) but maybe others would feel different, and shouldn't be forced to do things my way.