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woolymonkeyThis is so spot on that I went to listen again and transcribe it.
One of the problems is that we have poured so much time into trying to make sure that children look as though they're achieving more that we've not been prepared to say how do children actually learn? And one of the answers in that you have to enthuse them for their learning. You can't make them think, as they so often do in school, "What I'm learning here isn't interesting. I mustn't read around the subject in case I put the wrong answer in the exam. The only thing that matters is getting the right test result."
Jenny Russell on Today this morning (2hrs 43 minutes in, if you want to hear the whole thing.)
This is exactly what we've seen with the monkey boys education at secondary school. Sadly we're still seeing it with Science A Levels at sixth form. It's not such a problem for squirrel because he has the kind of brain that is good at understanding and at exam technique. Mugging up the definitions comes easily and doesn't waste much of his time. For spider, who's dyslexic, it's a huge energy drain that takes time away from real learning, and puts him off further study.
I'm not saying all bright kids are harmed by this. Squirrel can laugh at the notion that using the word, lexis, in an English answer get you bonus marks , write a thoughtful essay with the word dropped in for fun, and have time over to take a photo of his marked script with a red tick by lexis before the teacher has even seen the rest of the sentence. The extra challenge of playing the system to score marks only adds to his enjoyment, because it's easy for him.
But it seems pretty clear we are doing education doubly wrong by teaching to tests that test the wrong things.
Why else would spidermonkey, who understands chemistry and physics, have to sit and practise rote learning cards with me, who understand not one word of it? It's not enough that he understands the processes and can do the formulae: he has to use the right key words in his definitions or he won't get the marks. I have only the haziest idea what heterolytic bond fission is (and only because spider has helped me). However, I do have a good memory for quotations, so I can get full marks for defining it: Just watch me.
Heterolytic bond fission is the breaking of a covalent bond asymmetrically so that both the bonding electrons go to the same atom. Ta da!
Spider could tell you when and why heterolytic bond fission happens and what makes it different or similar to other ways atoms join or separate. He could give examples and draw diagrams to show what's going on inside the atoms. But he might not remember to use the word 'asymmetrically' (and he'd almost certainly spell it wrong) or he might forget to specify that the electron he's talking about is a bonding electron, or that it's a covalent bond. Any of these will cost him marks. He might actually score zero for his definition of a process he understands. Seriously. The mark schemes specify things like "the word, perpendicular, must be used and spelled correctly or no marks can be given".
The reason he forgets to mention the type of bond or electron it isn't that he doesn't know, it's that he thinks it's too obvious to need stating. He understands the process well enough to know that it can't be any other kind of electron or any other kind of bond. Even once he realises that he has to state the obvious, he has trouble knowing where to stop. Should he also explain what the electron is doing in an atom in the first place? His understanding of science is actually costing him marks. Sure, he could compensate if he was better at verbal memory and good old rote learning. He does compensate by working hard. And, yes, there are other marks for the hard stuff, which he does get. But his revision time and energy have to be concentrated on rote learning the wording to avoid losing marks for things he knows.
This in not a criticism of his college or his teachers. As far as I can see, lessons are interesting and spider does well in them because he is enthused and he does "get it". But so often the grades he gets in exams don't reflect that, and the things he needs to do to improve those grades actually go against what he should be learning.
One of the problems is that we have poured so much time into trying to make sure that children look as though they're achieving more that we've not been prepared to say how do children actually learn? And one of the answers in that you have to enthuse them for their learning. You can't make them think, as they so often do in school, "What I'm learning here isn't interesting. I mustn't read around the subject in case I put the wrong answer in the exam. The only thing that matters is getting the right test result."
Jenny Russell on Today this morning (2hrs 43 minutes in, if you want to hear the whole thing.)
This is exactly what we've seen with the monkey boys education at secondary school. Sadly we're still seeing it with Science A Levels at sixth form. It's not such a problem for squirrel because he has the kind of brain that is good at understanding and at exam technique. Mugging up the definitions comes easily and doesn't waste much of his time. For spider, who's dyslexic, it's a huge energy drain that takes time away from real learning, and puts him off further study.
I'm not saying all bright kids are harmed by this. Squirrel can laugh at the notion that using the word, lexis, in an English answer get you bonus marks , write a thoughtful essay with the word dropped in for fun, and have time over to take a photo of his marked script with a red tick by lexis before the teacher has even seen the rest of the sentence. The extra challenge of playing the system to score marks only adds to his enjoyment, because it's easy for him.
But it seems pretty clear we are doing education doubly wrong by teaching to tests that test the wrong things.
Why else would spidermonkey, who understands chemistry and physics, have to sit and practise rote learning cards with me, who understand not one word of it? It's not enough that he understands the processes and can do the formulae: he has to use the right key words in his definitions or he won't get the marks. I have only the haziest idea what heterolytic bond fission is (and only because spider has helped me). However, I do have a good memory for quotations, so I can get full marks for defining it: Just watch me.
Heterolytic bond fission is the breaking of a covalent bond asymmetrically so that both the bonding electrons go to the same atom. Ta da!
Spider could tell you when and why heterolytic bond fission happens and what makes it different or similar to other ways atoms join or separate. He could give examples and draw diagrams to show what's going on inside the atoms. But he might not remember to use the word 'asymmetrically' (and he'd almost certainly spell it wrong) or he might forget to specify that the electron he's talking about is a bonding electron, or that it's a covalent bond. Any of these will cost him marks. He might actually score zero for his definition of a process he understands. Seriously. The mark schemes specify things like "the word, perpendicular, must be used and spelled correctly or no marks can be given".
The reason he forgets to mention the type of bond or electron it isn't that he doesn't know, it's that he thinks it's too obvious to need stating. He understands the process well enough to know that it can't be any other kind of electron or any other kind of bond. Even once he realises that he has to state the obvious, he has trouble knowing where to stop. Should he also explain what the electron is doing in an atom in the first place? His understanding of science is actually costing him marks. Sure, he could compensate if he was better at verbal memory and good old rote learning. He does compensate by working hard. And, yes, there are other marks for the hard stuff, which he does get. But his revision time and energy have to be concentrated on rote learning the wording to avoid losing marks for things he knows.
This in not a criticism of his college or his teachers. As far as I can see, lessons are interesting and spider does well in them because he is enthused and he does "get it". But so often the grades he gets in exams don't reflect that, and the things he needs to do to improve those grades actually go against what he should be learning.
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no subject
Date: 2013-04-19 11:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-04-19 06:19 pm (UTC)Some comes from the pressure on teachers. It's hard to teach someone to think. Impossible if they don't want to. Much easier to teach them tricks that will earn marks. Happily the course I teach now don't lend themselves to such short cuts--or at least there is some real education involved in acquiring the tricks. GCSE and A level seem to be less well-designed.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-19 12:00 pm (UTC)The OU is actually fairly good at using psychology research to inform their teaching methods. But it doesn't happen in schools.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-19 06:27 pm (UTC)When I did teacher training we got no psychology at all, except a few things that are very specific to language learning.
School seems very intolerant of people whose minds don't fit the standard pattern.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-19 02:28 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-04-19 06:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-04-19 05:43 pm (UTC){Warning - middle aged 'young people today' rant coming up.) Is it just me who finds the current generation of teenagers incredibly childlike? At 17, I was already paying my own rent, wage slaving for England and generally sorting out my own problems and making my own (mostly bad but who cares?) decisions. I don't remember being - or any of my friends being - like the hyper-anxious, dependent uber-narcissists I too frequently meet in my work. (Like the young lady in one of this morning's lessons, who - seriously! - wanted me to pause the lesson to photocopy a handout she was missing...) Actually lots of them are sweeties, and many more mature than I am. But way too many princesses (of both sexes). Or is this just a Cambridge thing?
no subject
Date: 2013-04-19 06:15 pm (UTC)Actually, I think it's an artefact of the pressure kids, families and schools are under to get those shiny grades. And you only see the ones with the shiniest.
Mind you, the ones I teach don't always want to think for themselves either, but those that don't will go to the internet to download however many bytes they feel the assignment requires. I very rarely meet princesses, though I do spend a lot of my contact time dealing with anxiety. It's generally of the 'please can you reassure me my assignment isn't total rubbish?' or the young man who admitted he'd missed a deadline because he'd started drinking again and just stopped bothering. (He's back on track now to pass the course.) The ones that annoy me are the ones who send me emails asking me to answer questions so obvious that I have anticipated and already sent out an email with the answer - but apparently they don't read anything sent to the whole group.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-19 07:28 pm (UTC)It's true, and very depressing, that so much of our contact time is spent on anxiety management. I'm trying to reassure people who've been told for 16 years that no shiny grades means you don't get to have a life. I want to shoot the people who promulgate this life-destroying nonsense - and I really do think there are more of them in Cambridge than the average. But we do get the offended vanity cases too. An short life filled with an uninterrupted flow of shiny grades makes for a bad case of withdrawal when they meet difficulty.
Have a good weekend. You'll like this:
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Mgn12dHOitM/T9HgnH_vezI/AAAAAAAAAB8/ukfkpCXJtfQ/s1600/9.jpg