The history of education contains a fair few innovations, and more than its fair share of shortcomings. However, the concept of ‘modern education’ is in itself a vague and potentially misleading term, as it presupposes that education methods of the past have less value than those that exist today.
According to A Brief Guide to Online Courses, written by Matt Crosslin, the theoretical foundations of education exist on two axis, which he terms “power dynamics” and “methodology.”
The power dynamic ranges from “Instructivism,” where the teacher is assumed to have absolute knowledge of the subjuct, to “Connectivism,” where learners are expected to create ways of knowing through dialogue with each other. In these definitions, both cases are taken as logical extremes, as in reality neither is completely possible, but they provide a means to identify ways of education in absolute relationship to each other. Naturally, any individual course will have moments that fall at different points along the spectrum. One such example of this is a professor spending several classes in the “Instructivism” mindset in order to provide a theoretical framework for the students, before transitioning into a “Connectivism” mindset where the students take the information and expand upon it based on their own experiances, sharing it with each other and effectively becoming teachers in their own right for a time.
Meanwhile, the methodology ranges from “Pedagogy,” where the teacher has control over the information distributed to the class, to “Heutagogy” where the teacher focuses on how to learn, rather than what to learn. Like the power dynamic, these exist as the ends of a spectrum, and both spectrums together serve to illustrate the education possibilities. There are power dynamics that are unlikely to combine with some methodologies, as Crosslin notes chapter 2:
Instructivist Heutagogy
Probably a very unlikely design to attempt, but this would basically be an expert sharing information about where to learn about a topic. Contains mostly lists of resources and professional communities that learners can join into to learn more, as well as instructions on how to best interact with resources and communities.
Of the combinations of methodologies and power dynamics that he notes within his book, the most common of them is what he refers to as “Instructive Pedagogy,” which can be found in almost every grade school and high school in the western world, as well as a number of other education systems around the world. He defines it as “formal learning that depends on the instructor to dispense knowledge that is new to learners. Focused on content, video, Standardized tests, papers, and instructor-guided discussions.” This style of teaching seeks to transfer knowledge, but often ends up transferring facts without understanding of what they mean. It is also often the least engaging form of education, where students sit at desks and take notes about what the teacher says, are assigned homework, and are expected to complete it to the professors standards. These tests are usually multiple choice, although there may be essays, in which students include facts they have been taught, which they often parrot without understanding behind the meaning of the words they write. Furthermore, teachers are able to punish children for disrupting class, which further highlights the uneven power dynamic.
It is often not until University that classes teach how to think. Rote memorization can only go so far in an academic setting, and knowing how a certain field thinks about itself, and the general mindset that it requires for success is paramount. However, this mindset of how to think isn’t exclusive to academe, as this method of knowledge transmission is common amoung trade schools, as well as First Peoples.
Technology also opens up “when” as a question of learning. Before the advent of the internet, teaching could only take place in person, and those who were unable to attend might perhaps be able to read what was taught (if they could read at all,) or watch a static recording of what was said. With technology, learning opportunities have increased alongside the complexity of knowledge. This means that tools for learning must be developed in order to take advantage of this. These tools might come in the form of VR programs, a la Star Treck, or be interactive games, or even come in the form of Wikipedias detailing knowledge on a specific subject, that allows the learner to develop their own skills, even in the absence of a defined teacher. Even seeing the beginnings of these technologies, I am unable to predict where they will go from here. As Sarah Williams writes in her poem:
He may know the law of all things, yet be ignorant of how
We are working to completion, working on from then to now.