As many of you know, I spent 5 years trying to pass a bunch of teacher qualification so I could one day be a lecturer at MIT.
It should have taken 2.
And while I [eventually] passed and have done the odd lesson here and there, the reality is I find the whole thing very difficult.
Part of that is because I’m a bit thick, part of that is because the students I’ve worked with are ridiculously smart [one is 21 and re-engineering the pace maker for fucks sake] … but the other part is that so much of the ‘higher education industry’ seems to be focused on teaching, rather than on helping students learn.
Of course, both of those are interconnected, but for me, it’s about the core motivation.
If it’s about ‘teaching’ … then your focus is communicating the curriculum within the time allowed.
If it’s about ‘learning’ … then your focus is on enabling the students to grasp concepts that they can then use with their own free will.
I am absolutely in the latter camp, which is why I’ve found MIT a bit of a struggle and why I’ve found The Kennedys such a joy.
Of course it doesn’t help there are systems in place where the students ‘grade’ the teacher.
Seriously, how stupid is that?
I appreciate there’s some bad teachers out there, but to give students the authority to pass judgement based on their experience is ridiculous.
Of course, in a perfect world they would be able to do this objectively, but as we all know, so much commentary these days is from a subjective point of view so you could be a great teacher who is given a bad grade by students simply because you didn’t give them the grades they desired because they didn’t warrant them.
Now I’ve made a distinction between higher education and more junior – but that’s not to say they don’t suffer the same issues – but the reason I write this is because of that article at the top of this post.
Despite the author inferring they found it educational and inspirational, I’m not sure that approach would be allowed today.
I appreciate it is fairly radical, but handled correctly, it not only helps students learn, but it opens a debate that would help them truly understand.
To me, that is what education is about …
Giving students the tools to challenge, destroy and liberate stuff … because if we don’t give them that, what hope has society to move forward, let alone stand up against those who wish to do us harm?