Howard Gardner does it again!!! He always brings relevant messages.
Within chapter 2, many ideas/quotes rang true and made me think. To keep from writing a dissertation, I will simply list a few quotes and comment.
"I believe it is essential for individuals of the future to be able to think in the ways that characterize the major disciplines (p. 31)".
-One of the biggest issues in education is that many of our students lack the ability to think. Students merely want us as educators to tell them what they should know and then allow them to regergitate it on assessments. Makes me think of education as the banking analogy - we educators merely deposit the knowledge and make withdrawls. Not real learning!!
-Question - Sometimes I feel the American education creates this problem. Our system tends to stiffle creativity as early as kindergarten. What do you think?
- The second portion of that qoute leads me to reflect on a conversation my son and I had a few days ago. I was telling him how I belive if a peron is strong in math and science, they will typically fuction better in life than poeple who aren't. Moreso, people who have mathematical and science minds. I believe this because these are typically the thinkers and the people whom are good at problem solving (life is problem solving); thus they are more equipped to handle whatever mey come their way. What do you all think?
How to achieve a disciplined mind . . . 2. Spend a significant amount of time on this topic. If it is worth studying, it is worth studying deeply, over a significant period of time, using a variety of examples and modes of analysis (p. 33)".
- Would someone please pass this message on to TEA!!!!! We have too many TEKS and standards and not enough time to cover the material. Thanks Gardner!!!
"In the future, individuals must learn to synthesize knowledge and how to extend it in new and unfamilar ways (p. 44)".
-My PreAP kids struggle with this the most. They often complain my tests are not over what we have covered in class or in the homework. I continue to explain to them the tests are over what we have covered. The tests comprise higher order thinking questions which test them on the application of the basic concepts. Based on Gardner, in order to adequately prepare our students for the future, we need to teach them how to apply their knowledge across disciplines, teach them such that the knowledge is fluid and teach them how to THINK!
Scitists end mathematicians are certainly good at solving problems of a certain type, where the data is available or can be theorized. We owe to them so many of the advances that have made like good for us all. On the other hand, we owe a lot to the dreamers, the visionaries, the creators of song and dance and art. Didn't God do a good job of designing a world where all of us have contributions to make?
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ReplyDeleteYour last comment sounds so familiar. My daughter studied for her history quiz, and I asked her how it went after school. She did not do well on it because "the test did not look like the review." I tried to explain to her that the information was the same she just had to apply it in different ways. (She did not appreciate my reasoning about it). You are so right that our education system is not supporting our children in synthesizing thinking. In his book, Learning as a Way of Being, Peter Vaill(1996)also noted that "institutional learning philosophy and practice" inhibits students from thinking in a synthesizing, systems-minded way (p. 104).
I can understand and agree to a point. We used to constantly drill teachers to teach to the higher end, but when assessments teach to the middle and do not require synthesis of the information......until assessment meets with the expectation of HIGH and to the RIGHT, we will continue to see students who are wanting to be able to "regurgitate" information, because for the most part we aren't teaching to mastery - we are skimming the information to mark the checks in the boxes and to meet the timeline of teaching necessary information.
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