The costs of education are astronomical - and rising.
Jobs lost to automation, a hot topic in the past century, have been lost for centuries. There once was a job "purifier" in old England and other countries wherein the job holder would collect animal feces and sell them to tanneries. Until the 1920's (horse) harness makers made a good living. Then came cars. Until the 1960's there was the job of elevator operator. No longer as the vast majority of elevators are now automatic. There are hundreds of examples. Large categories of jobs have been lost only in the past few decades. Consider
Many are no more or a shadow of their former prominence. What is the reason for these changes? Technology is one reason and it figures high. Some jobs just disappear because they were no longer needed. Equally important is the cost of these jobs as compared with the reduced cost of technology to do them about as well, in some cases better. Well, I guess we all know this.
Our mission in this note is toward education, traditional versus online education. The case-in-point is the current fad of the "flipped" classroom. This means the student learns the material online while class time is dedicated to problem solving. Flipped is a good term, because it completely displaces the traditional role of the teacher as the "agent of knowledge transfer." It is an admission that the knowledge transfer process is not working well enough to sustain continuation. Why? Because with the traditional model our students are unable to solve problems - as evident by international tests. The PISA test comes to mind.
It may not be necessary to support fully trained teachers to do problem solving sessions, if all the learning, i.e. knowledge transfer, has become online. Teacher aides, a lower cost work force, can do these tasks. The outrageously (astronomical) high costs of education are among primary drivers for this trend. Many students simply do not need the stand-up teacher and relate far more successfully to a very high quality online presentation that can, incidentally, be reviewed multiple times. Look at just a few examples.
The flipped classroom, signaled and even hailed by educators as "the" future for successful instruction, seems to serve as the camel's nose under the tent toward the automation of teaching.
Final note. The flipped classroom is currently in competition with discovery learning, wherein the teacher acts as a facilitator for learning. Even though it is billed as student-centered, this constructivist pedagogy is fully teacher intensive, asking them to teach in a manner beyond their own learning experience, both in the schools and college. It asks teachers to be so fully engaged in their craft that they read and react to the most subtle events in their classrooms, that they sense the learning issues of their individual students, and that they have the skills to do so. Make no doubt, even though discovery learning advocates independent student centered learning, teaching as a facilitator is far more challenging that merely giving daily presentations. Very rarely are constructivist teaching principles taught by the same; they are usually taught by the traditional lecture methods.
Jobs lost to automation, a hot topic in the past century, have been lost for centuries. There once was a job "purifier" in old England and other countries wherein the job holder would collect animal feces and sell them to tanneries. Until the 1920's (horse) harness makers made a good living. Then came cars. Until the 1960's there was the job of elevator operator. No longer as the vast majority of elevators are now automatic. There are hundreds of examples. Large categories of jobs have been lost only in the past few decades. Consider
Auto Plant Assembly Workers
Factory Jobs
Farming
Telephone Operators
Cashiers
Tollbooth Collectors
Many are no more or a shadow of their former prominence. What is the reason for these changes? Technology is one reason and it figures high. Some jobs just disappear because they were no longer needed. Equally important is the cost of these jobs as compared with the reduced cost of technology to do them about as well, in some cases better. Well, I guess we all know this.
Our mission in this note is toward education, traditional versus online education. The case-in-point is the current fad of the "flipped" classroom. This means the student learns the material online while class time is dedicated to problem solving. Flipped is a good term, because it completely displaces the traditional role of the teacher as the "agent of knowledge transfer." It is an admission that the knowledge transfer process is not working well enough to sustain continuation. Why? Because with the traditional model our students are unable to solve problems - as evident by international tests. The PISA test comes to mind.
It may not be necessary to support fully trained teachers to do problem solving sessions, if all the learning, i.e. knowledge transfer, has become online. Teacher aides, a lower cost work force, can do these tasks. The outrageously (astronomical) high costs of education are among primary drivers for this trend. Many students simply do not need the stand-up teacher and relate far more successfully to a very high quality online presentation that can, incidentally, be reviewed multiple times. Look at just a few examples.
- DVD language learning
- DVD math and science tutorials
- Webinars on assorted topics
- Training videos
The flipped classroom, signaled and even hailed by educators as "the" future for successful instruction, seems to serve as the camel's nose under the tent toward the automation of teaching.
Final note. The flipped classroom is currently in competition with discovery learning, wherein the teacher acts as a facilitator for learning. Even though it is billed as student-centered, this constructivist pedagogy is fully teacher intensive, asking them to teach in a manner beyond their own learning experience, both in the schools and college. It asks teachers to be so fully engaged in their craft that they read and react to the most subtle events in their classrooms, that they sense the learning issues of their individual students, and that they have the skills to do so. Make no doubt, even though discovery learning advocates independent student centered learning, teaching as a facilitator is far more challenging that merely giving daily presentations. Very rarely are constructivist teaching principles taught by the same; they are usually taught by the traditional lecture methods.
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