My son Joshua (10) wants to know what it would cost to build a bridge between South Africa and Australia. That’s the third question in the last ten minutes. “I dunno,” I confess, and he replies: “But how much do you think?” I direct him to Google.

There’s just no getting away from young children’s questions. They are naturally inquisitive.

In my university lectures, it’s a different story. Wrapping up, I ask: “Right class, any questions?” Thirty silent seconds pass. “There must be a question. Anything?” More silence, and then a hand goes up. The student asks: “Umm, will this stuff be in the exam?”

That’s not the type of probing question I was hoping for. Children’s insatiable curiosity and search for new knowledge is getting lost somewhere along the way. Where have we mislaid the art of the question?

Seek and ye shall … get impatient?

More and more, children are being told to shut up, take notes and do well in tests. Participation is discouraged. This attitude follows them to university: former Yale professor William Deresiewicz complains in his book Excellent Sheep that “curiosity is dead”.

Deresiewicz believes that even elite schools are simply manufacturing students: they’re smart, they’re driven – but they have no intellectual curiosity. They don’t ask questions.

Former maths teacher and tech guru Dan Meyer agrees. Modern students are “impatient with things that don’t resolve quickly”, says Meyer. He explains:

(They) expect sitcom-sized problems that wrap up in 22 minutes, three commercial breaks and a laugh track.

There’s a strange paradox at work here. We live in an era where information is more freely available and easily accessible than ever before. Learning has, broadly speaking, evolved in three stages. First, knowledge resided in books or was held by experts. Students had to “knock” – to go looking – to find the answers. Then came Google, and with it students learned to “seek” because it was right there at their fingertips.

With the advent of Facebook and other social networks, we’ve entered the era of “ask”. Knowledge resides in the minds of the network, so students can just throw out a question on their Facebook page: “Hey guys, how would you answer this question that our professor set?”

My PhD research traced the impact of this shift by exploring student learning on Facebook. Students don’t read lengthy documents – like academic papers – any longer. They don’t go hunting for answers. They just put a question out to their network, sit back and wait for the answers to come their way.

There’s the paradox: in the online world, asking is ubiquitous. But offline, in spaces like the lecture theatre, asking questions is a dying art.

The quest for the question

There are several ways in which teachers and parents can instil a love of questions that will last a lifetime. Take my son’s bridge question. “Josh,” I say, “that’s a great question. I don’t know the answer but it would be fascinating to find out. I wonder if anyone has ever thought about it? Why don’t you Google it and see what you can find?”

Now the kicker: “And while you’re searching, see if you can figure out what material would have to be used”. He looks at me for a moment, replies "OK”, grabs his phone and starts tapping away. We’re starting with one question and one answer – then going in search of more.

This building curiosity floods the brain with dopamine, which gives kids a positive push to learn and know more.

One recent study suggests that teaching children philosophy and guiding them through questions that lead to more questions has a positive impact on their progress with maths and reading.

For university students – like my silent class – one process of using questions to stimulate critical thinking and idea generation that works well is the Socratic method. This provides a space in class for questions, debates and for students to challenge their teachers and each other – respectfully.

In a research paper about the method, Sharon Jumper says that Socratic discussions are:

… a fantastic tool for educators in the online environment, as they build collaborative learning communities and increase interaction.

This technique is being applied well by a number of websites that flatten traditional classroom power structures. The sites try to encourage learning through questioning. Socrative, for instance, turns learning into a game: students compete through questions and answers.

Other sites like Socratic use gamification and also encourage students to put questions to the online community which has gathered there to learn. This sows the seeds of discussion – and paves the way for more questions.

Technology is a powerful way to get children and students asking questions. Researchers have found that widely available tools like WhatsApp can be used to encourage questions. Even the shyest person can be emboldened to use the messaging service rather than sticking their hand up in front of classmates.

In a world full of questions desperately needing answers, isn’t it high time that we reignited the dying art of asking questions?

Dr. Craig Blewett is an education technology consultant, speaker, author, and developer of the #ACT_ digital-age teaching approach.

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Craig Blewett, University of KwaZulu-Natal

“Also: please note that we NEVER link to Wikipedia,” reads the email about an article for The Conversation Africa. I’m not surprised. The same sentiment is expressed in many course documents at universities and schools.

Wikipedia, the pariah of content resources, is frequently considered an unacceptable and unreliable source of information. It’s critiqued as being “a mish-mash of truth, half truth, and some falsehoods".

But, in 2005, the journal Nature conducted a study comparing the accuracy of Wikipedia to Encyclopedia Britannica. The results showed that the average Wikipedia article had four errors while the average Britannica article had three. A more recent study found that:

Wikipedia fared well in this sample against Encyclopedia Britannica in terms of accuracy, references and overall judgement.

Encyclopedia Britannica reacted strongly to the first study. In 2012, after 244 years, it stopped printing its famous print edition.

What’s important about these studies is not Wikipedia’s accuracy rate. Rather, the research reminds us that all content contains errors.

Shifting technology

Technology has changed the way we document, share and access knowledge. First came the shift from oral learning and communication to text. This meant that knowledge could be thought about carefully before it was recorded and transmitted. Once recorded it could be assessed and discussed even though the originator was not present. This increased the necessity for content to be correct before it was recorded.

Then the printing press was developed. Now written content could be replicated and shared almost without limit. Mistakes would be seen by even wider audiences, so once again correctness became crucial. The job of proofreader was even developed to guard against mistakes.

The next big advancement was the development of the computer. Now content that was recorded could be changed after the fact – a crucial change from paper-based content. Word processors, made popular by office suites like Microsoft Office, became common tools. Text could be cut and pasted, words inserted, deleted or changed, or additional content added. Proofreading was still necessary, but no longer as important. After all, content could be changed at any point in the process.

What word processors were to writing, the Internet became to printing. Now for the first time not only could content be digitally recorded, it could be shared almost without cost or limit. The explosion of content across billions of websites bears testimony to this.

We’ve always been correcting

As the research comparing Wikipedia to the Encyclopedia Britannica shows, even printed content has errors. But before digital media, we deemed content to be correct simply because the feedback loop was much slower and not as obvious. The errors in those encyclopedias were corrected in subsequent editions – and, invariably, new ones would be introduced and have to be corrected in another edition down the line.

In academia, published research would eventually be read and critiqued. This would spark new research that improved on what was previously deemed as correct.

All of our scientific development and writing, at a meta level, has essentially been a huge wiki experience. Content evolves and improves as people read and add to it. So our disdain for wiki-type, correcting spaces is essentially a rejection of the process we’ve been undertaking for centuries. The main differences now are that the correcting cycle is far quicker and many more people have input.

From content to conversation

I’ve written this article as a process born of my modern technologies. I wrote a draft without being concerned about grammar or exact phrasing, because I knew I’d return to it later. Most important was the capturing of ideas and arguments. Even these were only partially formed and after each reading some were added while others were discarded.

The process of correcting continued until the piece was complete. Complete, but not correct – because this is itself just another voice in the conversation that is correcting as we continue. This is just a wiki of voices filled with content that is surely incorrect but right in our desire to keep improving.

We need to shift our conceptions of content. We need to shift our ideas of “correct”. We need to embrace an era where everything is in beta. Everything is correcting. Everything is in conversation. Wikipedia is the ultimate exemplar of such a space. Already, teachers are showing how effective it can be as a tool for learning once we change our perspective. It shatters the illusion of perfection and encourages creativity and critical thinking.

Our attempts to ban students (and writers) from using these modern digital spaces will inevitably fail. And, in the meantime, it will rob us of the opportunity to engage in conversation, rather than blind content consumption. Let the conversation continue.

Craig Blewett is Senior Lecturer in Education & Technology at University of KwaZulu-Natal.

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Peter Ellerton, The University of Queensland

One of the most desirable characteristics of school graduates is that they can think critically. This helps them individually and also helps the societies in which they will play a role. It’s a game in which no one loses. So why is it so difficult to achieve?

Teaching critical thinking is not something that teachers are explicitly trained to do – in fact very few people are. Nor does the curriculum generally demand it. Too often an instructing syllabus focuses on the recall of content, and this in turn forms the basis for assessment.

Standardised testing

In standardised assessment in particular it is simply cheaper and quicker to algorithmically mark multiple-choice questions than it is to read and assess nuanced responses showing an advanced use of cognitive skills.

South Africa has a standardised system including a highly regulated matriculation programme and national testing that together act as the barometer of good schooling. But there is some debate as to how effectively these kinds of tests measure the outcomes of an education in critical thinking, let alone their value as an educational device.

People often define a rigorous course as one that is heavy in content. This is misleading. Intellectual rigour lies in the sophisticated use of a range of cognitive critical thinking skills such as analysis, justification, synthesis and evaluation. Recalling content or demonstrating algorithmic procedures makes up only a small part of this.

The desire to teach to the test at the expense of skills not measured by them is a universal characteristic of standardised testing. The danger is that if critical thinking is not explicitly assessed, it will not be valued and therefore not taught.

The South African context

None of this is unique to South Africa, but several things make the problem more acute.

The first is that the country’s teacher workforce is not well monitored and there are significant shortages in many regions.

Attendance in South African schools is generally high but some schools are struggling to provide continuity of learning because of problems with student attendance and engagement.

A stated objective of the relatively new CAPS curriculum in South Africa is to develop critical thinking. This is an important step in the right direction, though a strategy needs to be developed for how this can be achieved.

I recently spoke to a number of schools throughout the country as a guest of Thinking Schools South Africa (TSSA), a non-profit organisation encouraging and resourcing the teaching of effective thinking in schools.

Faced with these problems, TSSA has developed several principles that seem, to this international observer, quite effective. These principles (the phrasing is mine) include:

• a commitment to work collaboratively with local and international universities, academics, schools, teachers, communities and other relevant bodies including government organisations;

• adopting a broad theoretical approach that is informed by and inclusive of existing successful practice;

• driving systemic change that makes learning visible and goes beyond the “tips and tricks” mentality found too often in educational environments; and,

• a commitment to teachers and schools that includes ongoing training and resourcing over a well defined developmental cycle.

This is intended to produce sustainable, whole-school transformation through globally tried and tested methodologies involving local communities of practice. TSSA-affiliated schools and teachers become part of the TSSA Network to support and train others.

There are many advantages available to students who can think critically. One significant but overlooked advantage is that it develops resilience.

Students who have an ability to think their way through problems, a confidence in their ability to do so, and who can apply critical thinking skills to understand their circumstances and explore options open to them are more likely to successfully navigate through their school years.

Within the context of South Africa’s complex social and economic challenges and opportunities, resilience is likely to be a vital virtue.

Teaching critical thinking

There are a variety of approaches to developing courses in critical thinking though it’s preferable that critical thinking pedagogies are used in the delivery of all subjects. In this comprehensive model, students are taught the explicit skills of thinking as they learn their discipline knowledge.

But as teaching Mathematics, Science or English is not just about knowing the subject matter but knowing how to teach that subject matter (called pedagogical content knowledge), so too the teaching of critical thinking is about more than just knowing some useful thinking tools.

It’s not enough to know about critical thinking, you have to know how to teach for it. It’s difficult to create students who are critical thinkers without teachers who are critical thinkers.

Teaching someone to surf by just handing them a surfboard seems less than optimal, as does teaching students to think by simply delivering worksheets. Without knowing what to do with them, without an insight into their purpose and function, goals falls short of being realised.

In the case of surfing, it also helps to have a beach. In critical thinking, it’s about the community - social, educational and institutional.

This is the advantage of the TSSA approach, and all approaches that focus on working collaboratively and inclusively to build capacity in schools, teachers and communities for sustainable and effective teaching and learning.

Like a language, critical thinking is not something you can learn alone. The best way to produce a critically thinking student is from within a critical thinking community.

Peter Ellerton is Lecturer in Critical Thinking at The University of Queensland.

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Outdated teaching methods will blunt technology's power

Craig Blewett, University of KwaZulu-Natal

The man who runs state education in South Africa’s richest province has no time for old-fashioned classroom accessories. In January, Panyaza Lesufi, who heads the education portfolio in the Gauteng province, told journalists at Boitumelong Secondary School just outside Johannesburg:

I’m signing the death warrant of the chalk, duster and chalkboard in Gauteng. We are moving on with the times and we are moving to better things.

Lesufi was at the school to promote the Big Switch On pilot, a project in which pupils are given tablets loaded with textbooks and their schools receive interactive whiteboards. “You will never accuse me of failure to deliver textbooks,” he said. “You will now accuse me of failure to download.”

But is making technology available to schools without adapting curricula or teaching methods to a digital platform actually worthwhile?

The trouble with copy-pasting

According to John Hedberg from the Australian Centre for Educational Studies, e-learning can only be successful if there is a “revolutionary move away from replicating traditional classroom-based teaching practices”.

At the heart of Hedberg’s critique is the idea of skeuomorphism, which is keeping the form of the old but discarding its function. Think of smart phone cameras that “click” like a DSLR camera or pages in an e-book reader that “curl” as they are turned – just like a paper book. Thanks to Hollywood star Tom Hanks you can even make your laptop’s keyboard sound like a quaint old typewriter.

Technology giants like Apple, Google and Microsoft have all used skeuomorphic designs to soften the transition from old technologies to new.

These features don’t have any functional value but their resemblance to forms of the past gives users a sense of comfort and familiarity.

Tablets and smart whiteboard won’t magically make pupils smarter unless teachers know how to use the devices properly and in a way that encourages learning. When Brandon Martinez and his colleagues from the University of Southern California started training teachers to use educational technology, they looked to the aviation industry for inspiration. Writing about their experiences, Martinez said:

To increase instructor skills, we borrowed a technique from airline pilot training – simulators. Teaching in a virtual classroom requires knowing the basics of the technology and being ready to adjust … We watched each other teach and practised new approaches, testing what captured student interest.

Success story

In 2011, Clintondale High School in Michigan became the global poster child for “flipped” classrooms. This is an exciting example of how educational technology can change teaching and learning if it is properly used and doesn’t just become a copy-paste substitute for old methods.

A flipped classroom inverts traditional teaching methods. “Lectures” happen after hours, usually at home – students watch instructional videos at their own pace.

During formal class time, students are given activities that help them engage with concepts. Rather than just standing in front of the class and reading from a textbook or tablet – what some theorists call the “sage on the stage” model – teachers become “guides on the side”, available to answer questions and lead discussions.

Clintondale High’s combination of new technology and radically different teaching methods has pushed up its pass rates, improved discipline and seen more of its students securing college places.

The educational technology boom isn’t limited to the developed world. It is growing rapidly in countries like India and Brazil. If teachers are exposed to new digital teaching approaches, and given the space to experiment with technology, we can begin to produce a whole new generation of pupils: those who think and create and not those who just sit in classrooms waiting to be told what they should do or know.

Avoiding the white elephant syndrome

In August 2013, the Los Angeles Unified School District launched a US$1 billion project designed to make its schools high-tech havens. A month later, officials discovered that nearly 300 students at one high school had hacked through security and were using their district-issued iPads to surf the Web rather than study.

Then, in April 2015, it emerged that a digital curriculum developed by publishers Pearson and loaded onto pupils' iPads as part of the district’s ambitious project was simply “unusable”. Critics complained that the project had been rushed from conception to execution far too quickly and without any proper planning.

Why wasn’t the technology pre-tested by the teachers who were expected to use it every day? Technology companies may understand the mechanics of their products, but it’s teachers who understand teaching and who must be involved in making those products more than just electronic white elephants in the classroom.

Craig Blewett is Senior Lecturer in Education & Technology at University of KwaZulu-Natal.

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.