Last Updated on 2024/10/22 by BrieferBob
Education Evolution Re-defining Educational Process
Some would say the failure of deeply entrenched traditional educators adapting to this change is crippling education. As a result, preparing today’s college freshmen for the writing challenges they will face on the collegiate level isn’t happening!
First of all, it seems like the traditional view of our defined understanding of what education is and how we perceive it is changing. Online learning opportunities like ed2go affords everyone the possibility of learning just about anything. Pimsleur is where you can learn a new language. And grammar apps are changing the way we learn how to write. When it comes to children, educator resources like ABCmouse, and Reading Eggs are having an impact on the way kids learn today. Without question, education is going through an evolutionary change.
What is Education?
I’m not attempting to change your own perspective on what education should or shouldn’t be. Aside from the fact that I posses a Bachelor of Arts Degree obtained from an on-campus university and presently closing in on a Bachelor of Science Degree through an online program, I’m not “certified” in the formal sense to be qualified at attempting such a thing. This brief article is simply to highlight the discussion at hand.
When I was pursuing my first Bachelor’s Degree, I quickly came to realize that education was all about developing the knowledge of how to research knowledge. How to find the information I was lacking, and develop the skill necessary for what I was preparing to do with this new-found knowledge.
What Education Isn’t:
Be it gardening, managing a business, helping the sick, flying an airplane, or writing a blog if not a book, education isn’t about stuffing facts into your brain or memorizing the letter of the law, as happens through rote learning. Rote is simply a memorizing process using repetition and routine. It rarely requires any real interaction or involvement with the subject. And it does not require comprehension from the student. In many circles, rote learning is still considered to be the backbone of traditional education. The lowest and least productive form of learning. But learning methods are changing!
Defining its Meaning:
The traditional definition goes something like this: “education is the act or process of imparting or acquiring general knowledge, developing the power of reasoning and judgment, and generally of preparing oneself or others intellectually for mature life.” Or “the act or process of imparting or acquiring particular knowledge or skills, as for a profession.”
Probably, we would all agree that education is a learning process and we assume it comes to us through a set program or instruction from an educator. Someone who we would assume specializes in the field of educating others in the particular field of study. For example, let’s take social science, the study of the theory of teaching and learning. And round-and-round we go!
What, Really, is Education?
So, really, what is education? Is it something we find in the word itself through our own experiences? Also, does it have to do with the basic, real, or invariable nature of a thing? Could real education involve individual personal experiences? Hence, a question not easily answered. Nor a quality not easily found.
A Real Life Example
I know some who work in the “formal” educational public schools environment with children who have special needs. In the traditional sense of the word, these special kids are unable to learn or be educated. Kids who are ESL (English Slow Learners) or diagnosed with ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder). Consequently, teaching students with ADHD, ESL, or teaching students with any learning disability for that matter, is changing for a variety of reasons. All of which can be underscored!
These students are placed in a one student to one educator learning environment. It has to be this way because of the learning disorders of one kind or another. One thing is certain: they each get an education. Meaning, not only does the teacher teach the student, but the student educates the educator…in matters of life, from the student’s perspective. Continue Reading
