The Ministers’ Misconceptions

by Howard Gardner

Of all the findings from cognitive psychology that are relevant for education, one stands out. That is the repeated demonstration, across a number of disciplines, of the prevalence of misconceptions and the difficulty of getting rid of them and replacing them with more powerful and more veridical conceptions. The most famous examples occur in physics. Students at outstanding universities, who have studied the laws of motion and have done well on standardized measures of achievement in physics, are asked to explain a new phenomenon—one that they have not studied but one governed by the laws of motion. Not only do these star students typically fail on these performances of understanding. More dramatically, their responses are often indistinguishable from those obtained from students who have never studied physics. Comparable examples can be found in biology, astronomy, psychology, economics — indeed across the disciplinary spectrum.

These difficulties can be blamed in part on inadequate instruction, but they also reflect a disturbing reality. When young, without the need for formal instruction, nearly all human beings develop ‘folk theories’ of how the world works: the physical world (if an object is broken into tiny, no-longer-visible parts, it ceases to exist); the biological world (all organisms were created at a single, pre-historical moment) and the social world (people who look different from me are to be feared and shunned). More effective theories can only be constructed in the mind of the learner through effective teaching and significant involvement with the materials (object, data) for which the disciplinary understandings are appropriate.

Nowadays almost everyone goes to school. And even in the remaining unschooled societies, there is informal tuition. Nonetheless, misconceptions continue to hold sway. Here are the some of the powerful misconceptions about learning and teaching that characterize the folk theories of human beings:

• Education involves the transmission of ideas and skills from older and more powerful persons to those who are younger and under the control of their elders.

• The young mind is a blank slate on which correct ideas and needed skills need to be implanted.

• Learning should occur bit by bit; to the extent possible, errors should be identified, discouraged, corrected.

• The best way to teach—indeed, the only effective way — is to reward correct answers and punish wrong ones.

• On any dimension worth considering, you can array people from the best to the worst (a so-called ‘league table’).

• If someone does not do what you want them to do, just ask them to do it, louder and louder, over and over again.

Now, since misconceptions like this are part of the human condition, it is not surprising that most children and most parents believe them. But that does not mean they are correct, any more than that the world is flat or that all creatures were created at the same moment. Indeed, considerable social-scientific research over the last century calls each of these so-called truisms into severe question.

It might seem reasonable to expect that those who are in charge of educational policy should have moved beyond these misconceptions. And indeed, if engaged in quiet discussion, at least some policymakers reveal their awareness of the research. And yet, in observing ministers of education all over the world, I find them remarkably tied to these powerful, though erroneous ideas. Indeed, I sometimes think that for most Ministers of Education, their only goal is to improve the performance of their nation in the international comparisons, independent of the worth or utility of that comparison. In fact, I’ve recently encountered a new ironical twist on this: The absolute standing of Scotland is less important than its relative position vis-a-vis England. Better to be 20th if Britain is 21st, than to be 10th if Britain is 9th.

Going beyond this ‘league table’ mentality, I am constantly surprised at the persistence, in ministerial talk and writing, of allegiance to the ‘transmission theory’ of education; the focus on rewards (even monetary ones) and punishment; the lack of openness to multiple answers, productive errors, creativity; and the preferred solution to bad performance on tests—the administration of more and more tests. It is like the misguided belief that if the patient is sick, the royal road to health involves repeating measurement of temperature.

I don’t mean to demean all Ministers of Education. As already suggested, some of them know better, and a few try to do better. It may be that there is something about the air in the ministries of the world, and in their all-too-frequent meetings with one another, that reinforces the worst of these misconceptions and repeats them endlessly to the public at large.

Of course, we do know a great deal about what actually brings about strong achievements in education around the world; plausible goals, understood and subscribed to by the range of constituents; awareness of the changing nature of knowledge and the need to prepare learners for an uncertain future; respect for teachers who, because of their knowledge of content and pedagogy and sensitivity to individual differences, merit respect; regular parental involvement; instilling in young people a love for learning that endures throughout life, even when no one is looking. If I were trying to determine in which school system to send my children or grandchildren, I’d beware of Ministers bearing misconceptions, I’d look instead for ones who understand these equally simply, and yet surprisingly elusive powerful ideas.

A Choice with Real Value

by Kathleen Kury Farrell

Choice and opportunity are emblems of freedom. But researchers tell us that the myriad options available to us are no longer liberating but quite oppressive. Studies indicate that the number of decisions we make every day – in the cereal aisle, at the espresso stand, on our cable TVs – are literally exhausting us. Perhaps more significant is the implication that the constant stream of relatively minor decisions we make may lead us to make poorer choices across all areas of our lives.

I wonder whether the number of choices available to us is the real problem. Maybe choice has become so challenging because we aren’t really equipped to make decisions, or because our communities don’t encourage a habit of using knowledge and tools that may help us. Most of us make daily decisions quite automatically: we eat what our families ate, what our friends eat, what is readily available, or what is on sale this week. And yet we all have decisions we just won’t compromise on, such as eating organic food, being loyal to a brand, or supporting family businesses.

What we care about deeply can be an invisible hand that guides the big and small decisions that we make: our human inclination is to bring our actions into alignment with our image of ourselves. Throughout life – and certainly throughout the K-16 years – this “self” is a work in progress. A tough choice for educators is whether and how to explicitly help young people develop not only self-understanding but to help them acquire tools for checking-in on who they aspire to be as students, community members, parents, and employees. You likely found the GoodWork community because of your own commitment to supporting students and/or colleagues in defining what excellence means, exploring meaningful pursuits, and considering how their decisions affect others.

Our research at the GoodWork Project consistently shows that young people struggle to make decisions about major aspects of their lives. Too often they fall prey to the mantra “not to decide is to decide.” The latter is certainly true when they follow their close peers into a college major – a trend documented in a study published by the National Bureau of Economic Research earlier this year. We witness them “falling back” on their parents’ dreams or the profitable occupation du jour. It is also evident in their stories about taking the path of least resistance – often one down an unethical road – in order to develop traction in their careers. Not surprisingly, students struggle with the “minor” decisions too, choices that pit their personal values against what is the norm in their families and peer groups.

The great news is that most students are grateful for opportunities to stop and think about what they find personally meaningful. They are often surprised that not only can their personal values be a compass to guide decision-making but that, in fact, many admirable adults intentionally make time to think about decisions past and pending in order to evaluate how their choices measure up to their personal dreams, standards, and commitments. One university vice president who I much admire made it his habit to have weekly lunches with the president of the student government association. To a one, these students expressed gratitude not simply for the generosity of the V.P.’s time, but for the his willingness to model and share the ongoing process of aligning the responsibilities of one’s position and an organization’s dreams while refining personal ambitions, too.

It is similarly encouraging that many teachers, coaches, and parents are finding ways to help students discover what they care about deeply and encourage them to be mindful of how their choices reflect those personal values. We know, however, that this is difficult work at a time when economic decline casts a shadow on students’ aspirations and focuses the public’s eye on “basic skills” that rarely address how life gets lived or how work gets done. We invite you to use the Toolkit Forum to share ways you are honoring the third “E” of good work by helping young people in your life to discover what is personally engaging while, of course, helping them focus on the implications enacting their dreams may have for others.

Related Links:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-tyranny-of-choice

http://www.nber.org/papers/w14948

Nobel Prize for Mentorship?

by Lynn Barendsen

The recent announcement of the Nobel Laureates in Medicine point to another achievement that deserves recognition: outstanding mentorship. Elizabeth Blackburn and Carol Greider were members of a scientific “lineage” with Joseph Gall at its head. Blackburn studied under Gall; Greider studied under Blackburn. Two very successful women in a field that has been dominated by men, in a field in which mentoring does not typically come first.

In the New York Times interview after the announcement of the award, Greider was asked about the nature of her research with Blackburn, and whether the type of research (on telomeres) was in itself particularly attractive to women. In her response, she specifically credits Gall’s mentorship efforts:

“There’s nothing about the topic that attracts women. It’s probably more the founder effect. Women researchers were fostered early on by Joe Gall, and they got jobs around the country and they trained other women. I think there’s a slight bias of women to work for women because there’s still a slight cultural bias for men to help men. The derogatory term is the “old boys network.” It’s not that they are biased against women or want to hurt them. They just don’t think of them. And they often feel more comfortable promoting their male colleagues.”

In the world of science, especially post-doctoral work, the relationship between students and teachers may be fraught with tension. Unlike other fields (journalism, business, theater, for example), in science students DO have mentors – they are assigned to someone and that relationship may be complicated. We heard quite about this during our GoodWork research. The years post-docs spend working in labs often result in frustration, and this is sometimes the result of a poor relationship with an advisor. One version of this advisor/advisee relationship is as follows:

“I know in an ideal setting it would be true that your advisors would have ways of talking to students and post-docs that separates science from the individual, but it just doesn’t happen in the real world. And I think that part of that is that the people who become advisors are selected because they are great scientists, not because they are managers or not because they have well-developed interpersonal skills. So, you get these people who have spent their whole life at a bench and all of the sudden, they’re in charge of fifteen people. Where were they supposed to learn?”

Considered within this context, the achievements of Gall, Blackburn and Greider are even more remarkable.

We’ve learned a lot about mentors on the GoodWork Project. We’ve learned that most often, people, especially young people, don’t have mentors. When we asked them to talk about mentors, instead we heard about “antimentors” – people who came to exemplify qualities they themselves didn’t want to develop. And worse, some told us about “tormentors”. Our colleagues on the GoodPlay Project have found that young people lament the lack of mentors who are able to help them navigate cyberspace. Young people are digital natives, while the older generation, who may have some wisdom with respect to ethical issues, are “immigrants.”

Resourceful individuals develop a practice of “fragmentoring” – or piecing together qualities and lessons learned from various different people in their lives. Mom teaches a lesson about finishing what you started; Coach Andy hammers home a message about follow through; a drama teacher invites you to push your limits, and an unfailingly honest friend inspires you to tell the truth even when difficult. Even individuals who lack bits of positive exemplary behavior find other means – for example, emulating the work of inspirational public figures. In short, what’s involved in finding a mentor is changing, what it means to be a mentor is evolving. It’s a lot harder to do this mentoring work on your own, however, and it takes tremendous determination and focus.

Who we allow to have influence over our choices, our beliefs and our lives is no small decision. It is not always a conscious one, but clearly it ought to be. Following the examples set by these outstanding scientists is a good place to start.

Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/13/science/13conv.html?hpw

The Road to Hell?

by Howard Gardner

If the proverbial inter-planetary visitor observed educational policymakers around the world, she would soon infer their single preoccupation: “How to raise scores on international comparisons like the TIMMS or the PISA tests.” This mentality also dominates the United States. A focus on standardized tests, how to raise scores, and what consequences follow there from, has become a national, as well as an international, obsession.

That ‘road to hell’ is paved with good intentions. Concern with performance grew out of a consensus that American youth were not getting properly educated. Since the 1980s, leaders from across the political spectrum have joined forces to focus sharply on test performance.

I don’t question their motivation. Policymakers were concerned with the mediocre education in most inner-city schools, the lack of preparation (and sometimes motivation) of teachers, and job applicants who lack skills and a sense of responsibility.

And yet, the consequences of this testing mania have been mixed at best. Impressive, widespread improvement has not occurred. Scores may improve on familiar items but rarely on measures that are differently conceived. Classes focus on preparation for high stake tests, while less attention is paid to the arts, history, current events, humanities—indeed, anything untested. Educators with discrepant philosophies or approaches abandon the public sector, or education altogether. Teaching is becoming de-professionalized; students construe education as a winner-take-all tournament, rather than the opening of the mind and the imagination.

It need not be that way. No country need conceive itself in a ‘league table’ competition. And certainly the richest and most successful can chart its own course;

Visitor: What form might that course take?

My answer:

Start from the kinds of human beings that we desire. We want adults of character: persons who care about their family, their neighbors, the larger, society, the planet— good workers and good citizens. Perhaps at one time, these ethical, moral, and character issues could be addressed at home, on the street, in religious settings, in the media. But no more. If schools do not develop individuals of admirable character, the society won’t have them.

We want individuals who love learning, want to learn in (and outside of) school and will continue to learn throughout their lives. The current system stifles more than it stimulates. Young people gravitate toward learning when the older persons around them love learning and invite the youth to join them. In an age of exciting media and sundry other temptations, we adults have to be their heroes, their role models, their inspiration.

Finally, what to learn? Here I differ most sharply from those who favor fixed curricula, with lists of so-called important facts. Given the ubiquity of digital information sources, there is no need to prescribe materials. Once basic literacies have been achieved, it’s most important to master the major ways of thinking: historical, mathematical, scientific and artistic. Armed with these tools and suitably motivation, learners can achieve disciplined, synthesizing, and creative minds.

Lest one think that a misguided course is restricted to education, consider the current American quagmire in health care. Too many of our citizens, and too many of our leaders are blind to what is expected in other societies—affordable health care for all. Much of our population lacks compassion for fellow citizens and for the ills to be faced by future citizens.

Faced with such thoughts, I take heart from Winston Churchill who once observed “The American people always do the right thing—after they have tried every other alternative.”

Copyright Howard Gardner 2009

Looking for Good Work

by Amy Quon

A year ago, I was content in California—finishing up graduate school coursework and working in educational program assessment. Based on what I hear from everyone who has ever spent a winter in New England, I probably should have appreciated the sunshine and cool breezes back home (read: the opposite of gray skies and icy wind) a bit more. Yet, I felt strongly about moving here because I found myself in one of those precarious positions—where you know the work you are doing just isn’t enough.

For some people, it might be working against the grain everyday through nit-picking bureaucracies, with difficult colleagues, doing work that doesn’t seem to go anywhere and help anyone, or perhaps, it’s just not something that allows you to grow, it’s not where your passion is, maybe it’s just something you can do but not something you feel drawn to. I felt some combination of these factors, which pushed me to act, to take a risk, and to move towards something else.

After deciding to move to the east coast, I was confident; I had interviews lined up and a place to live. However, like thousands of others this year, I remained unemployed for several months. I was rethinking everything—whether or not it was possible to do work that was more valuable or better than what I previously had and whether it was even possible to pursue my ideal in the midst of the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression. All the while, I struggled to manage student loans, bills, rent, and this weird social pressure to be building my career, or establishing something, not wasting time. In the back of my mind, I remembered friends complaining about horrible jobs they were “stuck” in, but I kept thinking, at least they had a job. I had to remind myself that I was hoping for something more, but honestly, I’d often forget.

I wondered if the lack of conversation as a student, around the type of work I would do in the future, and the choices I’d be forced to make on the job played a role in my forgetting. Often, the lesson in school is to adjust your efforts to what works, what the teacher wants and expects, but when no one is looking, when we work in our communities or help a friend, these are the times when we know our best matters most. Having conversations around how to bind engagement and excellence in all of our work can prepare us to surpass expectations and manage challenges more proactively as they come—even if these challenges include shifts in economic opportunity restraining our realities and perceptions of choice.

Understanding the diversity of ways people are experiencing this push and pull between what they hope for and what seems possible is important in helping others to strive towards good work. Given my own luck in finding a great match of my skills and interests with the GoodWork team, I feel like beyond it all, things do turn out. And, I hope that through open conversation on this site, we can reflect on what good work means to each of us, so that ultimately, we find and offer that support.