Short Lesson on 'Future of Education' | classneutral

July 17, 2013

The aim of this lesson is to give you some insights regarding the future direction of education, or at least educational philosophy, to supplement the main discussion we?ve covered in JC1 on the function, history and challenges faced by education systems both local and abroad.

Work in pairs to complete the following (make notes of your answers to the questions provided and file these when you are done, please.)

First watch this 12min video on ?Future Learning?:

Write down answers to the following questions. These are the essential points to glean from the video.

1) Who is speaking at the start of the video? (You should probably recognize the voice!) In what context was the speech given and what might this tell us about the importance of education?

2) Provide a compelling example of how the current model of education ?squashes motivation? in children. (Avoid standard references like long lectures or vague ones like boring classes. Be specific.)

3) Consider the claim by Sugata Mitra that ?arithmetic is an obsolete skill?. Should we therefore remove mathematics from core education entirely? What skills do children learn from mathematics that are important for adult life, if any? Try to be specific about the topic instead of referring to reasoning skills which can be picked up from many disciplines. (He doesn?t actually outright claim this, only suggests it, but for the sake of discussion lets consider the implications for such a claim.)

4) Sugata Mitra also argues that information search and retrieval skills are the essential skills for today?s working adult. Why is this the case? (Again, this is an easy question to answer, what you want is to think of a compelling and specific example you can bring into an essay, etc.)

5) What does the example of children learning how to use a computer on their own, without supervision, illustrate about the nature of learning or self-directed education?

6) What are the limitations of using technology to merge the concepts of ?play? and ?learning?. Can this be done effectively for all subjects and all levels of education or is it restricted to one stage or another?

7) Sugata Mitra?s reference to ?mechanisms of belief? can be explained as the capacity for an individual to be a critical thinker, to be skeptical and examine what they are told to believe or not believe. If you wanted to introduce the notion that ?doctrine is one of the primary obstacles to progress in our generation? what examples would you use? Do some research and find 2 different examples you can use as an entry point for this discussion.

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