Serendip is an independent site partnering with faculty at multiple colleges and universities around the world. Happy exploring!

Reply to comment

memyselfandi's picture

Structure and lack thereof

The definition of the objective of education as "the means to create knowledge" makes sense to me, but I'm not sure I entirely agree with it. I think it's important to keep in mind that we do need to have some basis on which to build. We can't just start creating knowledge out of the air, nor can we then rely on what we have created because it did come out of thin air. Perhaps the objective of education is better put as "to acquire knowledge in order to create more knowledge"?

As far as the structure arguments go, I am biased because I definitely like structure. I like knowing the rules, exactly what I should be doing, and how it's going to be evaluated. That being said, I feel that in class and here in the forum structure is getting demonized to some extent because of the conception that structure means forcing students into certain pathways without allowing any time of freedom. I agree with D2B's comments above (or below, I guess), and I would take it even one step further: that structure and room for creativity are not mutually exclusive. I have been in many classes where I have been assigned an essay or a project, complete with a rubric for how it would be graded, but I would be able to pick my own topic and take the idea(s) in a direction of my choosing. I really think there is room for creativity and structure to exist side-by-side. If this type of learning needs to be encouraged instead of diminished so that it takes precedence, then so be it.

 

I'm not really a "science person," and as I said in class, it's been years since I've thought of anything as immutable fact. Everything is relative to something, be it personal experiences or knowledge or someone else's opinion. So the "loopy science" model wasn't super new to me. I am curious as to how exactly it would be implemented into the education system, though. The logistics involved, like those in the article we read, seem nearly impossible to reconcile. I hope to touch more on logistics in class tonight.

Reply

The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.
To prevent automated spam submissions leave this field empty.
9 + 5 =
Solve this simple math problem and enter the result. E.g. for 1+3, enter 4.