Why Does This Stuff Succeed?

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Why Does This Stuff Succeed?
It's a rant, but we ned more rants like this. Because while on the one hand there is the scepticism - often expressed in these pages - about standardized instruction and instruction-based learning. But there is the other side of the discussion we need to see: the problem of charlatans who have a 'solution' to sell, that 'improves learning' - though they won't tell you how, nor provide any evidence that it does. And we have in common the objectives of seeing our educational system produce, as the author says, "people who understand through hard study of history and philosophy the challenges of self government." Self-discipline and even self-sacrifice are indeed noble virtues, and we would like to foster them. But students often hear of the need for self-sacrifice from an individual or an institution that will take the fruits of that sacrifice merely to enrich or empower themselves. More...