Models of education

Knowing my erstwhile Ofsted affiliations perhaps, a friend lent a book by “one of HM Inspectors of Schools,” in which the author describes education in Anglesey, Norfolk and NW England between 1872 and 1906.

The volume describes Manchester Board Schools where “143 boys in four classes were being taught in a large hall” or where “classrooms … were insanitary when 65 were black-holed in them… .”  Small wonder that teaching dominated, and knowledge and skills were valued above understanding and attitude.

For example, HMI Kynnersley unpacks ‘Composition’ as “writing from memory the substance of a short story read out twice.”  He goes on to note the contemporary philosopher who argued that such activity “gave no play to the imagination” and was not educative.  A move to get pupils to add originality to accurate reproduction resulted, but “it was too easy to let the teacher do the originating.  The latter began by providing ‘heads,’ accompanied with copious comments; then he supplied rough scribbling books, in which the children wrote their crude attempts. Then he wrote on the blackboard a jejune essay, which the class copied verbatim into their show-books. These were offered to us as the first fruits of original thought.”

It is heartening to think how much progress has been made in schools from that teaching model of education to one in which learning is central.  Further, the use of ICT has made possible many more opportunities for learners to work at their own pace, to follow their own routes and thus to facilitate understanding.  And learners become more creative because review and improvement are made easier.

The current development of virtual learning environments (VLEs) moves us a stage further towards ‘anytime, anyplace’, without losing the advantages of learning with and from others.  The teacher becomes increasingly the guide on the side in contrast to the sage on the stage.

A Christian educator's critique of all this might start by asking how Jesus saw teaching and learning.  Where does his parabolic, questioning style fit on the spectrum from acquiring facts to using VLEs?  To what extent was he given to universal pronouncement and to what extent to individual answer?  How much did he emphasise obedience to a common message and how much response to the changed heart?  To what extent, then, might eLearning be of value to Christian educators concerned to walk in their Master's footsteps?

Of course there are dangers to open approaches, as Kynnersley found.  “A boy was told to write an essay on the Seven Ages of Man.  Not having read As you like it, he evolved this out of his inner consciousness:

When he is young, he thinks of the bad things he will do when he grows up: this is the age of innocence.
When he grows up, he does some of them: this is the prime of life.
When he is very old, he is sorry for what he has done: this is dotage.”

Happy Christ-mass.

Peter Nicholls