I am not too optimistic that post pandemic we’ll be returning back to
“normal”. The irony of the Coronavirus is that this is first time since the
creation of the “global” economy countries had to function as a real global
economy. All of a sudden the global economy was tasked with supplying life or
death equipment for healthcarers and the public in general.
The problem with education in all this is that education is very
similar to the military infrastructure. They both cost a lot of money, the
Return on Investment will take years to happen, and by the nature of knowledge
it is in constant progress and evolution. Basically our victories depend on the
weaknesses of the enemy.
Traditionally the seat of knowledge has always been universities and
people had to go through the “system” to reach the high levels of academia and
thus respect. But this model of education has been challenged recently. The
most important challenge is that not only do we have far more sources of
knowledge than ever before but for the first time we theoretically have the
means to access all the knowledge we have today when we “want” to access it.
Another implication of knowledge is that many activities can be
classified as bodies of knowledge. In other words, knowledge can be about
something and how to do something. This implies that what we call education is
not just for children or those who belong to institutions we call colleges, but
rather education is a source for knowledge. In the past we had academia and
apprenticeship. An apprentice is someone who knows how to do something through
empirical knowledge and experience.
During this pandemic we have demonstrated that new technologies,
such as the PC, mobile phones, tablets etc are robust for many information
exchange purposes. It is enough to continue with the teaching process at all
levels of the education process. But it is also true that many teachers (and business
managers) have been inundated with the challenge and as a consequence they are overloading
children and young adults with homework. Indeed today under the present
circumstances people are afraid of the looking-busy-disease. We inherited this
disease of having to look busy more as a defence against not seeming to have
anything to do than any rational justification to be doing something.
Post pandemic we need to develop new management skills and these
management skills have to cover two objectives: plan our objectives and plan
not to waste time. Of course, piling loads of books and chapters from books and
telling students to read them is not efficient nor being busy. I would argue
that a sign of efficiency comes in two parts. The first is how to remember a
particular piece of knowledge. Although learning is not about memory but about
application. This means that we are going to be more dependent on machines.
Finally what the pandemic has also demonstrated is that we need a
deep understanding of the scientific method and how to us this method. The
lack of scientific awareness around us is an indictment of the failure of the
political system that models the education system not necessarily in the
interests learners and those engaged in furthering their knowledge.
Best and take care
Lawrence
telephone/WhatsApp: 606081813
Email: philomadrid@gmail.com
http://www.philomadrid.com
PhiloMadrid on Skype 6:30pm Sunday 17th May: Education now
and post pandemic
No comments:
Post a Comment