Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!emory!stiatl!stbimbo!tok From: tok@stbimbo.UUCP (Terry Kane) Newsgroups: comp.edu Subject: Re: Against educational fads (was: math credit) Message-ID: <271@stbimbo.UUCP> Date: 12 Dec 90 15:29:16 GMT References: <15488@cs.utexas.edu> <16495@s.ms.uky.edu> <1990Dec9.183544.6800@cs.ubc.ca> Organization: Sales Technologies Inc. Atlanta, Ga. Lines: 43 manis@cs.ubc.ca (Vincent Manis) writes: >People often try to come up with clever applications for computers in >schools. As a computer scientist and a (former) high-school teacher, I >can confidently say that this is putting the cart before the horse. >First, we must try to determine what we're teaching and why, and only >then determine what means we will use to achieve this goal. `How can we >use the computer in our school?' is most definitely the wrong question. >`What tools should we use to solve problem X?' is the right question. Indeed, this is a common problem, one which is not limited to education but is taught in schools everywhere. I see this problem as a lack of analytical and planning skills. You can probably look around you and see numerous examples of technology applied for technology's sake. This might be a distributed data sharing system developed without analyzing the users' real needs - which may actually call for a complete redevelopment of an existing paper system at considerably less cost than a laptop(s)+server system purchase. Of course, the computer solution could - and probably would - create an explosion! of productivity IF THE PROBLEMS WERE PROPERLY DEFINED. This is a skill that can be taught in mathematics to very young people. You know the technique. It's the dreaded word problem. (How about that? We're back to reading skills.) An equally important method of teaching analytical and planning skills is good old composition. If a person can not state a problem (the thesis) and solve it in a disciplined manner (development and conclusion) in an English (rather, the person's native tongue) then that person can prob- ably not succeed in the computer industry, or any other, without resort- ing to the princely means described by Machiavelli. I know that teachers try to develop students' abilities to think, and I know that most do quite well, according to the students' abilities - physical, emotional, environmental, intellectual and whatever other abilities you may care to name. (Each person is an individual; no two learn the same thing the same way.) I also know that pre-university schooling includes a social education. A person must learn many things to become an asset to society, but some things are not learned as well as they should be. Teachers - teach disciplined thinking, please.