I enjoy reading your post! Coming from China, my life before 18 is full of tests and exams. In my senior year at high school, I had 4 exams every three days, and a rank would be given based on these 4 exams and revealed to whole class (every three days!). You can imagine how much I hate quantitative assessment at that time. Too many assessments definitely inhibit imagination and passion for learning, and critical thinking skills are not fully developed via tests. But right now, as I look back ten years later, I can actually understand the assessment-centered education system. We had 3000 students in the same grade with me (class of 2007, just in our school) and 0.5 million students in our province. Only 5-6% of students will go to a decent university every year. So how can you select this 5% student without a fair assessment? Without these assessments (tests and exams), I may still live in a rural place out of no where in China. I feel so grateful that I survived so many tests and definitely will not let my child go through these in the future.
Author: Shiqiang
Comment on The World is flat. I know it is. by Shiqiang
We should encourage students to explore the world around them, and this learning and exploration should be fun to them. It takes curiosity, passion, and imagination, but none of them can be fully evaluated by tests. From my perspective, assessment, like tests and exams, provides a relative fair way to select a small number of people due to limitation of resources. I can hardly imagine a world without assessment when it comes to some serious issues such as decision-making and survival.
Comment on A lesson in perspective by Shiqiang
I really enjoy reading your post! Course design and development in higher education definitely need some rethinking and improvement. Some courses are designed to let students complete several specific goals each semester, and in the end students can happily graduate on time. But the consistency of all the courses are equally important. It would be a great idea to present the freshmen with the full connection of all courses prepared for their following four years and let them know, from the beginning, that all knowledge are actually connected. Hopefully through this way we can help students build a strong bond between new and old knowledge while encouraging them to see the whole world as a big picture and explore more outside the classroom.
Comment on Mindful teaching and learning by Shiqiang
After reading your past experience, I feel like most of my middle school and high school teachers practiced mindless teaching since it was much easier for them. They believed mindless teaching is the most efficient way to handle all the exams. However, the students’ imagination and curiosity are greatly hindered, so are their thinking pattern and the way to understand the whole world around them. It is quite easy to solve exam problems with what we learn from the class. But a high score cannot help you deal with the real life issues. Mindful teaching and teachers should be much appreciated!
Comment on Grandma, why can’t I ask why? by Shiqiang
Asking WHY, from the learner’s perspective, is definitely a great way for efficient learning. Meanwhile, we need teachers and instructors to show us the way or skills to find the correct answer, instead of handing over the answers directly. Just as the old saying reveals, “Give a man a fish and feed him for a day, teach a man to fish and feed him for a lifetime”. Learning is an interactive process between learner and educator, and we need both sides to be more engaged in higher education.
Comment on Lessons from Music by Shiqiang
I second the thought that we need to be an active learner throughout the learning process. In my personal experience, those I can remember for the lifetime tend to the knowledge bearing with a unique/personal mark, and the most efficient way to leave a unforgettable mark with one part of knowledge is to truly engage yourself with it in as many ways as possible.
Comment on No Information is an Island by Shiqiang
Thanks for the comment! To be honest, though I’m dealing with lots of information everyday as a graduate student, I’ve never take time to think about these questions deeply. But I believe all the information should be connected somehow. For those information that appears to be very distinct from each other, we just have not find the right connection to bridge them. I believe the whole world around us is a little bit like a giant jigsaw puzzle. Some parts of the puzzle is quite complete, and hence we can clearly see the connection. Still, some parts are quite new to us, and the information we currently have is just a few pieces of puzzle. It takes time to unveil the the whole picture, and networked learning can certainly help accelerate this process.
Comment on No Information is an Island by Shiqiang
In 2015, I signed up for two courses on Coursera during the semester and completed none of them. I believe I’m way too positive about my time schedule during the semester when I can easily get swamped. It should be easier to complete the MOOC during summer or winter vacations.
Comment on No Information is an Island by Shiqiang
It is hard to imagine the time when we were young and all the teaching happened only on the blackboard. No recording and video is provided, and you can only count on yourself. Good old times.
Comment on No Information is an Island by Shiqiang
I second your thought that better blogging communities are required in academia. Though we have lots of conferences each year with thousands of oral and poster presentations to promote face-to-face discussion, academic blogging provides an alternative approach for everyone to be engaged in the research topic, anytime and anywhere. However, it is also very important to know our target audience and adjust the written language.
