I found it funny that you equated the assessment based learning to the apprenticeship system from the Middle Ages. Pretty good analogy. And it still works really well today: carpenters, electricians, and plumbers for instance.

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I’m a little confused. I am having trouble understanding how you can simultaneously expect yourself to perform perfectly academically but admit that you are not perfect nor care about perfecting other activities. I am also having trouble believing you didn’t reflect on your school assignments. Sure, maybe you would put them away right after it was returned but for someone so concerned with grades and having “no room for error” have you never looked at an old test in preparation for a final?

And if you are still striving for perfection I’d like to offer some advice. Realize that the only constant in the world is that it is changing so perfection will always be fleeting:

“One minute was enough, Tyler said, a person had to work hard for it, but a minute of perfection was worth the effort. A moment was the most you could ever expect from perfection.” ~Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club, Chapter 3

I identified with many of your sentiments. Especially the need for a spiritual element of education and the benefits of meditation (I’m still trying to become a pretzel though). And I think more students would find success and reduce stress if they could learn to focus on their learning and quality of education over how they will be evaluated.

As an instructor and TA I can sympathize with Professors who are asked “Why are you teaching this? Why is it relevant to me?”. A perfectly valid response would seem to be “Why did you sign up for the class if you weren’t intrinsically motivated to learn the material?” Granted, many classes can seem to be irrelevant considering ones careers goals while being required for one’s degree, but I think students often underestimate the thought and reasoning that has gone into the development of their curricula. And of course part of the students’ inability to assign value to their education rests with them (at least, I think this is reasonable for university students) for a significant part of learning involves practicing the integration of new information into one’s intellect in ever more creative, unique, and efficient ways.

I agree teachers can do more to deliver content more effectively. There seems to be a tendency to simply try to transmit information and skills. Perhaps, there should be more of an emphasis on creating an intellectual experience, guiding students through a cognitive path to discovery instead. What do you think?

I think you may be just slightly missing the point of the grand narrative and how it connects to education – or, at least, how I understand it. Education is less about, or should be, convincing students to adopt as dogma one narrative or another; it is about teaching the ability to construct a narrative for themselves – to tell the story of who they are, where they’ve been, where they’re going, and why. The key is to teach the skill of developing and editing our own narratives.

You are right to suggest that the basics are valuable – and even indispensable – in creating a foundation for further learning. An example from physics and engineering is the need for a mastery of calculus and differential equations before seriously studying quantum mechanics. Likewise, advanced and intriguing literature is inaccessible to the student without the requisite vocabulary. However, I feel this view of the “basics” of education is limited in that it really only makes sense to apply it within a discipline. For instance, statistics wouldn’t be part of the basics for theater like it would be for engineering.

Students often struggle to endow their education with meaning, you’re right. But you seem to take it for granted that the problem is how their being educated rather than the content of their education. Could we be too concerned with teaching things well instead of teaching worthwhile lessons, ideas and, skills? I think part of the tendency for glossing over this question has to do with the fact that the american obsession with economics tends to conceptualize schools as tools to increase worker productivity and consequently, corporate profits. Your mention of students’ concern in repaying their loans and discussion of vocational schools are examples of the economic mentality influencing the view of education – after all, isn’t the purpose of education make minds, not careers. We might agree (or disagree) that ought to be the purpose.

If we can re-frame the purpose of education from creating economically productive and consumptive adults to serving and protecting democratic society by endowing the populous with the capacity for dispassionate reflection, moral reasoning, responsible action, and independent thought, it becomes much easier to identify some “basics” of education that would be worthwhile to teach before we move on to the mechanics of how to disseminate the information.

I’d agree with you that formal, traditional schooling is not the optimal form of education for everyone. And while schooling can seem endlessly relentless (especially to graduate students…) it is surely much less relentless than the education that will come from the experience of our lives. You mentioned the importance of instilling a desire to learn in students. Using my proposed purpose of an education, a “desire to learn” – I would add, the means to learn – would be an important indicator that someone is well-educated. Your comparison of pursuing knowledge as a end (the PhD) vs. pursuing knowledge as a means (your M.D. friend) was also interesting.

At least in the context of higher education, I do not understand the need to define a social media or online etiquette. Is it really that different than what would be expected in the classroom?

“I’ve yet to have an instructor mediate this outside of a short paragraph in the syllabus which encourages students to think before they post” Really? Dr. Nelson syllabus and “blogging basics” seem to pretty clearly lay out what is expected for this class and I really feel that most graduate students should understand “If you wouldn’t want your grandma to hear it read on television don’t write it on the internet.” Perhaps because I’ve grown up with it, the internet doesn’t really seem like a place to require special etiquette. And part of the point of blogging (as I understand it) is to develop confidence in your ideas and how you decide to express them. However, I can agree that discussing some ground rules as a class might be useful.

“With so many blogs and so many posts that probably contain a large number of repetitive information, are we able to go through most of them within a limited time and get the best out of it? Wouldn’t this cause information explosion in our minds that gets us to lose the focus through the way?”

Can’t you say the same thing about textbooks and libraries? I think something you have omitted that is important to all seekers of knowledge is a disciplined volition. Perhaps more than ever, it is important to be able to focus as a learner and hone in on the things one really desires to know. I think connected learning is the way to go. But it will look different for different learners. The technology is just a tool; learn to adapt it to your learning style.

“Our inventions are wont to be pretty toys, which distract our attention from serious things. They are but improved means to an unimproved end,… We are in great haste to construct a magnetic telegraph from Maine to Texas; but Maine and Texas, it may be, have nothing important to communicate.” Henry David Thoreau wrote this in the first chapter of Walden. I think you’re onto something when you point out that an over-abundance of information can shut down deeper critical thinking and perhaps we should seek to make local communities closer before connecting them globally. However, knowledge is power. You mention the absurdity of trying to connect everyone to the internet when many don’t have access to clean water. I can understand your sentiment but with the internet and all the information it brings it may very well provide those people with the means to secure their own water among other things. I think we are living in the digital age and privileged to do so.