Penny Thoughts: COVID-19 has ushered in 21st Century education

Those of us who have had a full house these past few weeks as a result of the COVID-19 urgency have come to realize that our children today are undergoing s very different kind of educational experience than we had. While in the past we may have volunteered to help our youngsters with their homework, today we find ourselves deeply “in the weeds” when it comes lending our “expert” assistance with their homework.

The subject matter itself in some instances may have exceeded our grasps, but that is something we can quickly apprehend and get up to speed. The REAL challenge for many and perhaps most parents today is the methods of delivery our urchins have become accustomed to – technology!

While we have been annoyed that our children have become preoccupied with their “smart phones” and their obvious facility with all forms of technology, we have been oblivious to it, often dismissing it as just another “toy”. We have taken for granted all the “refinements” of present-day technology which has allowed us to enjoy better deliveries of telephone service, television broadcasting with more options and automobiles which can predict servicing needs. We have assumed that they somehow have just “crystallized” for our very own comfort and convenience.

All the while, our children have been using the blessings of technology for their entertainment.

In the meantime, some very enterprising learning theorists and educators have been developing delivery systems for our children to actually learn and to think. Many other countries in the world have experimented with and adopted these new platforms of education delivery. Since education in America is individually state mandated, executed and governed, American universality of this form of education delivery has not been uniform. Often, it is dependent upon the individual, local school districts which ultimately have budget limitations.

So today, our eager, young chargers who are home since their schools have been closed for a time, are continuing their schooling through a combination of prepared lectures in written format and with assignments which they can complete on their computers – as in “online”. They have essentially left us in the dust, as it were, when it comes to relating to their learning experiences.

Still, those of us who are enamored of this technology, who do not fear it and who are eager to grasp and understand it realize that while this process has been a gradual amalgamation of our “older” learning systems and state-of-the-art technological advancements, do welcome it.

Many of us also feel rather jealous that we did not have such tools and avenues for learning when we were where our children are today. We are frantically trying to catch up, and it is my considered opinion that we will do so and will enjoy the access to all forms of knowledge which they have at their command.

I don’t want to get into “the weeds” too much, but it is about time individual American school systems adopted methods and means of learning which actually reach our children. It seems obvious that one of the positive side effects of COVID-19 is that we have been forced into a position which demands that we re-examine our basic approaches to learning theory through learning delivery.

On this count I am very proud to claim that the Demopolis City School System has charged into the breech, as it were, and is providing our school children with what I call “Twenty-First Century Learning Theory Deliveries”.

I applaud our School Board for doing so. And while some educators will be dragged kicking and screaming into this century and its advancements for learning theory technology, ultimately it will be us parents who reinforce and support it.

But first, let me point out three elements which will ensure the success of students learning in this technological environment:

1. “Learning” is the aim of education, but THINKING must be its goal – not too profound, of course, but we must realize that learning is an INTERNAL process – not an external process with all the acoutrement of overheads, flashcards, videos, lectures, and the like;
2. Socrates pointed this out when he constantly referred to himself as a “midwife to ideas” – educators MUST also see themselves as midwives to ideas as they give birth to thinking;
3. The Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget revolutionized the entire enterprise of education with his studies in child learning theory – he recognized that children were not merely “mini-adults” but are emerging and developing organisms who see their worlds differently at different stages of their development. If it is not done now, study of Piaget and his work in “constructivist theory of learning” must be an essential requirement for ALL would be educators – without exception! 

Perhaps the greatest trait of being an American is something which was attributed to us immediately prior to and during WWII. Americans have a certain ingenuity, a “know-how,” to get a job done! Its continent forced the European explorers – “invaders” if you prefer – to adapt. The Nations here – Cheyenne, Arapaho, Sioux to cite just a few – taught the Europeans just how to do that – and we became the strongest nation in the history of humankind as a result!

It will be that same trait and resolve which will lead us into this new era of learning methods and processes.

I am reminded of an attribution to Friedrich Nietzsche, my favorite philosopher, who declared that we must love our fate (Amor Fati), recognize that life is a struggle, and “embrace the struggle.”

So, as is our American trait, we move forward in learning theory and developmental thinking with eyes wide open and hearts eager to accept all forms of knowledge.

This means that chalk boards, lectures and such vehicles are becoming dinosaurs in learning/thinking delivery forms. In that regard, the future is not tomorrow – it is NOW!