Monday, January 18, 2010

Edu Cusp

2. Mark Twain said, “Never let formal education get in the way of your learning.” What did he mean by that? Is technology blurring the boundary between formal and informal learning?


Mark Twain puts it quite eliquently. Education should never stop, inside or outside the class, the pursuit of knowledge is a life long quest. So for many formal class room education gets in the way of their actual success as a person outside the class room. Once you leave a classroom the learning doesn't stop it only changes and becomes a more expansive basis to learn from. At CRMS we participate in the concept of education inside and out. Meaning that our trips our active program and interim are all extremely involve learning processes, not just trips for fun. They provide opportunities to learn about one's self and the world around them, while also encouraging independence and self sufficiency.

This quote also explains that the traditional workings of a classroom should not hinder your learning and should not be the only source for it. You must look beyond the classroom even for your traditional classroom education. For example with the progression of technology there are now many new sources for information that may provide information not found in text books. I have found a number of youtube videos and written examples that have helped in further expanding my knowledge base for the bast two rules that we studied in calculus. Technology has been progressively blurring the line between the classroom, the rest of the world and ultimately the idea of informal versus formal learning.

Education never stops and that has become no more evident than in the current modern era that we live in. With the expansion of technology we will more and more sources of media that provide an education and a smaller and smaller divide between when formal education stops and starts.

5 comments:

  1. Winn Plot,
    John and Anne Holden fully understood what Mark Twain was saying when they established CRMS. You rightly noted that through our "outside education" we all learn important life skills and habits of mind.

    I appreciate your acknowledgment that technology provides learners with a plethora of resources for acquiring information. Keep that in mind the next time you get stuck on the escalator! Also, remember that information is not knowledge. Not until one acts on or uses that information can it truly be called your own.

    In future posts, it would be helpful for you to use spell check. In addition, get into the habit of proof reading your post before publishing. Spelling and grammatical errors detract from your great insight and thoughtful ideas.

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  2. Hey, I'm interested in your point about technology blurring the line between formal and informal learning. On one hand I agree - you can get a lot of the same things that you get from formal education online informally and formal school increasingly reaches outside its walls for help in teaching (is this a fair summary of your argument?).

    On the other hand, it seems to me that technology has created a huge amount of formal schooling. Back in the 1800s when technology was pretty limited, most people only went to school for elementary school, only the elite went to high school and college. Now, everyone is required to finish high school, and most go on to college of some sort if not graduate school and beyond. It seems to me that technology has sort of created a huge amount of formal schooling. Do you think the more recent development of the internet will turn back this trend? Or are we eventually going to have to go to school for 25 years before we can start to look for a job?

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  3. Very nicely put. I like how you relate Mark Twain's quote back to CRMS and its founding principles. After reading this quote I didn't connect it to John and Anne Holden's view on education until reading your post. I also like how you provided examples of looking to the progressions of technology by relating it to how the internet has helped you in learning calculus. Good job!

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  5. Hey Winn Plot. This post was legit. I agree with you when you say that people learn inside and outside the classroom. I would go so far as to say that some kids learn more outside than inside. This is because some of the public school systems are pretty bad. Many kids in this time dread going to school and learn little to nothing. Like I stated in my post, I think that it is more important to get real life experiences to learn from. I'm glad that i go to a school that applies this concept to our learning.

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