One way the government could adapt NCEA to completely revolutionise the education system.
We understand why the education system needs to change. As the Factory Model moves gradually out of our schools and we usher in a new era learning. As the knowledge curve extends upwards in our lives, the schooling system moves away from content transmission and moves towards using knowledge to create new knowledge. Developing skills of collaboration, critical thinking, creativity, problem solving...
...unless you're doing NCEA external exams.
Exams are solely based on memorising information before you go into them, and regurgitating as much as you can onto the page, to be marked on how well you applied the knowledge you could remember to the problem given on the day.
The exams create a need in schools for teachers to follow a syllabus. I lived with a high school science teacher for a while, and although she loved the idea of introducing modern learning principles into her classes, she struggled because of the amount of content she had to deliver to students to get them ready for the end of year exams. She had it all planned out for pretty much the entire year of what she was going to deliver and when. And talking about this person comes from an absolute place of love. I know she was doing her best to ready her students for the system they were in.
So we need to change the system.
The digitisation of exams is coming. Sue Suckling talks about it has she travels around the country. But I don't believe this goes far enough. To just digitise exams becomes doing the same thing we have always done but in a different format. It's pointless.
I propose we go further. We open ourselves towards the heretical notion that we allow students to access online material while sitting exams. That we actually allow them access to google and the wealth and breadth of knowledge that lies within it. Even this small step would change education completely.
No longer would high school teachers be driven to deliver the content for students to remember before they head into the exam. They could focus on the important skills that students need for the future, like how to find and access knowledge. How to critically think about the knowledge that is in front of them. How to apply the knowledge that they have accessed to different contexts and across different disciplines.
They could begin to prepare their students for their own, unknown future.
...unless you're doing NCEA external exams.
Exams are solely based on memorising information before you go into them, and regurgitating as much as you can onto the page, to be marked on how well you applied the knowledge you could remember to the problem given on the day.
The exams create a need in schools for teachers to follow a syllabus. I lived with a high school science teacher for a while, and although she loved the idea of introducing modern learning principles into her classes, she struggled because of the amount of content she had to deliver to students to get them ready for the end of year exams. She had it all planned out for pretty much the entire year of what she was going to deliver and when. And talking about this person comes from an absolute place of love. I know she was doing her best to ready her students for the system they were in.
So we need to change the system.
The digitisation of exams is coming. Sue Suckling talks about it has she travels around the country. But I don't believe this goes far enough. To just digitise exams becomes doing the same thing we have always done but in a different format. It's pointless.
I propose we go further. We open ourselves towards the heretical notion that we allow students to access online material while sitting exams. That we actually allow them access to google and the wealth and breadth of knowledge that lies within it. Even this small step would change education completely.
No longer would high school teachers be driven to deliver the content for students to remember before they head into the exam. They could focus on the important skills that students need for the future, like how to find and access knowledge. How to critically think about the knowledge that is in front of them. How to apply the knowledge that they have accessed to different contexts and across different disciplines.
They could begin to prepare their students for their own, unknown future.
Comments
Post a Comment