Very
excited to see Audrey Watters in action
in real life after having read her posts and keynotes on many occasion where my
mind was in need of critical analysis of contemporary learning and society. She
is wearing some fabulous boots (!) and looks fierce as ever.
The transcript of her talk Thehistories of personalized learning - can be read here.
There is no
agreed upon definition of personalized learning. There is a history of people
working in tech, she refers to disruptive narrative often accompanying the
technological discourse. The invention of education is filled with slogans,
imagined histories… and they add to the narrative of Edtech and its perceived
disruption.
Currently,
there is a hype towards the need for personalized learning. This could mean
that students to move through content at their own pace. Or personalized learning
could mean that the students get to determine the topics. Or it could mean that
it is personalized by students visions, ideas. It can be driven by student
needs or abilities, navigating through education. Or personalized learning will
only be attained through computer technologies, through automation of
everything, the tech being the salvation.
The history
is filled with traceable legacies on what education is, and this points towards
your philosophical and political (and economic) views/values.
The latest
influence of ‘philantropics’ putting their money in one type of definition of personalized
learning, has a profound impact on education.
The
definition of personalized learning today is related to 1903, individual
learning can be traced back to 18th century. This shows that personalized
learning is a very recent development where the individual learning was
replaced in personalized learning.
‘rugged
individualism’ is a core American ideology, particularly Sillicon Valley (back
to frontier days). This is also deeply intertwined with contemporary
capitalism. Post-war consumer capitalism. Personalisation acts as a salve for standardization,
in an age of mass consumption (name on coke bottle to make it feel special).
Personalisation is related to customization, more than actual tailored to the
person’s own needs.
So, how
much of personalization is this contemporary definition: think MOOC, think
online courses, online tech, … we even have the ‘personal’ computer (oh, I like
this parallel and critical realization).
Pressey (name
not sure) made an automated teacher, and wrote a practical guide on standardized
testing. By the 1920’s standardization was already embedded in the American educational
system.
The message
that automation is going to free the teacher is also very perverse. It is not
about labor saving devices. The automated teacher was seen as a need for personalization,
but it was in fact a response on standardization.
Self-management,
self-help has got…
[suddenly
Audrey completely lights up when she mentions the link between pigeons and
education, and that she could go on for hours on this link… it reminds me of my
grandfather who had pigeons that entered competitions – blauwe geschelpte his type of pigeons were called].
All the
smart people fucked up education, and no one takes responsibility. There is
currently a death of expertise, this has an impact on the future of education,
of society. How does an algorithmically driven FB news impacts ‘the news’.
Freedom of
the state is the cost of education being supported by private money. Schools
suddenly need to use the buzzword personalization, but there is no government
oversight, and no appeal to civil and human rights in the face of the shift of personalized
learning. In democracies one can wonder whether we can maintain shared responsivities
for collective justice when our institutes are taken down.
No comments:
Post a Comment