Dan Brown’s video (below) presents the best rationale for educational reform I’ve seen, and like any provocative cry for revolution, it raises more questions than it answers.
Even if we all agree that the U.S. educational system needs an overhaul, HOW do we go about it? We don’t agree on the best fix or have a clue about how to proceed. All we know is what we have right now isn’t working. So we bite our lips and desperation grows, and sometimes we commit drastic acts to sweep the problem around enough to appear progressive — such as firing an entire high school staff of teachers — but we really don’t have a plan to replace the current one.
Meanwhile, videos like this and blogs by passionate advocates of reform continue to stir an uneasy feeling that all is not well with the status quo.
You know what? This uneasiness is a good thing. All changes start with an uncomfortable feeling that something isn’t right. I have faith that “the plan” will come in time, but first we need to bring people into the think tank. We need to recruit reformers. At least we can serve as rabble-rousers to point out some of the pedagogical reasons old-style education is failing our modern kids.
So let’s spread the discomfort! Share this video with people who need to hear it, the ones who have the power to change the system: administrators, politicians, school boards. For those of us in the trenches, Dan Brown is singing to the choir. Most of us have been hoping for systemic change our whole career.
“Any educational institution based solely on providing students with facts is not preparing students for the real world.” - Dan Brown
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Posted on February 25th, 2010 by Sharon Elin
Filed under: Uncategorized
I found him annoying, narrow-minded, opinionated, and ranting from limited experience.
OK, so let’s see. The school he went to was totally lecture-based; his profs had no personal interactions with their students; his classes were totally fact based. Is this typical? Not in my experience. Not as a PhD student and not as an education prof. I question his narrow view and emphasis on “facts.” Maybe he should have changed schools?
Explore the differences - schools teaching skills and schools teaching facts. In science we kept having trouble teaching “facts” because the facts kept changing. Theories kept changing. (Everything changed: Atomic Theory, the Universe, Cellular Structures, and on and on.) In teacher education we don’t emphasize facts because there are so few of them - well, some maybe, like “teaching is tough.”
A need for change in education - a resounding YES. A need for research, experimentation, a variety of options, and attention to changing technology and cultures - ABSOLUTELY. But then, I’d like to see a change in Washington politics, the banking industry, health and safety, environmental awareness … Where to start?
Love your disagreements! You have me there on some points, like about teaching science (as a process vs. as a fact-pool) and your own experience being different than he described. I know you personally as a retired education professor, and I know your style of instruction. I know that you’ve always been a more hands-on educator — and education classes are by their nature more interactive than many other courses of study.
Through my own college-hopping I’ve realized that different institutions foster different philosophies and cultures, and I’ve seen a variety of teaching approaches, both good and bad – mostly bad, unfortunately. So I had to agree with him about the classes he describes; I see and have been in too many classes like that, where the expert in the front of the room doles out the information and students are not encouraged or even allowed to take an active part in discourse about it. The model of education he described at the beginning of the video bothers me as it bothers him; we’re past the day when we need experienced experts to do a mind-dump and fill our notebooks with what they know; instead these experts should teach students to interpret and filter facts, and engage them by challenging their assumptions, guiding them in their own explorations, and modeling how to problem-solve. I know good professors do that instinctively, but Dan Brown apparently didn’t land in any of those classes. Or, since you perceive him as narrow-minded, maybe he wasn’t open to recognizing it if he were!
Have to admit I can see why you say he was annoying, but where you were annoyed, I was charmed by his enthusiasm and snappiness. I’ve always enjoyed smart alecks, but I know they’ll have the wind taken out of their sails eventually.
He’s definitely limited in experience. A case in point: it bothered me that he dropped out of school rather than seeing it through and trying to push for change within rather than criticize it from without.
Thanks for voicing your opinion! Your comments reminded me to consider the source. Is Dan Brown a veteran in the education field or a recognized expert on educational reform? Absolutely not, so his credibility is purely emotional. He’s a fired-up firebrand, whose cry for change is shrilly naive but at the very least provokes us to examine our personal beliefs about the system of education as it is today and as it should be in the future.
I am really enjoying your website! My name is Lauren Loper and I am a student at The University of South Alabama. I am currently taking the course EDM 310, where we are learning to increase the use of technological programs in our future classrooms. As an assignment, I will be leaving weekly comments on your posts; I hope you enjoy my feedback!
I agree that we need to spread the “discomfort.” We can not have reform until ALL teachers and administrators realize that our current form of education is not preparing our kids for the real world. We need to be up to date with our teaching materials!
My website
First I would like to state this post is required for my EDM Class at South Alabama University, also I will be following this blog on my blog which I am also required to write the URL to, which is : chestnutkennethedm310.blogspot.com
AND my class blog : edm310.blogspot.com
Okay, I think this young guy has a solid view point on his issues regardless of his “experience.” I agree with what he has described, and I know the classroom environment changes while furthering your education, but my argument is why spend so much time and money teaching kids information or “facts” that will not help them find solutions to their real world problems?
Ms. Sharon Elin, I am a student at the University of South Alabama and I am required to read your posts for my EDM 310 class. Dan Brown’s video was part of one of our blog assignments. I agree with your comments! I found it interesting when you questioned how we should go about overhauling the United States Educational System. You are correct when you say we don’t agree on a fix or how to proceed as you stated. We just know what we have now isn’t cutting the mustard so to speak.
Hello again,
I enjoyed reading what you had to say about Dan Browns video. I agree with your comments. We have to be able to work together to come up with a way to fix our educational system. We keep posing problems without solutions. We all need to work together to come up with solutions for our education system.