Training vs learning

[Myron Tribus <mtribus@compuserve.com>]

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"Within the same company but different delegates I am re-running the
series.
- I have changed my approach - This time I have far more discussion
groups(of 4) so that they learn from each other - I worry that the groups
are like the blind leading the blind - rule 4 of the funnel experiment -
but what I am finding is that they are learning far more."
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Gordon has provided us with a good example of the difference between
teaching and learning.  It reminds me of an anecdote David Langford often
tells:
"Last week I taught my dog to whistle.  Now it isn't easy to teach a dog to
whistle.  In the first place you have to learn a lot of physiology.  The
dog's throat is different and the muscles are differently placed.  Then
there is the matter of dog psychology.  But I studied and last week I
taught my dog to whistle.  He didn't learn,  but I taught."

Many years ago,  in discussions with Dr. Bertrand Schwartz,  one of the
world's leading experts on adult learning,  I learned that it is useful to
divide teaching activities into four categories:
1) The acquisition of knowledge.   This occurs in many ways:  reading,
looking at video tapes, listening to a lecture
2) Confrontation of ideas.   This occurs when you talk with other people
about what you have learned and discover that others,  hearing the same
thing,  have a different slant.  This causes you to look more closely at
what you took as knowledge.
3) Reduction to practice.  This involves working on a real problem in which
you learn to formulate questions and then apply what you have learned to
developing an answer.  This step converts knowledge to know-how and
develops wisdom, that is,  the ability to set priorities and to decide what
is worth doing.
4) Evaluative feedback.  Everyone needs to know the answer to the question
"How am I doing?"  This occurs efficiently when three students review their
work with an expert and see how the others did.  It removes the one-on-one
judge-and-jury aspect of an evaluation since afterwards the three students
can compare notes on what they saw and can give each other moral support.
In my opinion,  the worst kind of attempt at education is one in which the
instructor plays the role of 'sage on the stage' and works diligently to
see that the students develop the 'correct concepts'.
If you think you understand a students concept by listening to what he says
then you also think you know what a man means when he tells a woman, "I
love you."

Myron Tribus,  350 Britto Terrace,  Fremont, CA 94539
Ph:510 651 3641  Fax: 510 656 9875   e-mail: mtribus@compuserve.com
Bureaucracies do not opt for change for the same reason turkeys do not
favor Christmas.
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