This is a wonderful and comprehensive look at the opportunities schools have, Adam! The sad reality is that it will take a long time for the educational enterprise to make the necessary changes that you are advocating - even though we need change today!. Until colleges and universities adopt a process-based rather than knowledge-based approach, the rest of k-12 is kind of forced to keep doing the same old thing, since that's how students gain entry into higher ed.
I'm interested in hearing about ways to be intentional about process learning while the school system attempts to change course. I have some ideas, and I wonder if you have insights to share. Thanks,
It is funny, I often find myself thinking a lot more about the ways in which higher ed is responding to K12 than the other way around. But your comment makes total sense to me! I have some thoughts about this too, and I'm going to try to write up a few more pieces over the course of the next month that hit on this topic and a few others that people have asked for in response to this essay.
Oh yes! A complete manifesto, a call to arms, a source that I think I'll be coming back to often. Thank you for this thorough overview of process-based teaching.
I think I'm a little too too timid to call anything I produce a manifesto! I really appreciate the compliment and I'm glad that you like the piece. I hope it will be helpful!
Adam, Thank you for this thought-provoking post. Have you given any thought to how teacher educators can prepare our future teachers for this AI world? I am especially interested how to prepare undergrads to use AI to enhance K-12 education.
Franklin, You bring up a valid point. All of us, employers, parents and students, have been brought up in a 100% or 4.0 environment. It will take a full transformation before we are able to accept a report card or college transcript as "passed." It will begin somewhere and will be a difficult transformation. Having a portfolio that demonstrates mastery will be much more valuable than a transcript that reports I achieved a 3.8 in my studies.
Adam's modest proposal apparently requires the substitution of pass-fail grading for letter grades or percentage grades. He has literally advocated "replacing the hundred-point scale with a simple binary: the work either meets the clearly defined standards (”specifications”) for a given task, or it does not yet" (https://purposefulai.substack.com/p/the-un-cheatable-assignment). What proportion of students would actually like to see their college transcripts consist mostly or wholly of pass-fail coursework--especially if their college transcripts play an important role in the decisions made by prospective employers or post-graduate school admissions staff? I can imagine a recent graduate trying to explain the lack of letter grades in a job interview--"Well, as you can see, I did not fail a single course, right?" Moreover, how would professors, deans, and provosts view the transformation of most or all of their courses to pass-fail in the wake of abandonment of evil letter grades? "Here at Podunk U.," a provost might brag to a roomful of parents on a campus visit, "we hold our faculty and students to the highest standards--that's why our courses are pass-fail!"
This is a wonderful and comprehensive look at the opportunities schools have, Adam! The sad reality is that it will take a long time for the educational enterprise to make the necessary changes that you are advocating - even though we need change today!. Until colleges and universities adopt a process-based rather than knowledge-based approach, the rest of k-12 is kind of forced to keep doing the same old thing, since that's how students gain entry into higher ed.
I'm interested in hearing about ways to be intentional about process learning while the school system attempts to change course. I have some ideas, and I wonder if you have insights to share. Thanks,
It is funny, I often find myself thinking a lot more about the ways in which higher ed is responding to K12 than the other way around. But your comment makes total sense to me! I have some thoughts about this too, and I'm going to try to write up a few more pieces over the course of the next month that hit on this topic and a few others that people have asked for in response to this essay.
Oh yes! A complete manifesto, a call to arms, a source that I think I'll be coming back to often. Thank you for this thorough overview of process-based teaching.
I think I'm a little too too timid to call anything I produce a manifesto! I really appreciate the compliment and I'm glad that you like the piece. I hope it will be helpful!
Adam, Thank you for this thought-provoking post. Have you given any thought to how teacher educators can prepare our future teachers for this AI world? I am especially interested how to prepare undergrads to use AI to enhance K-12 education.
Franklin, You bring up a valid point. All of us, employers, parents and students, have been brought up in a 100% or 4.0 environment. It will take a full transformation before we are able to accept a report card or college transcript as "passed." It will begin somewhere and will be a difficult transformation. Having a portfolio that demonstrates mastery will be much more valuable than a transcript that reports I achieved a 3.8 in my studies.
Adam's modest proposal apparently requires the substitution of pass-fail grading for letter grades or percentage grades. He has literally advocated "replacing the hundred-point scale with a simple binary: the work either meets the clearly defined standards (”specifications”) for a given task, or it does not yet" (https://purposefulai.substack.com/p/the-un-cheatable-assignment). What proportion of students would actually like to see their college transcripts consist mostly or wholly of pass-fail coursework--especially if their college transcripts play an important role in the decisions made by prospective employers or post-graduate school admissions staff? I can imagine a recent graduate trying to explain the lack of letter grades in a job interview--"Well, as you can see, I did not fail a single course, right?" Moreover, how would professors, deans, and provosts view the transformation of most or all of their courses to pass-fail in the wake of abandonment of evil letter grades? "Here at Podunk U.," a provost might brag to a roomful of parents on a campus visit, "we hold our faculty and students to the highest standards--that's why our courses are pass-fail!"