Developing New Minds

I must give credit to Pat Bassett, the president of the National Association of Independent Schools. A recent workshop he gave on effecting change for the 21^st century provided a framework for me to clarify some of my thinking.

Over a year ago, I read the book A Whole New Mind – Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future by Daniel Pink. While intended mainly to provide a business perspective on our changing economy, Pink’s assertion that the information age is giving way to a conceptual age has definite implications for how we (should) educate students to give them the best chance for success.

What follows is the beginning of a synthesis of the workshop, the book, and my own perspective. While perhaps being guilty of some ivory-tower idealism, it would be nice to see schools ride the crest of the changing world rather than trying to catch up to the wave in the next generation.

The digital age has broken through the barriers that used to limit access to information. Students no longer need to find information in a book or hear it from a teacher, which means they no longer have to be in class or have the right book handy or have to wait until the library opens. Search engines provide almost instant access to more data than generations of students could have imagined.

But – not all data is created equal. A single search can yield a spectrum of data that ranges from highly regarded science to sheer quackery. Educated students need a more strongly developed ability to evaluate and synthesize what they read, skills that are high on Bloom’s taxonomy in the cognitive domain. Basic factual comprehension and understanding inferences are no longer enough.

Along with the consequences of unlimited access to data, there are the economic realities that Pink lays out in his book. Traditional information age jobs can be automated or outsourced. The abundance our culture provides does not limit our purchasing choices to what we need, but rather what we want, meaning that aesthetics can play a larger role in our commerce than utilitarianism.

It is incumbent on our education system to adapt to these realities.