Tag: education
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Mistakes on Tests Crucial to Learning
Thanks to our illusory superiority we consistently overestimate our performance on tests, and, without quality feedback, rapidly become oblivious to the gaps in our knowledge. Furthermore, many consider testing to be an ineffectual tool for assessing performance and errors to be counterproductive to learning. Challenging this preconception is research suggesting that making mistakes on tests–and being…
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Being a Successful Teacher
The non-profit organisation Teach For America has, for two decades, been tracking huge amounts of data on its thousands of teachers and the results they get from their students. By mining the data, testing hypotheses and refining hiring and training practises constantly, the organisation says it is now starting to create a reliable profile of…
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Entrepreneurial Success Not Correlated to University Prestige
An analysis of the educational backgrounds of tech company founders has shown that an elite education does not provide as much of an advantage as many expect. In fact the results seem to show that where one studies has no correlation to entrepreneurial success, as long as one actually does study. The 628 U.S.-born tech…
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Business Schools Failing American Manufacturing
America’s deterioration as a leader in the engineering and manufacturing fields can be attributed largely to the failings of the elite business schools, suggests Noam Scheiber, Rhodes Scholar and senior editor at The New Republic. Business school graduates are now educated toward high paid financial services jobs, leading gradually to an “era of management by…
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Statistics on Social Mobility and Belief Systems
Careers in law, medicine and the media are become more exclusive, while citizens from deprived areas continue to be failed by education. New Statesman provides a summary of (some) social mobility issues in the U.K., including these somewhat startling statistics: Privately educated candidates account for 7 per cent of the population, but occupy more than half…
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Breeding Trust Through Better Science Journalism
With a public distrust of scientists comes the idea that “no scientific evidence will ever be compelling”. That’s what we can learn from Creationism, says Andrew Brown, and to solve this distrust we cannot rely on education to help the next generation understand, but instead we must improve science journalism. I’m not sure what the…
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Healthy Food Boosts School Results
In 2004 UK TV chef Jamie Oliver ran an experiment at a school in Greenwich, London for an upcoming show of his, Jamie’s School Dinners. By various means Oliver attempted to improve the eating habits of the school’s students and, by-and-large, succeeded. Tracking his progress–and that of the children–were two Oxford economists, Michele Belot and Jonathan James.…
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The Inefficacy of Learning Styles
Learning styles, you’ve heard of them before: visual, kinaesthetic or auditory learners; left and right brainers; activists, reflectors and analysts. However learning styles are “theoretically incoherent and conceptually confused” concluded a 2004 study from the UK’s Learning and Skills Development Agency—an agency set up by the UK government to “improve the quality of post-16 education…
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Gladwell on Education, Hiring, Journalism
I haven’t read (m)any of Malcolm Gladwell‘s articles in the past 6 months as they’re all, well, a bit homogeneous. Plus, if there are any fascinating revelations that I really should hear about I’ll undoubtedly discover them (in a much-condensed form) in many other places rehashing his content. This interview with Malcolm Gladwell—where he discusses…
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New Literacy Strategies
Seth Roberts recently reflected on the New York Times article The Future of Reading | A New Assignment: Pick Books You Like with his own piece entitled Student Power. Seth delivers his own constructive criticism regarding the American higher education system (emphasis his): 1. Students in a class are treated all alike. They’re not. All…