What makes a good course? (7th Mar 2012)
Obviously, lots of content, a logical structure and a useful qualification at the end.
Well, for once, I'm going to agree with the opening statement, just not quite in the way it is all meant currently.
There should be lots of content. The more knowledge that can be packed into a given time, the better. However, the atoms being achieved may not all come from a set syllabus. A computing student who also achieves paleontology atoms is learning more than a student who only completes those in computing. The syllabus should be a minimum level of content and not the maximum.
At the moment, a student who completes a qualification does not need to demonstrate an understanding of the whole curriculum. For example, a student who has an A* grade in mathematics has shown that they have covered the content well, but even they will have gaps. In this case, the gaps may be small, but crucial at the next level. Therefore, the current system accepts that no student will have a complete understanding of the syllabus of a course, but give them the qualification any way! The "acceptable standard" is always lower than the content of the course. Maybe we should consider a far finer granularity of knowledge, accept that this has then really been achieved and that the body of learning may not all be in one, narrowly defined area. A good course would give more opportunities to achieve than that.
What about the logical structure? Well, yes please - just not in the way it is at the moment. A student who starts a course knows what will be covered from day 1. It is fixed and immutable because we have our schemes of work! Yes, as a lecturer, I know that whilst I will deliver everything in the syllabus, what will be acquired by my students will only be a proportion of that, but that is what is expected. However, rather than me impose a structure, how about the student being involved in the process? I am not proposing that students do anything, merely that they become more and more involved in setting up the parameters as they move up the academic ladder. Their first attempts to negotiate goals may be totally unrealistic - but that is also part of the learning process. The sooner those lessons are learnt, the sooner a realistic view of the world can be introduced. What will matter here is how we deal with the "failure".
Failure is a concept that has a very negative meaning - it was a non-concept at my primary school where thing were just not finished yet, but at secondary school it was the only metric by which you were measured. The meaning that was current at my primary school, i.e. not completed yet, is the one that would fit atomisation. Those who set unrealistic goals have not achieved that atom yet. Those who want to become a rock star or a Big Brother "celebrity" may also not be there yet. Atomisation encourages future self-expansion rather than dwells on the past. In that way, learning can become a life-long journey rather than something that is done to you for a set period.
And now, for those useful qualifications. You may think those have been abolished in a fog of idealism. How can the system proposed above deliver doctors to our hospitals or lawyers to the court room? Suppose the atoms required to achieve a qualification were mapped out (something that has happened in the previous blogs and on o-vl.com). The system could look at your portfolio of atoms and match those against the qualifications. Then a certificate pops through the letterbox when your portfolio matches a qualification. This could be taken further by the system looking for the qualifications nearest to your portfolio and alerting you to the atoms you need to achieve that. The next stage would be to enter career goals (yes, plural because you may have several avenues you want to explore) and map an atom path for you. In this way the student stays in control of their learning and that should affect motivation.
There is another important factor though, social cohesion. If this exists within the course then students are much more likely to achieve. If those on a course had a common purpose, then those on it would feel a part of something and each could feed off the others. The level would be irrelevant if those present were all enthusiastic about a particular subject area. If each felt supported and their enthusiasm understood by the others then mutual help is more likely. Much more importantly, though, people would want to come in and learn. Some of my students have challenging lives outside of class. Some have abusive families, some have "helpful" friends (read, run in gangs) and some are unwell. Each of these are good reasons not to succeed in conventional education, but whom a socially cohesive atomised learning system would help. It will not cure those problems but it will minimise their effect.