Experimental Education

Talking after class with Libby and Kirk, I realized (after both Libby and Kirk explained it to me) that this is a class to throw out ideas.  Let me explain.  It seems as though we, as students, are being asked to just think and explore different ideas that might help education.  This isn't the time to shoot down ideas; in my mind, we should just be throwing out ideas and seeing which ones get traction.  This course is kind of like an experiment lab, except instead of mixing chemicals, we are mixing ideas and view points.  

It's taken me weeks to get to this understanding of the course, and I'm excited about it.  We shouldn't be overly connected to any of our ideas; we just need to generate them.  We should be generating so many that if one doesn't seem to resonate, it doesn't matter; we can just go to the next one.  I think this is one of the reasons we have been given the assignment to look into the future of education.  Nothing is wrong for this assignment; we have no way of knowing.  And along those lines, nothing is right.  Even though that makes everyone uncomfortable (because we like to have "right" answers), not searching for the "right" answer is just as liberating as knowing that nothing is wrong.  The only way we will fail is if we don't think and we don't create new ideas.  Like Patrick said, we just have to explore certain beliefs, and some of those beliefs are going to have to be exploded.

I think I'm starting to understand this class and its purpose more and more.  However, I'm sure that things will change next week and I'll be back to being confused.  But even confusion is a key purpose to this class.  It's uncomfortable at first but ultimately exciting.