On May 2, 2018 the Harvard Business Review, one of my favorite publications for reading, published an article by Ulrich Boser entitled Learning is a Learned Behavior. Here's How to Get Better at It. The article points out that contrary to our popular belief, learning is not necessarily linked to intelligence. It also points to emerging research that shows with practice and strategy, anyone can get better at learning, just like anything else you practice.
This has huge applications for a classroom, namely that our ability to learn can be treated just like our ability to throw a football, dribble a basketball, ride a bike or write something for publication. It can get better with practice. The real question is, why don't we treat learning like a behavior? Why do we still treat it, and more importantly account for it, like it's skill acquisition. Is there more value in a "test" than in a metacognitive reflection on a specific idea, concept or problem? If we're going to be tied to grades, shouldn't we at least place as much value on a metacognitive reflection as we do a regurgitation of a practiced set of steps or historical facts? As Boser articulates so eloquently in this article "The issue, then, is not that something goes in one ear and out the other. The issue is that individuals don't dwell on the dwelling. They don't push themselves to really think about their thinking." Finally the article describes how important a moment of "silent introspection" is to learning. With out quiet reflection we miss that opportunity to really wrestle with our understandings, perceptions, biases and takeaways. A moment of silence can't be underestimated or undervalued in terms of how we get better at learning. Learning is learned behavior. You can (and should) practice it. If we want to really get serious about closing gaps, eliminating disproportionality and all of the other issues we face in classrooms today we better start holding learning practices as religiously as we hold sports practices.
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January 2020
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