Noam Chomsky - The Purpose of Education
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0:00 - 0:05[music]
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0:38 - 0:45Well, we could ask ourselves what the purpose of an educational system is
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0:45 - 0:51and there are sharp differences on this matter.
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0:51 - 0:54Now, there's the traditional interpretation
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0:54 - 0:57that comes from the Enlightenment
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0:57 - 1:04which holds that the highest goal in life is to inquire and create,
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1:04 - 1:12to search the riches of the past,
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1:12 - 1:19and try to internalize the parts of them that are significant to you
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1:19 - 1:24and carry that quest for understanding further in your own way.
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1:24 - 1:28The purpose of education from that point of view
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1:28 - 1:35is just to help people determine how to learn on their own.
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1:35 - 1:41It's you, the learner, who is going to achieve in the course of education.
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1:41 - 1:46It's really up to you what you'll master,
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1:46 - 1:49where you'll go, how you'll use it.
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1:49 - 1:58How you'll go on to produce something new and exciting for yourself, maybe for others.
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1:58 - 2:00That's one concept of education.
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2:00 - 2:03Now the other concept is essentially indoctrination.
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2:03 - 2:08People have the idea that from childhood
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2:08 - 2:20young people have to be placed into a framework in which they'll follow orders,
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2:20 - 2:24accept existing frameworks, and not challenge.
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2:24 - 2:27And this is often quite explicit.
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2:27 - 2:35For example, after the activism of the1960s,
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2:35 - 2:42there was great concern across much of the educated spectrum
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2:42 - 2:49that young people were just getting too free and independent,
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2:49 - 2:53that the country was becoming too democratic.
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2:53 - 2:59There was an important study on what's called the crisis of democracy--too much democracy--
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2:59 - 3:09claiming that there are certain insitutions responsible for the indoctrination of the young--
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3:09 - 3:13that's their phrase-- and they're not doing their job properly.
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3:13 - 3:18That schools, universities, churches---we have to change them
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3:18 - 3:22so that they carry out the job of indoctrination and control more effectively.
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3:22 - 3:31That's actually coming from the liberal internationalists' end of the spectrum of educated opinion.
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3:31 - 3:35In fact, since that time there have been many measures taken
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3:35 - 3:41to try to turn the educational system towards more control,
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3:41 - 3:45more indoctrination, more vocational training.
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3:45 - 3:54Imposing a debt which traps students--young people--into a life of conformity.
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3:54 - 4:02That's the exact opposite of what I referred to as the tradition that comes out of the enlightenment.
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4:02 - 4:04There's a constrant struggle between those.
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4:04 - 4:14In the colleges and the schools, do you train for passing tests?
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4:14 - 4:18Or do you train for creative inquiry?
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4:18 - 4:26Pursuing interests that are aroused by material that's presented, you want to pursue either on your own
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4:26 - 4:27or in cooperation with others.
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4:27 - 4:34And this goes all the way through up to graduate school and research.
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4:34 - 4:38Just two different ways of looking at the world.
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4:38 - 4:43When you get to a research institution like the one we're now in,
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4:43 - 4:50at the graduate level, it essentially follows the enlightment tradition.
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4:50 - 5:06In fact, science couldn't progress unless it was based on inculcation of the urge to challenge,
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5:06 - 5:17to question doctrine, question authority, search for alternatives, use your imagination freely of your own impulses.
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5:17 - 5:22Cooperative work with others is constant as you can see just by walking down the halls.
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5:22 - 5:28That's my view of what an educational system should be like down to kindergarten.
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5:28 - 5:35But there certainly are powerful structures in society
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5:35 - 5:39which would prefer people to be indoctrinated,
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5:39 - 5:44to conform, to not ask too many questions, to be obedient,
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5:44 - 5:51to fulfill the roles that are assigned to you and not shake systems of power and authority.
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5:51 - 6:01Those are choices we have to make, wherever we stand in the educational system.
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6:01 - 6:08As students, as teachers, as people on the outside trying to help shape it in the direction that we think it ought to go.
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6:21 - 6:28Well there certainly has been a very substantial growth in new technology--
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6:28 - 6:33technology of information, communication, access interchange.
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6:33 - 6:38It's surely a major change in the nature of the culture and society.
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6:38 - 6:45We should bear in mind that the technological changes that are taking place now,
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6:45 - 6:52while they're significant, probably come nowhere near having as much impact
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6:52 - 6:57as technological advances of a century ago.
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6:58 - 7:03Let's take just communication.
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7:03 - 7:14The shift from a typewriter to a computer or a telephone to email is significant.
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7:14 - 7:21But it doesn't begin to compare with a shift from a sailing vessel to a telegraph.
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7:21 - 7:27The time that that cut down in communication between England and the United States
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7:27 - 7:32was extraordinary as compared with the changes taking place now.
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7:32 - 7:34The same is true of other kinds of technology.
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7:34 - 7:42The introduction of widespread plumbing in the cities had a huge effect on health,
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7:42 - 7:46much more than the discovery of antibiotics.
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7:46 - 7:48So the changes are real and significant,
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7:48 - 7:54but we should recognize that others have taken place that were much more dramatic.
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7:54 - 7:59As far as the technology itself and education is concerned,
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7:59 - 8:05technology is basically neutral.
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8:05 - 8:06It's kind of like a hammer.
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8:06 - 8:12The hammer doesn't care whether you use it to build a house
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8:12 - 8:16or whether a torturer uses it to crush somebody's skull.
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8:16 - 8:18A hammer can do either.
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8:18 - 8:22Same with modern technology, say, the internet, and so on.
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8:22 - 8:27The internet is extremely valuable if you know what you're looking for.
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8:27 - 8:30I use it all the time for research, I'm sure everyone does.
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8:30 - 8:36If you know what you're looking for, you have a kind of framework of understanding
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8:36 - 8:40which directs you through particular things,
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8:40 - 8:44and lets you sideline lots of others.
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8:44 - 8:47then this can be a very valuable tool.
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8:47 - 8:49Of course, you always have to be willing to ask
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8:49 - 8:50"Is my framework the right one?"
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8:50 - 8:52"Maybe I have to modify it.
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8:52 - 8:58"Maybe if there's something I look at that questions it, I should rethink how I'm looking at things."
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8:58 - 9:09But you can't pursue any kind of inquiry without a relatively clear framework
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9:09 - 9:15that's directing your search and helping you choose what's significant and what isn't.
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9:15 - 9:18What can be put aside, what can be pursued,
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9:18 - 9:21what ought to be challenged, what ought to be developed.
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9:21 - 9:26You can't expect somebody to become a biologist
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9:26 - 9:35by giving them access to the Harvard University biology library
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9:35 - 9:37and say, "Just look through it."
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9:37 - 9:40That'll give them nothing.
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9:40 - 9:43The internet is the same except magnified enormously.
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9:43 - 9:47If you don't understand or know what you're looking for,
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9:47 - 9:51if you don't have some kind of conception of what matters--
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9:51 - 9:56always with the proviso that you're willing to question--
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9:56 - 10:04if you don't have that, exploring the internet
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10:04 - 10:09is just picking out random factoids that don't mean anything.
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10:09 - 10:17Behind any significant use of contemporary technology--
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10:17 - 10:23the internet, communications systems, graphics, whatever it may be--
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10:23 - 10:33unless behind it is a well constructed, directive, conceptual apparatus,
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10:33 - 10:38it is very unlikely to be helpful.
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10:38 - 10:39It may turn out to be harmful.
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10:39 - 10:44For example, random exploration through the internet
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10:44 - 10:48turns out to be a cult generator.
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10:48 - 10:52You pick up a factoid here, a factoid there
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10:52 - 10:54and somebody else refers to it.
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10:54 - 10:59All of sudden you have some sort of crazed picture
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10:59 - 11:02which has some factual basis but nothing to do with the world.
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11:02 - 11:06You have to know how to evaluate, interpret, and understand.
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11:06 - 11:10Say biology again.
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11:10 - 11:13The person who wins the Nobel prize in biology
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11:13 - 11:19is not the person who read the most journal articles and took the most notes on them.
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11:19 - 11:21It's the person who knew what to look for.
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11:21 - 11:26And cultivating that capacity to seek what's significant--
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11:26 - 11:30always willing to question whether you're on the right track--
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11:30 - 11:34that's what education is going to be about.
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11:34 - 11:39Whether it's using computers and the internet or pencil and paper and books.
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11:54 - 11:59Well, education is discussed in terms of whether it's a worthwhile investment.
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11:59 - 12:02Does it create human capital
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12:02 - 12:05that can be used for economic growth and so on.
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12:05 - 12:15And it's a very distorting way to even pose the question, I think.
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12:15 - 12:22Do we want to have a society of free, creative, independent individuals,
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12:22 - 12:30able to appreciate and to gain from the cultural achievements of the past, and to add to them?
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12:30 - 12:31Do we want that?
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12:31 - 12:35Or do we want people who can increase GDP?
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12:35 - 12:39It's not necessarily the same thing.
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12:39 - 12:50An education of the kind that Bertrand Russell, John Dewey and others talked about,
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12:50 - 12:52That's a value in itself.
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12:52 - 12:57Whatever impact it has in the society, it's a value
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12:57 - 13:01because it helps create better human beings.
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13:01 - 13:04After all, that's what an educational system should be for.
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13:04 - 13:06On the other hand, if you want to look at it
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13:06 - 13:10in terms of costs and benefits,
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13:10 - 13:16take the new technology that we were just talking about, where did that come from?
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13:16 - 13:19Well, actually a lot of it was developed right where we're sitting,
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13:19 - 13:27Down below where we now are was a major laboratory back in the 1950s,
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13:27 - 13:29where i was employed in fact.
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13:29 - 13:39Which had lots of scientists, engineers, people of all kinds of interests--
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13:39 - 13:41philosophers, others.
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13:41 - 13:46Who were working on developing the basic character
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13:46 - 13:51and even the basic tools of the technology that has now come.
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13:51 - 13:54Computers and the internet for example,
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13:54 - 13:59were pretty much in the public sector for decades,
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13:59 - 14:04funded in places like this, where people were exploring new possibilities
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14:04 - 14:09that were mostly unthought of, unheard of at the time.
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14:09 - 14:11Some of them worked, some didn't.
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14:11 - 14:15The ones that worked were finally converted into tools that people could use.
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14:15 - 14:19Now that's the way scientific progress takes place.
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14:19 - 14:25It's the way that cultural progress takes place generally.
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14:25 - 14:29Classical artists, for example,
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14:29 - 14:34came out of a tradition of craftsmanship that was developed
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14:34 - 14:39over long periods with master artisans, with others.
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14:39 - 14:47Sometimes you can rise on their shoulders and create new, marvelous things.
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14:47 - 14:52But it doesn't come from nowhere.
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14:52 - 15:00If there isn't a lively cultural and educational system
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15:00 - 15:06which is geared towards encouraging creative exploration,
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15:06 - 15:17independence of thought, willingness to challenge accepted beliefs.
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15:17 - 15:25If you don't have that you won't get the technology that will lead to economic gains.
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15:25 - 15:33Though that I don't think is the prime purpose of cultural enrichment in education.
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15:47 - 15:56There is, in the recent period particularly, an increasing shaping of education
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15:56 - 16:04from the early ages on towards passing examinations.
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16:04 - 16:12Taking tests can be of some use, both for the person who is taking the test--
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16:12 - 16:17seeing what I know, and where I am, and what I'm achieving--
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16:17 - 16:24and for instructors--what should be changed and improved in developing
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16:24 - 16:27the course of instruction.
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16:27 - 16:29But beyond that, they don't really tell you much.
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16:29 - 16:36I mean I know for many many years, I've been on admissions committees
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16:36 - 16:43for entry into advanced graduate programs--
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16:43 - 16:45maybe one of the most advanced anywhere--
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16:45 - 16:51and we of course pay some attention to test results, but really not too much.
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16:51 - 17:00A person can do magnificently on every test and understand very little.
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17:00 - 17:05All of us who've been through schools and colleges and universities
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17:05 - 17:07are very familiar with this.
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17:07 - 17:15You can be in some course in which you have no interest
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17:15 - 17:18and there's demand that you pass a test,
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17:18 - 17:21and you can study hard for the test,
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17:21 - 17:26and you can ace it.
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17:26 - 17:31And a couple of weeks later you've forgotten what the topic was.
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17:31 - 17:33I'm sure we've all had that experience.
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17:33 - 17:34I know I have.
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17:34 - 17:39It can be a useful device if it contributes
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17:39 - 17:43to the constructive purposes of education.
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17:43 - 17:46If it's just a set of hurdles you have to cross,
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17:46 - 17:50it can turn out to be not only meaningless,
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17:50 - 17:52but it can divert you away from things that you want to be doing.
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17:52 - 17:56I see this regularly when I talk to teachers.
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17:56 - 18:01If you want an experience from a couple of weeks ago--
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18:01 - 18:06I happeneed to be talking to a group which included many schoolteachers.
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18:06 - 18:09One of them was a sixth grade teacher
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18:09 - 18:12who teaches kids who are ten or eleven.
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18:12 - 18:18She came up to me afterwards and I'd been talking about these students.
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18:18 - 18:24She told me of an experience that she had just had in her class.
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18:24 - 18:31After class a little girl came up to her and said she was really interested
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18:31 - 18:35in something that came up and she asked if the teacher could give her some ideas
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18:35 - 18:37of how she could look into it further.
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18:37 - 18:39And the teacher was compelled to tell her,
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18:39 - 18:42"I'm sorry, but you can't do that,
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18:42 - 18:46"you have to study to pass this national exam
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18:46 - 18:49"that's coming that's going to determine your future."
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18:49 - 18:52The teacher didn't say it, "but it's going to determine my future,
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18:52 - 18:58whether I am rehired."
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18:58 - 19:01The system is geared to getting the children to pass hurdles,
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19:01 - 19:05but not to learn and understand and explore.
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19:05 - 19:10That child would have been better off if she had been allowed to explore
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19:10 - 19:15what she was interested in and maybe not do so well on the test about things she wasn't interested in.
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19:15 - 19:20They'll come along when they fit into her interests and concerns.
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19:20 - 19:27So, I don't say that tests should be eliminated,
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19:27 - 19:30they can be a useful educational tool.
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19:30 - 19:36But ancillary--something that is helping improve ourselves,
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19:36 - 19:40for instructors, and others, what we're doing--tell us where we are.
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19:40 - 19:52Passing tests doesn't begin to compare with searching
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19:52 - 19:59and inquiring into pursuing topics that engage us and excite us.
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19:59 - 20:03That's far more significant than passing tests.
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20:03 - 20:09In fact, if that's the kind of educational career
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20:09 - 20:11that you're given the opportunity to pursue,
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20:11 - 20:14you'll remember what you discovered.
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20:14 - 20:18(Someone) is a world famous physicist
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20:18 - 20:28right here at MIT who was teaching freshman courses.
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20:28 - 20:32He once said that in his freshman course,
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20:32 - 20:37students will ask, "What are we going to cover this semester?"
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20:37 - 20:39And his standard answer was,
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20:39 - 20:43"It doesn't matter what we cover, it matters what you discover."
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20:43 - 20:44That's right.
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20:44 - 20:50Teaching ought to be inspiring students to discover on their own.
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20:50 - 20:55To challenge if they don't agree.
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20:55 - 20:59To look for alternatives if they think there are better ones.
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20:59 - 21:05To work through the great achievements of the past and try to master them on their own
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21:05 - 21:06because they're interested in them.
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21:06 - 21:13If that's the way teaching is done,
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21:13 - 21:19students will really gain from it and will not only remember what they've studied
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21:19 - 21:23but be able to use it as a basis for going on their own.
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21:23 - 21:25And again, education is really aimed
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21:25 - 21:31at helping students get to the point where they can learn on their own.
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21:31 - 21:35Because that's what you're going to do for you life.
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21:35 -Not just absorb materials that are given to you from the outside and repeat it.
- Title:
- Noam Chomsky - The Purpose of Education
- Description:
-
Noam Chomsky discusses the purpose of education, impact of technology, whether education should be perceived as a cost or an investment and the value of standardised assessment.
Presented at the Learning Without Frontiers Conference - Jan 25th 2012- London (LWF 12)
http://www.learningwithoutfrontiers.com
credits:
Interviewed & directed by Graham Brown-Martin
Filmed & edited by Kevin Grant at wildtraxtv (http://on.fb.me/wildtraxtv) - Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- PACE - OLD
- Duration:
- 21:58
altmediaangela edited English subtitles for Noam Chomsky - The Purpose of Education | ||
altmediaangela edited English subtitles for Noam Chomsky - The Purpose of Education | ||
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