Let Us Learn to Solve
Problems
David H.
Jonassen
One of the implicit goals of much of my work has been to change the
culture of learning anywhere that I can. In order to do so, I believe, we must
engage and support more meaningful learning outcomes in all formal and informal
learning contexts.
Meaningful learning is tacitly accepted and
verbally supported by most educators. Unfortunately, it seldom occurs. Public
schools are compelled by budget and censure to insure that students are skilled
test takers, so they will not be "left behind" in their abilities to take tests.
Corporate trainers too often reprise lessons that are decades old. Universities
tell students about the world and then quiz their understanding of something
they never experience. The field of Instructional Design and Technology
continues to regard every perceived need as an opportunity to apply new
technologies. To blog or not to blog, that is the question this week. What is
ignored in all of these venues is meaningful learning, because educators are too
committed to instruction and too impelled by shallow conceptions of
accountability. Besides, it's very hard to assess meaningful learning, so recall
is OK. At least the students show us something. Except how to think, reason, and
function in the world.
What should students learn? What is meaningful
learning? That is a very debatable question. For some, it is known as critical
thinking or self-regulated learning. For others, meaningful learning relates to
domain-specific skills, such as solving a differential equation or engaging in a
philosophic discussion. I have been conducting research on how to support causal
reasoning and argumentation, so they are two of my favorites. But, let me
suggest another approach to defining it (because we do like to define and
demarcate things, don't we). Rather than asking what is meaningful learning, let
us ask when and why do we engage in meaningful learning. We engage in meaningful
learning most consistently when we have a personal problem to solve. On the job,
workers are required to solve problems. In the home, we are motivated impelled
to learn in order to solve a problem. THE most common activity that requires
meaningful learning is problem solving.
Therefore, every course,
goal, and learning objective, from kindergarten through graduate school (plus
corporate training, even though they eschew problem solving as a learning
outcome), should require students to solve problems. Restated, the only
legitimate goal of education is problem solving.
Why?
1.
Authenticity.
In everyday life
and work, people constantly solve problems (ill-structured problems). Virtually
every professional, most paraprofessionals, and a high proportion of workers are
hired, retained, and rewarded for solving problems. The kinds of problems that
they solve in the workplace are almost always incongruent with the kinds of
problems that students learn to solve in classrooms (if they get to solve
problems in the classroom). There are exceptions. In my high school, the only
students who solved meaningful problems were in the industrial arts program (a
curious irony, given their low status). Workplace problems are ill-structured
(unclear goals, unknown problem elements, multiple solutions and solution paths,
no explicit means for determining appropriate actions), but we know very little
about ill-structured problem solving, and rarely, if ever, require students to
solve them. Therefore, graduates are unprepared to solve workplace problems. The
most compelling rationale for teaching students to learning to solve problems is
that if we don't, they will become increasingly unable to solve the complex,
collaborative, dynamic, and distributed problems of the 21st century workplace,
so we are destined as a society to become less competitive in the new world.
There are so many problems that need solving everywhere. At the
global level, the Union of International Associations maintains a database of
over 30,000 problems that continue to defy our problem-solving skills. Here are
a couple of my concerns (how can the U.S. regain the trust of Muslim nations, or
how can we help our legislative branch of government become less fiercely
dualistic so they can actually begin to resolve some of the problems in our
country?). At a local level, if you examine the first few pages of any newspaper
in print, problems of all sizes and levels of complexity drip off of the pages.
At the personal level, our everyday lives are filled with problems from the
mundane (what should I wear to day, or how can I avoid a traffic jam on the way
to work?). Karl Popper wrote a book of essays, entitled "Alles Leben is Problem
Lösen (all life is problem solving).
If you don't believe me, then
perhaps you will listen to several reports. For years, reports have validated
the importance of problem solving in the workplace. For instance the SCANS
Report (1991), What Work Requires of Schools, states that problem solving is an
essential thinking skill for workers. The Accreditation Board for Engineering
Technology (ABET, 2000) specifies the abilities to identify, formulate, and
solve engineering problems as essential learning outcomes for any engineering
program. The National Council of Supervisors of Mathematics claims, "Learning to
solve problems is the principal reason for studying mathematics" (NCSM, 2000, p.
1). "If the United States is to maintain its economic leadership and sustain its
share of high-technology jobs, it must prepare the engineers of tomorrow for
future technological and societal changes and to acquire new knowledge quickly
and apply it to emerging problems," said Wayne Clough, Chair of the Committee on
the Engineer of 2020 (National Academy of Engineering,
2004).
2. Intentionality.
From a learning
perspective, problems provide a purpose for learning. Without an intention to
learn, students do not engage in meaningful learning. When they want to solve a
problem (e.g., how to get to the next level of a video game), meaningful
learning is implicit.
3. Meaningfulness.
The knowledge
transmission paradigm of education does not prepare students to do anything
meaningful, like solving problems. The true test of a nation is not reflected in
the multiple-choice-test-taking skills of its populace. In math and science
skills, U.S. students rank near the bottom of the lengthening list of
industrialized nations. The situated learning movement of the past decade has
provided ample evidence that meaning making is most likely to occur when
embedded in some authentic task. Numerous research studies have shown that
constructive activities such as microworlds, anchored instruction, model
building, etc. engage learners more intensely and result in conceptual change.
Knowledge that is constructed in the context is more meaningful, more
integrated, better retained, and more transferable. Problems provide the most
meaningful reason for learning. Goethe, among others, was quoted as say that
"Life is short". There is so little time allocated to education that we should
not waste any of it with irrelevant instruction.
4. Wrong
Ontology.
The knowledge
transmission paradigm of education accords value to content. Content is the
stuff that students should know, according to some curriculum. Unfortunately,
content is normally defined in textbooks, syllabi, and curricula as a
hierarchical lists of subject matter topics. As I argue in a forthcoming
ETR&D article, this form of knowledge representation (ontology) is
incongruent with the ways in which humans most naturally and commonly make sense
of the world (knowledge in use and experiential).
5.
Intellectual Underdevelopment.
The knowledge
transmission paradigm of education assumes an absolutist epistemology, where
content is believed to represent the truth. Students learn that "the truth" is
what is on the exam, which impedes their consideration or exploration of
alternate perspectives, let alone the construction of their own belief systems.
It is sad but true (I believe) that the way that we typically teach students
represses their intellectual development and causes them to refrain, "what's on
the test" because that is all we need to know. As much as we may despise those
words, it's our fault. As Pogo the possum once said, "We have met the enemy, and
he is us." It is an insult to learners and a monumental societal anchor.
Shouldn't we expect more? Shouldn't people be prepare to solve their own problem
and hopefully contribute to others'.
6. Design.
As I
argued in a chapter recently published in Innovations in Instructional
Technology: Essays in Honor of M. David Merrill (Jonassen, 2004) problem solving
provides a variety of models for organizing micro-level lessons. I showed how
different kinds of problem solving require different combinations of
instructional transactions. So, rather than mystically identifying a learning
outcome and sequencing learning tasks in a prerequisite sequence, learning to
solve a troubleshooting problem, for example, would require a specific
combinations of instructional transactions.
The right Achilles heel of most instructional designers is task analysis
(assessment pains the left heel). Most designers are functional with one method
(procedural or prerequisite) but ignorant of most other methods. Problem solving
outcomes combine needs assessment and task analysis into a single process.
Through interview or observation, if you determine that the refrigeration
technicians you are training primarily solve troubleshooting problem, you know
the kinds of instructional activities that are required to help them learn to
troubleshoot. So the activities that you select are more relevant. Rather than
having students in an online course "discuss the importance of compressors", let
them collaborate to solve a problem by combining their experiences and knowledge
(the same rationale that John Seeley Brown used when replacing the training
department at Xerox Park with a coffee pot.
Conclusion
As an instructional design community that is increasingly
concerned with authenticity and situated learning, problem solving should become
a primary focus of researchers and designers. We need better models for
designing environments to support different kinds of problem solving in
different contexts (The bibliography below lists some of my contributions). We
need to research strategies other than worked examples (e.g., conceptual change,
causal reasoning, argumentation, tools for representing problems, etc.) for
supporting learning to solve problems. And yes, we need to better understand how
technologies can support problem solving, and not the other way
around.
Bibliography
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