“Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught.”
~ Oscar Wilde on Education
“War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength ”
~ The Ministry of Truth
“Edumacayshun? Wuts Taht?”
~ Typical ED User on Education
~ Oscar Wilde on Education
“War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength ”
~ The Ministry of Truth
“Edumacayshun? Wuts Taht?”
~ Typical ED User on Education
The History of Education
“Enlighten the people generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like evil spirits at the dawn of day.”
~ Thomas Jefferson
The Dark Pre-Dawn of Education
Long ago, before the advent of civilized man, there was no such thing as formal education. Education began, like all things, wild, free, and dangerous. Sharp things cut, hot things burned, and "scary big thing with lots of teeth going to eat you watchout watchout" ate you. However, it soon became evident that this informal, experiential type of learning was doomed to failure through attrition.
At this time in history, education was limited to short bursts of important information, delivered after the experiential learning had occurred. Unfortunately, these bursts often resulted in bursts, due to the unfortunate timing necessitated by experiential learning. As a way around this, early man soon devised a cunning educational technique which became known as "oook!". Using the newly devised "oook!" technique, these primitive hominids were able to indicate that experiential learning was about to occur, so the student had better be paying attention. This is demonstrated in the following, fairly standard educational example:
Scene fades in as Zook looks around, and spots a tiger.
"Zook!" Zook exclaims, pointing at the tiger.
The tiger eats Zook.
Scene fades out as the tiger plays tug-of-war with Zook's esophagus.
In this educational example, Zook was only able to benefit from experiential education. See how badly it turned out for Zook? Now examine what happens when Zook is able to learn through the "oook!" method:
Scene fades in as Zook looks around, and spots a tiger.
"Oook!" points out Gook.
"Oook?" Zook asks, pointing at the tiger.
The tiger eats Zook.
Scene fades out as the tiger plays tug-of-war with Zook's esophagus.
In this educational example, Zook learns a valuable lesson - "oook!" means, "Watch out, that tiger is going to eat you." In this way, Zook is able to learn a lesson through non-experiential means. Of course, Zook does not know that "oook" means this, and must learn it experientially. While this is not quite the sterling success it might seem, it laid the groundwork for more advanced educational techniques.
[edit] The Dawn of Education
Jimmy, there's something you should know about tigers...
For the better part of a few hundred thousand years, educational practices were limited to experiential learning and the "oook" method. However, better and brighter times were on the horizon, wrapped in the sparkling and exciting packaging of language.
While fairly useless in educating others about tigers, the "oook" method was fairly useful in educational situations dealing with fruit, rain, and small amounts of fire, as can be seen in the following educational example:
Scene fades in as Zook is starting to reach towards a burning fire with his bare hand.
"Oook!" points out Gook.
"Oook?" Zook asks, looking back at Gook.
"Oook!" confirms Gook.
Zook sticks his hand in the fire for a second, then pulls it out and runs away screaming.
Gook shakes his head and mutters, "Oook."
Obviously, in this example, Zook is able to connect his experiential learning to the utterance of "oook" by Gook. At the same time, due to the non-lethality of this experiential learning experience, Zook is able to add this to his danger-pain schema for future use and modification. As seen in this next educational example:
Scene fades in as Zook is starting to reach towards a nice apple.
"Oook oook." notes Gook, eating another apple.
"Oook?" Zook asks, looking back at Gook, wide-eyed.
"Oook!" confirms Gook.
Zook backs away from the apple and runs away screaming.
Gook shakes his head and mutters, "Oook."
As we can see here, Zook has been able to modify his danger-pain schema based on a combination of auditory and experiential learning. Obviously this event represents a great leap in educational technique, as Gook has just experienced the joys of educating the youth of today. Or of yesterday. Or of the Pleistocene epoch.
Obviously, the "oook" method is somewhat limited in the educational information that it is able to convey. Yet Gook is working on the subtle nuances of language, most easily seen in his body language and heard in the inflection of his "oook"s. Were this to come to fruition, education would take a sizable leap forward, like it did circa the beginning of the Holocene epoch:
Scene fades in as Zook is starting to reach towards a burning fire with his bare hand.
"Oook!" points out Gook.
"Oook?" Zook asks, looking back at Gook.
"Oook!" confirms Gook, smacking him upside the head.
Zook sticks tongue out at Gook, and sticks his hand in the fire anyway.
As Zook runs away screaming, Gook shakes his head and mutters, "Dumbass"
Here we can see how the advent of language exponentially increases the educational opportunities once solely available under experiential and "oook" methods. With such important groundwork laid, education was primed for rapid upward expansion, to be slowed only by bureaucracy and apathy.
“Enlighten the people generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like evil spirits at the dawn of day.”
~ Thomas Jefferson
The Dark Pre-Dawn of Education
Long ago, before the advent of civilized man, there was no such thing as formal education. Education began, like all things, wild, free, and dangerous. Sharp things cut, hot things burned, and "scary big thing with lots of teeth going to eat you watchout watchout" ate you. However, it soon became evident that this informal, experiential type of learning was doomed to failure through attrition.
At this time in history, education was limited to short bursts of important information, delivered after the experiential learning had occurred. Unfortunately, these bursts often resulted in bursts, due to the unfortunate timing necessitated by experiential learning. As a way around this, early man soon devised a cunning educational technique which became known as "oook!". Using the newly devised "oook!" technique, these primitive hominids were able to indicate that experiential learning was about to occur, so the student had better be paying attention. This is demonstrated in the following, fairly standard educational example:
Scene fades in as Zook looks around, and spots a tiger.
"Zook!" Zook exclaims, pointing at the tiger.
The tiger eats Zook.
Scene fades out as the tiger plays tug-of-war with Zook's esophagus.
In this educational example, Zook was only able to benefit from experiential education. See how badly it turned out for Zook? Now examine what happens when Zook is able to learn through the "oook!" method:
Scene fades in as Zook looks around, and spots a tiger.
"Oook!" points out Gook.
"Oook?" Zook asks, pointing at the tiger.
The tiger eats Zook.
Scene fades out as the tiger plays tug-of-war with Zook's esophagus.
In this educational example, Zook learns a valuable lesson - "oook!" means, "Watch out, that tiger is going to eat you." In this way, Zook is able to learn a lesson through non-experiential means. Of course, Zook does not know that "oook" means this, and must learn it experientially. While this is not quite the sterling success it might seem, it laid the groundwork for more advanced educational techniques.
[edit] The Dawn of Education
Jimmy, there's something you should know about tigers...
For the better part of a few hundred thousand years, educational practices were limited to experiential learning and the "oook" method. However, better and brighter times were on the horizon, wrapped in the sparkling and exciting packaging of language.
While fairly useless in educating others about tigers, the "oook" method was fairly useful in educational situations dealing with fruit, rain, and small amounts of fire, as can be seen in the following educational example:
Scene fades in as Zook is starting to reach towards a burning fire with his bare hand.
"Oook!" points out Gook.
"Oook?" Zook asks, looking back at Gook.
"Oook!" confirms Gook.
Zook sticks his hand in the fire for a second, then pulls it out and runs away screaming.
Gook shakes his head and mutters, "Oook."
Obviously, in this example, Zook is able to connect his experiential learning to the utterance of "oook" by Gook. At the same time, due to the non-lethality of this experiential learning experience, Zook is able to add this to his danger-pain schema for future use and modification. As seen in this next educational example:
Scene fades in as Zook is starting to reach towards a nice apple.
"Oook oook." notes Gook, eating another apple.
"Oook?" Zook asks, looking back at Gook, wide-eyed.
"Oook!" confirms Gook.
Zook backs away from the apple and runs away screaming.
Gook shakes his head and mutters, "Oook."
As we can see here, Zook has been able to modify his danger-pain schema based on a combination of auditory and experiential learning. Obviously this event represents a great leap in educational technique, as Gook has just experienced the joys of educating the youth of today. Or of yesterday. Or of the Pleistocene epoch.
Obviously, the "oook" method is somewhat limited in the educational information that it is able to convey. Yet Gook is working on the subtle nuances of language, most easily seen in his body language and heard in the inflection of his "oook"s. Were this to come to fruition, education would take a sizable leap forward, like it did circa the beginning of the Holocene epoch:
Scene fades in as Zook is starting to reach towards a burning fire with his bare hand.
"Oook!" points out Gook.
"Oook?" Zook asks, looking back at Gook.
"Oook!" confirms Gook, smacking him upside the head.
Zook sticks tongue out at Gook, and sticks his hand in the fire anyway.
As Zook runs away screaming, Gook shakes his head and mutters, "Dumbass"
Here we can see how the advent of language exponentially increases the educational opportunities once solely available under experiential and "oook" methods. With such important groundwork laid, education was primed for rapid upward expansion, to be slowed only by bureaucracy and apathy.
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