KEY POINTS:
Recent headlines about the effectiveness of Te Kotahitanga highlight this country's failure to realise that successful initiatives in education must be founded on robust evidence and research.
For many decades educational practice has been based on dogma, opinion and political agendas, ideas that add up to nothing more than empty slogans and pop psychology.
This is largely because decisions about the outcomes (successful or otherwise) of new education programmes or initiatives are usually anticipated before they begin.
Rather than introduce such initiatives as possible approaches that need to be tested and evaluated, they are hyped up before any robust evidence has been collected.
Once it has, and if it is found wanting, it becomes an embarrassment and difficult to dispel.
Enter the debate over Te Kotahitanga. It is a potentially innovative programme designed to improve the learning and development of Maori students.
The programme is based on the premise that the relationship between the teacher and student is of primary significance in terms of learning and, therefore, the reason so many young Maori fail is because that relationship is flawed.
But the assessment sponsored by the Post Primary Teachers' Association has highlighted difficulties in determining whether this programme, or others that may be operating in various schools, are responsible for any identifiable improvements among young Maori students.
No doubt, the ensuing debate over the effectiveness of Te Kotahitanga will be fuelled by political agendas and opinions that may determine the longevity of the programme.
And since these latest headlines it is timely that the Ministry of Education has established a series of Best Evidence Syntheses in order to clearly identify what sound practice should be in education and the basis on which that practice is developed.
Those involved in the business community should take note. These myths cross all ethnic and socio-economic boundaries.
The ministry's findings will help dispel five myths that for decades have permeated our policy-making and practice:
1. That experience is the best way to gain success.
2. That process is more important than product.
3. That learning must be fun and easy.
4. That you must "like" the person who teaches you.
5 That opinion equals fact.
The first myth is that experience is the most effective way for us to learn. This is based on the notion that humans absorb knowledge in much the same way a plant absorbs light. It is based on the view that we will learn if we are exposed to certain experiences. Thus, changes in our behaviour involve setting up a range of experiences and hoping some of what is intended will filter through. Experience alone does not improve performance. What improves performance is knowledge, skills and how they are applied and interpreted by experience. Without better knowledge and skill, experience alone is a vacuum.
The second myth suggests that how a person goes about learning is more important than what they end up knowing. While no one would deny the importance of sound processes to facilitate learning, providing these processes is simply not enough.
A fundamental body of knowledge and range of skills underpin most aspects of life and we must understand them in order to become independent, innovative and creative individuals. These fundamentals include the ability to speak and write well, numeracy, knowledge about the past, about the world and our place in it, and the ability to relate to others.
The third myth is that there are easy ways to learn. There are not. Thomas Edison said genius was 90 per cent perspiration and 10 per cent inspiration.
Much of the research in educational psychology supports Edison's view, that learning is often hard work and requires practice. If we want to be better readers we have to read more and receive clear and accurate feedback on our performance.
Accepting everything and expecting nothing will neither help children learn nor enable them to reach full potential.
The fourth myth is that we need to like the person who teaches us. Utter nonsense. Some of the world's greatest teachers have been roundly disliked by their students because they challenge them, threaten their view of the world and push them firmly out of their comfort zone.
The final myth is that in education opinion equals fact. It does not. All too often educational and business products are marketed and implemented when there is little research behind their development.
Asking people their opinion about whether or not something is or may be successful is no guarantee of success. Blindly accepting the political dogma of the day and assuming it will provide the answers to all our social and economic ills is an even worse predictor of success.
Because of these myths we seem to make little sensible progress in policy development and implementation in New Zealand. That will only change when we accept there are no easy answers in public or private policy.
We must look at what has and has not worked, develop sensible questions to be tested, test them and base our resources and funding on the outcome. In a country of this size it is absurd that we throw so much money at various schemes the way we do.
The success of programmes such as Te Kotahitanga is critical. Too many of our young people are not succeeding.
We will never be a highly skilled, high-salary nation unless we address this. More importantly, we will have failed morally. We cannot claim to be a nation that holds goals such as prosperity and social justice seriously if we know so many of our population do not succeed and yet continue to allow this to happen.
But the path to achieve this is not through the playing out of political agenda and dogma. It is about sound research, applying that research in what we do and being prepared to say we got it wrong.
I hope Te Kotahitanga succeeds. But, more importantly, if it succeeds I hope it is for the right reasons and that we know why. At present all I see is muddy waters.
A colleague of mine once said: "There is a wonderful device for ensuring success - it's called good practice." He is right.
* Dr John Langley is Dean of Education at Auckland University
