Please visit my new homepage since Nov 2023 here

Vision

Core aspects of students’ human-capital investments will be codified. They will not only control the means of human-capital production, but create them. Thus, their educational investments are crystallised as engines for further development. As such, objects for future creative destruction.

Whether or not students master all details, the most sophisticated knowledge within the curriculum will be at their disposal regardless. Their knowledge arranged to deal with any solvable riddle, within the domain and range of theory corresponding to syllabus, with a few keystrokes. They will be encouraged to ask relevant questions, create and cooperate while conquering the necessary conditions for their independence. The tremendous increase in productive potential following from the realisation of this vision, naturally demands adaptation in pedagogy to regulate supply.

One crucial adaptation is to dissolve tension between theoretical and practical. Code is employed as a vehicle for independent exploration of fundamental principles, not to focus on what programmers are specialised to do. Domain and range of theory cease to be philosophical speculation, in important respects, as the question rather is whether or not a given theory can be computed. Learning incentives exhibit similar clarity associated with problem solving, like immediate feedback; exact thinking; articulation and communication. Although theoretical in nature, students can nevertheless look forward to tangible labour-market skills

This endeavour grants tangible rewards through output which expands the set of feasible future creative undertakings. Incentive schemes for knowledge growth through free exchange and cooperation are given more options. Students will be encouraged to make use of their techniques in a variety of realistic settings, including innovation and teaching. In terms of organisation, synergies across courses and faculties are far-reaching. These knowledge keys may someday become part of what is to be a student. Even the Alumni will have incentives to come back for updates as evolutionary forces of each generation of students will exert pressure towards refinements with increased levels of scope and sophistication.

Reflection

The structure of my pedagogical framework, presupposes active students and teachers. It brings together desirable traits such as clear theoretical objectives, experimentation, mastery, relevance, framing, feedback and agency. It is consistent with research on learning at an individual cognitive level, and as an arena for reflective development.

The pedagogical practices and aims of this vision are compatible with findings in the literature regarding general thinking, learning, critical thinking and inclusion. Tricot & Sweller (2012) show that what once was thought of as innate and domain-general, including notions of memory and intelligence, has turned out to be crucially dependent on experience or domain-specific, and can thus be taught. They recommend worked problems as a first stage in achieving problem-solving mastery. This does not necessarily imply docility. Research shows it is feasible to improve critical thinking both with generic and content-specific approaches when dialogue, mentoring and ‘authentic’ problems or examples are employed (Abrami et al. 2015).

 Research also suggests that inclusion, by supporting the less privileged, does not necessarily come with a cost for the rest. Active learning is a teaching practice with statistically significant positive effects on overall student performance (Freeman et al. 2014)[1]. Evidence indicates that all benefit from a structured active learning, but less privileged groups improve most (Eddy & Hogan, 2014). Therefore, this approach allows adaptation to bridge general thinking and particular skills; structured environments and independence; inclusion and high academic standards.

The ‘backend’ environment where coding takes place is mental-simulation intensive. It combines assessing the syllabus, employing it while reflecting, and looking forward to begin to plan applications. A similar process takes place at a ‘frontend’ phase but more narrowly directed towards the realisation of research aspirations and problem solving.

Teaching thus becomes naturally in tune with reflective adaptive learning practices which emerge as vouge in pedagogical and psychological research. For reference see Walsh et al (2023; 2022) and Cole et al. (2021). The positive effects in a heterogeneity of cases suggest a general mechanism to be harnessed. The project under consideration aspires to add evidence in favour of reflective learning in university settings, and research provides ample reasons for optimism in this regard.

This pedagogical project prepares students and researchers for imminent uncertainty. Heterodox approaches have become a survival strategy for Economics. Evidence refuted some of its long-held assumptions, and currently supports alternative perspectives such as MMT. Hence, an intriguing era of hypothesis testing and ground-breaking theoretical syntheses is within reach, for those open to the new challenges ahead.

References

Abrami, C. et al. (2015). Strategies for Teaching Students to Think
Critically: A Meta-Analysis. Review of Educational Research.

Cole S.N., Smith, D.M., Ragan K., Suurmond, R. and Armitage C.J. (2021). Synthesizing the effects of mental simulation on behavior change:

Systematic review and multilevel meta-analysis

Eddy, L.S and Hogan A.K. (2014). Getting Under the Hood: How and for Whom Does Increasing Course Structure Work? Life Sciences Education. 13, 453-468

Freeman et al. (2014). Active learning increases student performance in science, engineering, and mathematics. PNAS

Tricot, A and Sweller, J. (2012). Domain-Specific Knowledge and Why Teaching Generic Skills Does Not Work. Educ Psychol Rev 26, 265-283

Walsh M.E, Witherspoon E.B, Schunn C.D, and Matsumura L.C. (2023). Mental simulations to facilitate teacher learning of ambitious mathematics instruction in coaching interactions. International Journal of STEM Education.

Walsh M.E, Schunn C.D, Matsumura L.C., Zook-Howell, D. (2022). Mental Simulations to Advance Adaptive Teaching Expertise in Reflection-based Instructional Coaching. International Society of the Learning Sciences.

[1] This paragraph benefits from the generous information on the subject provided by Georgetown University. For more info https://commons.georgetown.edu/teaching/teach/