David Didau ResearchED

transcript

Everything we know about education is

Wrong!David Didau

ResearchED - 6th September 2014

How many research papers are published each year?

• 28,000 – 90,000

• So, why hasn’t research changed teaching?

• Does research only tell us what was, not what might be?

What is education for?• Transmission of culture?• Making children clever?• Preparation for work?• Preparation for effective

citizenship?• Preparation for life?• Challenging the establishment?• Education is “values saturated”

We’re all wrong!

To err is human

If it looks like a duck…

The Illusion of Naïve Realism

The eyes see only what the brain is prepared to comprehend.

Henri Bergson

The problem with intuition

Our brains are not rational or logical; we protect ourselves from being wrong–Confirmation bias & the Backfire

Effect–The Illusion of Asymmetric Insight–Sunk Cost Fallacy–The Anchoring Effect

David McRaney, You Are Not So Smart

I can live with doubt and uncertainty and not knowing. I think it is much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers that might be wrong.

Richard Feynman

Darwin & the myth of progress

The growth of our knowledge is the result of a process closely resembling what Darwin called ‘natural selection’; that is, the natural selection of hypotheses: our knowledge consists, at every moment, of those hypotheses which have shown their (comparative) fitness by surviving so far in their struggle for existence; a competitive struggle which eliminates those hypotheses which are unfit.

Karl Popper

What we think success looks

What it actually looks like

When others disagreeWe assume:

1. They are ignorant

2. They are stupid

3. They are evil.

The problem with evidence

• It’s not the same as proof: – “You can prove anything with evidence!”

“You can prove anything with evidence!”

• Effectiveness of leech therapy in chronic lateral epicondylitis: a randomized controlled trial (Pain 2011)

• Maggot Therapy Takes Us Back to the Future of Wound Care: New and Improved Maggot Therapy for the 21st Century (Sherman 2009)

• Laser drilling holes in components by combined percussion and trepan drilling (Emer 1998)

The problem with evidence

• It’s not the same as proof: – “You can prove anything with evidence!”

• Context is king – can we generalise?

• What if it conflicts with our values?

Where’s the evidence!• Getting behaviour right should be

schools’ top priority• Students should enjoy learning, but

enjoyment should not be our aim• Everyone can be better at anything• Learning happens when you think hard• Any policy predicated on the belief or

expectation that teachers can or should work harder will fail.

Correlation is not causation• How can we isolate the variables in

classroom research?

• If you look for a link, you’ll probably find it…

1800 1850 1900 1950 20000

10,000

15,000

20,000

25,000

30,000

35,000

40,000

45,000

50,000

Number of Pirates on the "High Seas"

1800 1850 1900 1950 200014.4

Average Global Temperature °C

0 5000 10000 15000 20000 25000 30000 35000 40000 4500014.4

16Piracy reduces Global Warming

Number of pirates active

1830 1840 1850 1860 1870 1880 1890 19003

Litres of 100% Alcohol Per Capita (Adult)

1830 1840 1850 1860 1870 1880 1890 19000.000

Number of Clergy (all demonination) per 1,000 population

0.000 0.200 0.400 0.600 0.800 1.000 1.200 1.4003.0

Increasing the Clergy increases alcohol consumption

Number of Clergy per 1,000 population

Where’s the evidence!The existence of the experimental method makes us think we have the means of solving the problems which trouble us; through problems and methods pass one another by.

Wittgenstein

How People Learn (Donovan 2001)To develop competence in an area of inquiry, students must: a) have a deep foundational knowledge of factual

knowledge, b) understand facts and ideas in the context of a

conceptual framework, and c) organize knowledge in ways that facilitate

retrieval and application

• No amount of empirical research could ever demonstrate that these things are not connected!

Measurability• Do we look for what’s easy to

measure rather than measuring what’s important?

• What is the ‘unit of education’?

• Can we really trust effect sizes?

So, what should we do in schools?• What the research says?• What we’ve always done?• What works for us?• What gets results?

• Or, make predictions that are meaningful and measurable?

The power of prediction• Does a physicist have to examine all

atoms to be able to make predictions about the behaviour of all atoms in all contexts?

• Do we believe children are broadly similar or different?

• Can we make generalisations about how we learn?

Bayes’ Theorem

• P(A), the prior probability - the initial degree of belief in A.

• P(A|B), the conditional probability - the degree of belief in A having accounted for B.

• The quotient P(B|A)/P(B) represents the support B provides for A.

The burden of proof• How likely does a prediction seem?– Does it look like a duck?

• “Good tests kill flawed theories; we remain alive to guess again.”– Is it falsifiable, replicable, controlled, large

enough, published?

• Always remember the bias blindspot!

Things which seem probable• The spacing effect

• The testing effect

• Cognitive load theory

“As learning occurs, so does forgetting…”

Hermann Ebbinghaus, 1885

The spacing effect

About 90%?

The Testing EffectWhich study pattern will result in the best test results?

1. STUDY STUDY STUDY STUDY – TEST2. STUDY STUDY STUDY TEST – TEST3. STUDY STUDY TEST TEST – TEST4. STUDY TEST TEST TEST – TEST

Too much openness and you accept every notion, idea, and hypothesis — which is tantamount to knowing nothing. Too much skepticism — especially rejection of new ideas before they are adequately tested — and you’re not only unpleasantly grumpy, but also closed to the advance of science. A judicious mix is what we need.

Carl Sagan

To get anywhere, or even live a long time, a man has to guess, and guess right, over and over again, without enough data for a logical answer.

Robert A. Heinlein

Dubium sapientiae

initium @LearningSpy

ddidau@gmail.com www.learningspy.co.uk