A world without teachers?
Some truly believe that the teacher is and should be on the way out. This is an individualistic world, they say, so education needs to be customised. School of One in New York, for example, is designed to give everyone a personalised curriculum each day by using an algorithm to adapt instructional methods and content based on what was learned the day before. The growth of Moocs (massive open online courses) means millions of people around the world can access expertise and learning online. And many teachers are trialling forms of blended and “flipped learning”, where students have absorbed a lot of information and come to a lesson ready to discuss, apply and interrogate their knowledge.
As parents, we are aware of how quickly our children can pick up new skills by watching a clip on YouTube: a scientific experiment, playing the guitar, knitting, coding, even learning to read. We also know as adults that there is such a thing as “just in time” knowledge. When we want to develop a hobby like gardening, build an extension to our house, we swot up on it, immerse ourselves in it as and when we need to. These new types of learning should not be dismissed, as some do, either as fads or as doomed to fail. Neither is the case.
But there are limits to this model, and limits I believe to it being applied wholesale to schools. For, as one of the drama teachers at School 21 says: “Ultimately, teaching is about the relationship between the teacher, the student and the text.” (The text meant in its broadest sense.)
We all know that there is nothing quite like being inspired by an expert, having Shakespeare or a language or the wonders of science brought alive by someone who has a deep passion and real expertise. The teacher, like a great sports coach, is skilled at diagnosing what we need and guiding our deliberate practice – the idea of working again and again, not on the whole performance but on those parts we find most difficult until they start to come easily and automatically.
Source: https://www.theguardian.com/education/2017/feb/26/revolution-in-uk-schools