Kids are the greatest teachers. Sounds backwards but it is so true. As parents,we have completed our education and have great jobs. We are proud of our contributions at work and feel pretty good about our achievements. Then the kids come along. You think how to raise them, take care of all their needs and give them a future that is better than yours. It gives you great satisfaction to see them learning from you. If you have not already experienced it, or if you sit back and think about what you have learned since you started raising kids, you will realize that your knowledge has increased several folder. The most visible evidence is in the use of technology: how to program the cell phone or TV remote or use facebook - stuff parents have to ask their kids.
But as a parent in particular, and society in general, most of us feel the responsibility to provide a good education for our kids. It is infact, in my opinion, one of the prime responsibility of parents and society is to provide quality and efficient education to the new generation. That is the path forward. We need to enable the children to make new discoveries and inventions and solve the mysteries of the universe and human kind. Obviously we need to help the learn the basic or foundational knowledge. But we need to do much more. We need to capture as much data as possible so that at some point in future, the data be available for research and discovery. It is not possible to forecast if the data will be needed, but today's conventional wisdom dictates that it is likely to be needed. We certainly wish that we had more data from the past.
I don't think anybody can argue that we have a lot more to discover and preparing the future generations to make those discoveries will make a significant contribution to survival of human race. We have established institutions to provide this knowledge. Schools and Universities all around the world are doing a tremendous job in fulfilling our responsibilities towards our future genrations. But can we do more. I have not seen much change in the way we educate kids in the last 40 years. Minor changes but nothing that can be called a major improvement. We are still teaching some subjects in a class room setting and testing every year or so to measure progress. It is the same degrees that students of today earn that were being earned 30-40 years ago. We have made significant progress in the availability of information to everyone. Internet has revolutionized this field. The education system needs to morph towards teaching children to look for desired information on the internet to supplement their current knowledge. Today that skill is mainly learned on the job by most adults. Soon nobody will be able to learn the vast knowledgebase or even a meaningful subsection of it.
Creating and organizing the ever increasing knowledge base in such a way that it can be more effectively used will be a challenge for our descendents.
But as a parent in particular, and society in general, most of us feel the responsibility to provide a good education for our kids. It is infact, in my opinion, one of the prime responsibility of parents and society is to provide quality and efficient education to the new generation. That is the path forward. We need to enable the children to make new discoveries and inventions and solve the mysteries of the universe and human kind. Obviously we need to help the learn the basic or foundational knowledge. But we need to do much more. We need to capture as much data as possible so that at some point in future, the data be available for research and discovery. It is not possible to forecast if the data will be needed, but today's conventional wisdom dictates that it is likely to be needed. We certainly wish that we had more data from the past.
I don't think anybody can argue that we have a lot more to discover and preparing the future generations to make those discoveries will make a significant contribution to survival of human race. We have established institutions to provide this knowledge. Schools and Universities all around the world are doing a tremendous job in fulfilling our responsibilities towards our future genrations. But can we do more. I have not seen much change in the way we educate kids in the last 40 years. Minor changes but nothing that can be called a major improvement. We are still teaching some subjects in a class room setting and testing every year or so to measure progress. It is the same degrees that students of today earn that were being earned 30-40 years ago. We have made significant progress in the availability of information to everyone. Internet has revolutionized this field. The education system needs to morph towards teaching children to look for desired information on the internet to supplement their current knowledge. Today that skill is mainly learned on the job by most adults. Soon nobody will be able to learn the vast knowledgebase or even a meaningful subsection of it.
Creating and organizing the ever increasing knowledge base in such a way that it can be more effectively used will be a challenge for our descendents.
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