Obama: "Better to be strong yourself. Always"

A student came to me and BEGGED for additional marks. Not because I had made an error in my marking, but because I should have compassion. I told them that I teach and assess this way because I wanted them to be a stronger professional. But what do I mean by "strong"?

This quote from Obama's autobiography sums it up:

"My stepfather Lolo said, “Men take advantage of weakness in other men. They’re just like countries in that way. The strong man takes the weak man’s land. He makes the weak man work in his fields. If the weak man’s woman is pretty, the strong man will take her.

Which would you rather be? Better to be strong. If you can’t be strong, be clever and make peace with someone who’s strong. But always better to be strong yourself. Always.”

Source: Dreams from My Father, by Barack Obama, p. 37 Aug 1, 1996

MOOCs and gamification - are we already there?

Why MOOCs will not replace standard education.

Warning! This contains sweeping statements: this is true of too many students – but clearly not all!

Students do not want to learn anything, they want certification and prestige with minimal effort.  This fits neatly within the expectations of a rational person:

1. self-interested
2. utility maximising (Wealth)
3. strategically thinking

We can also further assume that students will prefer:

1. effort avoidance
2. short-term over long term rewards

Students are obsessed with grades. Indeed, the existence of grades are themselves is evidence of this obsession.  If students were truly interested in learning something, without the need for some arbitrary quantifying mechanism, students would come to learn from teachers, and the learning process would be reward in its own right.  But this is a system of our own making. 

There is a need to signal to 3rd parties of the quality of learning that has taken place.  Enter the grades.  Grades are by themselves, a gameification of the real world.  Where ever there are rules, rational agents will naturally attempt to maximise their expected returns within the real-life rules of the game.  Students, like all human beings, well understand that the real-life rules are not the same as the official rules.  This means some rules can be broken, many can be bent.  Thus the rules often create perverse incentives.

Seriously, why bother?

Cheating is a very common tactic among students within the rules of the game.  There are pens designed to help students cheat in exams. Yet, plagiarism is the biggest problem and it has never been easier.  Detection tools provide a shield, but are ultimately ineffective against a globalised workforce that is willing to hire out their time to create original work for a pittance.  Term essays can be sold for as cheap as $50, high school for $16.  In large classrooms, this can be difficult to detect.

MOOCs as an antithesis?

I hear pollyanna whenever people tell me
 "All education will be online, and for FREE!"
Uh huh, Sure. Here's a nice instruction book
to guide you to the superhighway.  

Some online courses provide no grading whatsoever, however most do.  Currently no MOOC provides recognised certification, as there are far too many barriers to true authentication.  How can we be sure that this really is your work.  Without authentication, there can be no certainty, and hence no certification.  Indeed without certification then there are no consequences to grades achieved.

This is insane.  Why bother?  Students are only cheating themselves. 

Thus, we expect students to only take up a MOOC if they were genuinely interested in learning.  Yet plagiarism seems rife.  It seems the goal of effort avoidance, appears to be a particular strong one, and often trump all other goals.

Cheating is not going away.

If cheating will not go away, then neither will face-to-face schools.  Teachers, as ever will need to find new ways to trick students into learning things that they really do not wish to do.  The gameification of the real world by creating our system of education, and the related sub-games of  grades and certification, has worked in the past.  However, a consistent weakening of the system may lead to a lack of trust.  Grade inflation presents a greater risk to our business model, then would the rise of online MOOCs.

"Now, jump through these hoops. It's a
FUN game - really!" - teachers

Gameification of courses could help to lead to better intrinsic interest - yet this is really a game application of an already gameified system. Perhaps we just need to make our classes more relevant to them. We only need these hoops for students to jump through because we haven't been able to convince them to do it themselves ordinarily. 



Ultimately, students come to school for a piece of paper.  Most of them are totally disinterested in learning anything we have to teach them. That ought be a terrible indictment on our practices rather than just theirs. 


-Tetracarbon out

A list of my personal heroes:

A list of my personal heroes:
Craig Deegan (CSR Accounting, RMIT),
Julian Savulescu (bio ethicist, Oxford & Uni Melb),
Geert Holfsteed (Culture and edu, too many to list),
John Biggs (Cognitive Alignment in Edu, too many schools),
David Boyd (Sustainable Assessment, UTS),
Ha Le Phan (Identity, edu and Asia as a method, Monash),
Raymond Chambers (exit price accounting, USyd),
Frank Fenner (Myxomatosis and Army drop out, ANU)
John Nash (game theory, Princeton) who was the most crazy of them all.

Observation to an Asian on Western writing styles: "less art more haste"

The following is an excerpt of feedback given to a Chinese student after reading their Advanced Accounting Theory report:
-----------------------------------------------
Dear STUDENT:

Observation on writing styles:

There are several things that I find frustrating when reading your work. You over rely on quotations.  You do not say the most important thing first, instead you wait until the very end of your argument before getting to the point. Under Western writing styles, you need to assume that your readers are lazy and disinterested. In order to hook their attention, you must state your argument first, and subsequently go on to prove your argument.  You need to demonstrate that this is your own writing, and that you personally have a solid grasp of the concepts. Any evidence you cite is merely supporting what you are saying.  But at all times, this writing is your voice, except when you use direct quotations. Direct quotes shows that this is somebody else's voice speaking.

This is very different to writing styles under Confucius heritage cultures (ie, writing in Asia). Quotations are far more acceptable in Asia, as it is understood that students do not have their own voice, and are able to gain perfection by using the voice and tools of the masters. Therefore many Asian students use large numbers of quotations to show they can speak with the voice of a master. Unfortunately  this  is not appropriate to do so in the West.

Writing in Asia also tends to be far more circular. If you were to write your main argument in the first sentence in a Chinese language essay, this would be considered rude, and very direct. In the West, we believe that this makes for "honest" dealings. The Western reader understands who you are and what you are saying straight away. Confucius heritage cultures might consider this to be "blunt", or lacking any "art".

This system of writing is not something based in schools alone; your business audiences will demand this structure even stronger than I will. Irrespective of if you become an accountant in Australia, or you return to Asia, when you write in English you need to follow this style.

As a business teacher in a Western education system, I am trying to train you to write as a Western business person. This is not to say that your Asian way of writing is wrong – it is not wrong, it is just different. However when you write in English, you must write as your English speaking audience would expect.  Therefore you must translate both the concepts and styles, as well as the words. This is an extremely difficult thing to do.

So I am quite understanding. But at the same time I need to award marks based on a Western style of writing and education. I want you to speak with a Western strength in English, and with the beauty and wisdom of Confucius in Chinese. At all times, I want your writing to be respected.  

I wish you all the best for your exam.

-Tetracarbon out

How to improve your LMS for Asian students using online checkpoint tests

This is a recording of a presentation  originally delivered at ConVerge12: 

The video is an update of an earlier piece of writing which you can find here:
http://www.tetracarbon.com/2011/11/how-to-using-your-lms-formative-online.html

Taxation and Sustainability