Education in America is a disaster, equaling perhaps any that has ever afflicted the nation. In 1983, the National Commission on Excellence in Education lamented, "if an unfriendly nation had attempted to impose upon America the mediocre educational performance that exists today, we might well have viewed it as an act of war."¹⁰

The extent of the educational devastation in America is hard to exaggerate. Twenty-five million adults, more than the entire population of the state of New York, are functionally illiterate. Some authorities provide evidence that this figure underestimates the true number.¹¹

For those who are well educated, inferior schooling may seem unfortunate, but only for the poorly educated themselves. If, however, they consider the correlation between illiteracy and crime, poor education affects everyone.

Even when crime isn't involved, abysmal education is costly. Many major companies carry on expensive programs to provide basic education for their employees. In 1991 the New York Times bemoaned that "business has become America's second-largest educator. It now spends a record forty billion dollars a year on education, about three-quarters of this to teach workers basic skills they should have learned in school."¹²

Since legions of students require remedial education after regular schooling, many youths obviously spend years in schools without becoming educated. Inferior schooling affects the least learned, but also taints those who plan to go to college. The federal government reported in 1989 that twenty-one percent of college freshmen were enrolled in remedial math classes, sixteen percent were studying remedial writing, and at least thirteen percent were taking remedial reading.¹³

A still more alarming statistic weighs on the nation. In tests comparing students throughout the world, Americans ranked at or near the bottom. These test takers did not include students from Japan, Germany, or England. Less advanced nations are surpassing us. The major nations are humiliating us. In an article in The New Republic, January 6, 1984 entitled "Japan's Smart Schools" Diane Ravitch who is a historian of education and author in the field wrote, "The average high school graduate in Japan is said to be as well educated as the average college graduate in the United States." A study by Harold Stevenson maintained that, "by the fifth grade, the worst Japanese class in the study was ahead of the best American class."¹⁴ There is no evidence that schools in America have lessened the gap since that was written.

The weakness of American students is apparent when contrasted with other nations, but also when compared with American pupils of other times. Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) Scores have declined in recent years. Although many authorities shudder at this reduction,¹⁵ some educators blithely dismiss the results. They declare lower scores come about because the number of SAT test takers has expanded, and the tests have become more democratic. Even these educational pollyannas can't explain why 1991 Scholastic Aptitude Test scores of entering freshmen at prestigious colleges had also declined markedly.¹⁶ This is shocking, especially since it accompanies an intense national disquietude about education.

The National Commission on Excellence in Education quoted analyst Paul Copperman when he grieved that:

Each generation of Americans has outstripped its parents in education, in literacy, and in economic attainment. For the first time in the history of our country, the educational skills of one generation will not surpass, will not equal, will not even approach those of their parents.17

Dry, simple statistics about the nation's educational weaknesses don't dramatize the devastating human suffering. The riots emphasize this side of the crisis. They often seem to begin as a reaction to racism. Even if cities eliminated racism, many youths who took part in the riots are virtually unemployable. They lack the education required for most jobs.

The government issued a report in July of 1991 about skills that are needed "to hold a decent job and earn a decent living."¹⁸ The New York Times interviewed and quoted Labor Secretary Lynn Martin as a follow up to that document. Ms Martin complained that "more than half of young people leaving high school won't have the knowledge or foundation required to achieve either goal."¹⁹

Lack of education even haunts workers with a job and hinders their full enjoyment of working. The Dow Jones News Service carried an article that pointed out problems of one worker at a major American corporation.

Jimmy Wedmore, a General Motors Corp. hourly worker, used to run from promotions. Wedmore couldn't read or write and was afraid he'd be discovered if he advanced beyond his job on the assembly line here.

"Better jobs kept coming and I had to keep turning them down," says Wedmore, age 50. "It's really a pitiful situation to be in."

Finally, he asked for help. In 1986, GM provided a tutor who taught him to read, write and solve basic math problems. Wedmore, who used to assemble parts for starter motors, now runs a high-tech machine that produces powder used to make powerful magnets. "I love the challenge of this job," he says. "You learn something new every day."²⁰

Jimmy Wedmore finally got an education that enabled him to lead a more satisfying life. Lamentably, he had to struggle through many flawed years deprived of what he should have had when he finished school. The years of success he had at General Motors prove that he was able to learn while in school. Wasting those years without education was unfortunate for Jimmy Wedmore. Losing the talents of armies of Jimmy Wedmores who are being jettisoned from schools today with an inferior education is a deplorable waste for the nation.

Some disasters lead ultimately to massive changes because they stimulate profound reactions. In 1775 the English Parliament created monumental difficulties for the Colonists who then revolted. The original adversity brought a revolution that caused a new nation to arise. The present crisis in education could galvanize the nation and bring an educational revolution that will turn the present catastrophe into a stunning triumph.

A century from now civilization will judge if the educational distress in America in the last years of the twentieth century led ultimately to profound improvement of schools, or to more terrible consequences. The latter alternative could include the end of America as a world leader.

The crisis has caught the attention of many leaders who talk of a need for a revolutionary approach to provide the answers. Those supposed "revolutions" are replete with good intentions but few radical ideas. President Bush and his administration introduced a program called AMERICA 2000. Considerable fanfare accompanied its debut. The objective was superb: revitalize education completely by the year 2000. Even this proposal with its grandiose goals hesitated to suggest original ideas. It stated early in the document, "few elements of this strategy are unprecedented."²¹

Educators seldom propose any serious change for schools. While they readily admit the problems are intense, many feel it will be sufficient to leave the present educational system intact while making cosmetic revisions. This reluctance to embrace difficult changes is a standard response to a crisis. Many honest and upstanding citizens in the American colonies wanted to solve the dilemma of taxation without representation by less drastic means than revolution. Today, many honest and upstanding leaders of the country follow a similar path. They dismiss serious disruptions that will accompany a genuine revolution in education as impractical and unnecessary.

Despite the lack of substantive proposed remedies, the difficulties with schooling keep gnawing at the American psyche. Answers continue to be offered and some have gotten national attention and warrant comment here.

1. Increased Funding

One simple solution is the call for more money. Teachers' unions, of course, support this approach. Unfortunately, this proposal is neither new nor guaranteed to produce noteworthy results. Funding for education in the United States increased approximately thirty-three percent in real terms from 1980 to 1990. Nonetheless, during that decade, noticeable improvement in American schools was lacking. Perhaps a valid argument can be made that increased funding might help if it were wisely applied. Nonetheless, the horrendous conditions inherent in education today would remain.

Advocates recommend increased funding for various reasons. Sometimes they contend more dollars will buy additional computers, and education, astride modern technology, will leap over its current barriers. I will explain in Chapters 7 and 8 why more computers alone will add little to what millions of computers are accomplishing now - virtually nothing. Another reason for seeking additional funding is the supposed benefits that would accrue if schools could raise salaries of teachers. Additional pay, advocates contend, would bring the cream of American students into teaching and improve schools. Additional pay hasn't helped thus far. The increased funding of the 1980s brought better compensation for teachers, but the quality of students entering the profession did not improve appreciably. One factor is that the overall job opportunities for talented women, who formerly had little choice outside of teaching, are greater and more challenging today than fifty years ago. As a result, teaching has a smaller pool of outstanding students upon which to draw. More money won't change that condition.

Teachers, have an aggravating and difficult job. Many are unhappy in their positions, and morale is often low. A poll of two thousand teachers in 1989 conducted by Louis Harris and Associates illustrates how teachers view themselves. The results revealed only fifty-three percent of respondents felt they were respected by society, and only sixty-seven percent would advise a young person to go into teaching.²² Although higher pay might lessen some of these difficulties, morale involves much more than pay. Moreover, schools must compete directly with industry when they recruit certain classes of teachers. Math and science instructors are crucial, but are in short supply. School systems have trouble paying wages for these teachers that private industry won't surpass. Even if school boards were to decree that everybody with a math or science degree would receive a substantial pay raise, industry, which also needs these people, would increase their own salary levels. Math and science teachers would continue in an inferior pay position compared with industry. Of course, conditions in education exacerbate the problem of insufficient math and science majors. Poor education prevents the development of many potential scientists. This difficulty probably begins in grade school. Most elementary teachers are uncomfortable teaching science.²³

The results from educational districts without excessive monetary shortfalls also brings into question the contention that more funding would drastically alter education. Students entering prestigious universities come primarily from these better funded districts. If these districts were providing superlative education, SAT scores for those entering the more highly rated universities would be rising, or at least, not declining. The conclusion must be that merely pouring more dollars into the system will not rectify its shortcomings.

2. Copy Other Nations

Some authorities propose another seemingly less difficult solution - study schools of other nations and then imitate what they are doing. The divergence in test scores shows that educational results elsewhere are often better than in the United States. If education in the United States were to mimic what others are doing, the argument contends, a drastic overhaul would not be necessary.

The difficulty is that other countries are using the same basic system that was successful in the United States for many years. Education in America fails to achieve the results of former times because the nation has changed. Part of the altered climate is due to the underlying social structure. Public officials and private commentators often decry lessened family standards in the country. Concerned educators legitimately bewail the home conditions of many of their students. They make the valid argument that a return to the life in America of twenty-five or fifty years ago would improve education. They particularly deplore lessened participation of parents in school programs and less parental direction of children.

Anyone who studies schooling in America must agree: more involvement of guardians would help to produce better education. Parents, however, are unlikely to make a sudden turnabout. Trying to return to previous times is an attempt to stop another societal upheaval. Those who struggle against developing changes in society have met a string of failures. Even religions, which have always exercised a strong influence in the nation have been unsuccessful. For example, some years ago when many priests and ministers vociferously decried the trend of more businesses staying open Sunday, they didn't stop an ongoing change. Stores are open throughout America every Sunday. Religions have seen the futility of their struggle and have accepted the inevitable.

Teachers do more than utter complaints about conditions. They also strive to bring changes by getting parents more involved. Nonetheless, they make little progress. Many parents, especially those who are alone, can't hold a full time job, run a household of never ending responsibilities, and still create the additional time to be as active in the education of their children as they might wish. This situation is truly unfortunate, but bemoaning it won't change it.

Part of the present condition stems from the change in the basic idea of "family" in the United States. The idealized couple of Ozzie and Harriet where the wife stayed home and the husband supplied the livelihood has gone. It won't return. Demographics in the United States today have changed. For example, fifteen million children are being raised by single mothers. Even in two parent families, both parents often work outside the home. Sometimes the income of one is insufficient, and both must be employed. Women also work because they find it enjoyable and challenging to participate in the commercial world, and can hire domestic help. Whatever the reasons, many parents fail to take the active role in the school work of their children that educators seek. This participation must be encouraged by schools, but with society seemingly headed in a different direction, merely waiting for the trend to stop will not solve the current educational quandaries.

Another powerful reason why copying other systems won't suffice is because the United States encompasses a more pluralistic society than any other nation. Immigration built America's population, and the influx continues today. The government predetermines that many thousands of immigrants from individual countries may take up residence in the United States every year. In addition, citizens of other nations who are experiencing political repression can seek and obtain permission to enter. This inflow increases the yearly immigration totals by hundreds of thousands. It doesn't stop there, of course. Millions of illegal immigrants now reside in the nation, and hundreds or thousands more pour in every day. As a result of all these new arrivals, eight percent of those living in the United States in 1992 were born in another nation. These rivers of immigration bring multitudes of new students into the schools. Frequently, immigrants are poorly educated. Often they can't speak English. They come from a variety of customs, languages and backgrounds. No nation, other than the United States, has an inflow of this magnitude. No existing educational system could cope effectively with this ongoing addition of new residents. Copying methods of countries that don't have immigration comparable to the United States can't provide the answers.

Another obstacle prevents the importation of approaches of other nations - the heritage of slavery in this country. When Emancipation took place, black children were far behind academically. For some decades after the nation abolished slavery, America was able to hide from itself results of involuntary servitude. The "separate but equal" method of education provided camouflage. The deplorable educational condition of former slaves was frequently continued for their children by a segregated and inferior school system. Residual effects throttle the nation even today. Schools in America must struggle to counteract a legacy that doesn't burden other nations.

3. "Choice"

Another proposed solution today is "Choice," under which parents could select the school their children attend. Under one form, parents could choose only among public schools. A variation would permit parents to pick either public or private schools. If the "Choice" option were adopted that allows selection of private schools, the government would help parents pay for any schooling, but private schools would usually require additional payment. Poor parents would still be forced to choose public schools. The ultimate result would be public schools filled with more impoverished students who most need better schooling. Financing for public schools would also be lessened because all students would eventually become eligible for assistance, including those of parents who now select and pay for private schools. There would be less money per pupil for public schools.

Arguments for and against "Choice" abound. It seems likely that it might benefit parents who have sufficient resources to send their children to the better private schools. Nonetheless, by itself with nothing additional, it can't change education sufficiently to make American children reach their full potential. One weakness of this approach is evident by returning again to private schools where sufficient funds are available today. Thousands of schools today operate under the basic idea of the right of a parent to choose a school for their children to attend. Many have greater endowments and income than can be expected in new schools that would exist under "Choice." Students from these private schools often score better on standardized tests than students from public schools. No evidence, however, proves that most students from these private schools can surpass students from other nations. Even with "Choice," schools would be unable to provide individualized tutoring, a help for bright students, but crucial for students who are behind. Raising enough money for this type of instruction in today's schools is unthinkable.

In any discussion of "Choice" another element is important: public schools have difficulties unknown in private schools. For example, public schools cannot be selective since every student must be offered an education somewhere. Public schools must also teach learning disabled and special education pupils, and this often increases costs. Opponents of "Choice" also fear that better students will flee the public schools leaving behind only the poorest students, whose education will be even worse than now, a destructive happening because the biggest crisis in American schools today is among these students. It is difficult to imagine private organizations making a meaningful effort to build and operate many schools in the inner cities.

A subtle yet deleterious aspect of the present debate about "Choice" is that many dedicated and influential people expend their efforts to bring about "Choice" as if it alone would solve the current educational problems. It won't. Even if it improved some parts, basic deficiencies would remain. When these leaders devote their abilities and influence primarily to encouraging "Choice," they cannot employ their full energies to revolutionize education in America.

4. The Internet

Another popular solution among some people arises from the profound changes that the Internet is bringing to many areas. I am a devoted user of the Internet and believe that it will have dramatic effects in the world beyond anything we can now imagine. Nonetheless, as a means of revolutionizing education, I believe it falls far short of what proponents seem to be hoping.

Again, the beauty of the Internet as a solution is that it can apparently be imposed merely on top of the present system and not create any real disturbance. Merely add wiring to schools, some machines, and presto, schools will necessarily improve. Closer look at the World Wide Web or Internet shows the fallacy of this position.

The Internet has two major functions - it is a superb library with features that cannot be duplicated by any other means, and it is also an outstanding means of communication. Let me pose a hypothetical question. Would it be possible to take the children of America and set them down in libraries and expect them to become educated? The answer is obviously "No." Children, especially, need structure. It is not sufficient to take a child, even one who knows how to read, and turn him or her loose in library and hope that the youngster will become educated. Even though a few of the brightest might profit from the experience, even these outstanding children would waste considerable time and energy before achieving any real learning.

If, however, the child can first learn how to use a library and can be taught the fundamentals of doing research, then the library can be extremely valuable as a learning tool. That is the role of education. This is the first difficulty with the Internet. It is, in effect, a massive library with many spectacular features, but nonetheless from the viewpoint of education, a library.

The other side to the Internet is its capacity for communication across the world. Again, a valuable feature which will prove of inestimable value. Nonetheless, it is not a practical primary tool with which to educate children. I am not here concerned about access to pornography which could probably be controlled. I am more concerned again with lack of structure. Although children might theoretically communicate with many learned people, there are only so many learned people and most students will spend the bulk of their time communicating with those who are less than learned, just as most students (and most adults also) spend more time reading less than the most learned journals. The Internet can and will be a valuable tool in education. I will mention some of its uses later when I speak of seminars and workshops in Chapter 19. Nonetheless, the Internet, by itself, will not provide the educational revolution needed today.

None of these proposed solutions will change the nation's educational system into one that will suddenly revitalize learning. Nonetheless, to remake education is arguably the preeminent need in America, because it is the root cause of other major difficulties such as crime and racism. Effective answers must be found. New educational methods, superior to older ones and easily duplicated, must be developed. The Office of Technology Assessment has summarized this crisis saying,

American education is at a crucial juncture. The demands on schooling in our pluralistic society are greater than they have ever been. An increasing percentage of students are educationally at risk, and demographic projections make clear that this problem will continue to grow. In addition, schools must prepare all young people with a new set of skills and understandings to assure the Nation's economic competitiveness.²⁴

Opponents of serious reform in any area, including education, are seldom satisfied by evidence that a radical new method is efficient. They continually demand more proof. No advocate of retaining today's system suggests, however, that current educational practices must prove that they are effective. A cursory glance at today's dilemmas makes it obvious that proof like that will be difficult to find. American education is in a troubled state. Teachers are not at fault - they have tried valiantly to help students by supporting a system that cannot cope with the vast changes erupting in the nation. These teachers cannot remake education and eliminate the horrendous problems, or they would have done it. Teachers are particularly unhappy with education results today. Only a revolution could have sufficed to cause the truly dramatic changes that resulted in the formation of the American nation in 1776. Only a real revolution will bring the turnabout needed to revitalize American education today. Unfortunate side effects, however, accompany revolutions. Before the upheaval is concluded, some people suffer. This happened in the American revolution. The needed shock in American schooling will also be wrenching for some educators unless they bring themselves to embrace different methods. For the nation, however, failure to make changes will intensify and worsen the current crisis.

Developing suitable answers for today's school dilemmas requires an examination of the essentials of education. Whenever an attempt is made to make any profound change, a disguised danger hides as efforts begin. Authorities responsible for developing a new direction may believe it necessary to continue whatever is being done if it has an extensive history. Scrutiny of basics will provide a foundation for a true overhaul, and will show what can be changed and what must be kept intact.

Education involves transference to others of knowledge and values accumulated by humans, and the development of skills allowing students to integrate this knowledge and those values into their lives.

Schools and teachers have been part of education for hundreds or even thousands of years. Everyone, however, has gained knowledge outside school. We learn by experience: by watching others and today through television and movies. Some learning, moreover, has always taken place without teachers. Abraham Lincoln studied law while reading by lamplight.

Since learning has happened without schools and without teachers, neither schools nor teachers must be considered as indispensable despite their long use. Modern technology could probably eliminate both, and authorities should first examine their weaknesses and strengths. Even if society decides to retain either or both, fundamental changes are possible.

Present shortcomings of schools are notably evident in large inner-city institutions where learning is difficult or impossible. Syndicated columnist Ann Landers printed a letter from a teacher in Philadelphia on May 3, 1992. The teacher complained,

At least half of the students arrive late. It is such a common occurrence that nothing is said. There is a constant level of noise throughout the building. It is more like a lunatic asylum than a place of learning. As I fight my way to the classroom, I try to avoid being knocked down by someone who is running, fighting, looking to start trouble or just being obnoxious.... At least 50 percent of the students in this place carry a weapon.... There is an awful lot of lawlessness here because kids don't care about suspension, detention or grades.... Our schools need help and they need it now.

This letter summarizes problems faced by some schools where external conditions disrupt learning.

Psychological impediments exacerbate the physical difficulties of schools. Youths are particularly influenced by peer pressure. This often prevents students from excelling in studies. As an educational conference noted,

Peer pressure profoundly influences the academic behavior of students. By the time students reach their teens, peer groups may actually define the stance most of them take toward academic achievement and effort. Typically, peer pressure motivates students to stay in school and graduate, but even as they frown on failure, peers also restrain high achievement.... some student cultures actively reject academic aspirations. In this case, high grades can be a source of peer ridicule and when effort is hostage to peer pressure, those high achievers who persist anyway may face strong social sanctions.²⁵

This adverse effect often happens in inner-city schools, but may also occur elsewhere. I will later discuss the difficulty that female students may encounter in certain subjects like science and math.

Unquestionably, schools as they are now constituted have many weaknesses. They also have, however, many valuable and constructive effects.

Schools enable students to interact with each other, and this is an important element in growing up and in learning. Schools also furnish structure and can provide a means for insuring that students devote time to studies. Under proper circumstances, schools can foster peer pressure to aid learning.

Moreover, if schools were eliminated, the probable alternative would be to have education take place in homes of students. Although home schooling is beneficial for some, obviously, home conditions for other children would impede learning.

Since schools provide advantages that can assist education, they should remain. Nonetheless, mere cosmetic adjustments in schools can't rectify the problems. The serious drawbacks of schools obstruct learning and demand extensive changes.

Like schools, teachers have disadvantages and advantages. Their negative features are easily overlooked since teachers are universally accepted in education, and almost everybody had a favorite teacher. Nonetheless, teaching has serious problems that any potential reform must evaluate and address.

Students have many teachers during their schooling. While adults may cherish the memory of an extraordinary teacher who aided them, they don't remember many in this way. By definition, few people of exceptional caliber exist in any profession.

Besides a shortage of sensational teachers, some teachers are decidedly inferior. This has always been true, but every poor teacher impedes learning and makes school unpleasant and difficult.

Another disadvantage of teachers flows from the ingrained attitudes they carry with them when they enter classrooms. This preset disposition sometimes is detrimental. In an article generally favorable toward teachers, J. R. Dusek summarizes existing research. He concludes,

evidence indicating that teachers form expectations for students' performance is abundant.... [and] teachers tend to treat students differently depending on their expectations for the students' performance.... [and] these expectancies, and presumably their behavioral manifestations, have been shown to relate to students' academic achievement.²⁶

Nobody has ever suggested a viable means of changing this condition.

Conditions in their classrooms, not their abilities or attitudes, present the foremost difficulty for teachers. They cannot tutor each student individually, but they must teach diverse students simultaneously. An instructor with thirty students has to try to accommodate his or her teaching to thirty different levels of ability. Anyone wishing to convey knowledge as each student could ideally receive it, is thwarted. Brighter students can quickly grasp the lesson while slower students are still struggling to understand. Teachers must make decisions about how fast to go. Even if higher authorities decide how much must be taught, some students will fail to progress as far as they are able; others will fail to reach even minimally acceptable standards.

Teachers also suffer from the usual human problems of sickness, accidents, psychological problems, boredom and burnout. Just as they lessen results in every profession, these impairments hinder teaching and result in poorer learning by students. Sometimes these impediments remove instructors from their classrooms. Regular teachers are then replaced by substitutes who are unfamiliar with the classes. An entire chapter, later in the book, is necessary to address this debilitating problem.

As with most human beings, teachers can also be slow to change. Although evidence exists that modern technology can aid teaching, relatively few instructors employ it in their classrooms. Also, research findings are often ignored.

These are negative characteristics of instructors that impede learning. Teachers, however, have many strong traits that can enhance education immensely:

• 1. In the lives of their students, teachers often achieve an influence beyond the intellectual knowledge they impart. Adults often look back on a teacher who had a dramatic and positive effect upon their lives.
• 2. Human teachers can also make decisions that might be difficult for a machine. For example, a computer can judge grammatical integrity in a paper, but evaluating the worth of original ideas is impossible for today's machines.
• 3. Many teachers are extraordinarily creative and develop new and better ways of teaching.
• 4. By their presence, teachers stress that learning, must be integrated into a world populated by intelligent and feeling beings.
• 5. Teachers, helping students to understand and accept each other, can ease interpersonal problems that often develop.
• 6. Teachers can be role models that children need.

SUMMATION

Schools have both positive and negative features for education and teachers also have benefits and shortcomings. Education needs to retain the sizable strengths of both schools and teachers. Merely retaining them in their present form, however, won't change the terrible condition of American schooling. If a meaningful alteration is to take place, American education needs to revamp schools and the role of teachers. Only if profound changes are introduced can their weaknesses and failings be reduced or eliminated, while their strengths are retained and amplified.

CHAPTER 5

PLEASURE IN LEARNING

Newborn children are soon hungry and curious. They want to eat and they want to learn about their surroundings. They suckle at the breast and they swivel their heads toward sounds. When they can see, they stare at anything new. Eating and learning both carry out innate needs or desires that drive humans throughout their lives. A rule of nature requires actions fulfilling innate desires be pleasurable. Without enjoyment, necessary actions would cease, and the species would die out.

This pleasure is obvious and well understood for eating. The enjoyment of learning is often overlooked. Since the need for learning is innate, it is also enjoyable. The reason, Patrick Koch, the second grader in Chapter 2, wanted to read his encyclopedia was because it was fun.

Despite the inherent satisfaction of actions that meet basic needs, other conditions may interfere with the usual pleasure. Researchers studying behavior of white rats sometimes combine tasty food with an electrical shock at a certain place in the cage. If the rat nibbles at food in that area, it will be shocked and it doesn't take the rat long to avoid eating there. If an animal refuses to eat good food in a specific location, that area must be responsible.

Students should enjoy their classes because learning, which fulfills a basic desire, is the object. If children reject education, the type of learning or the place may be the cause, but something is wrong. Millions of children are rejecting education today. Many drop out of school. Others remain and attend classes but are bored.

When animals or humans don't find healthy food in appropriate conditions, they look elsewhere for nourishment to satisfy their basic need. When students don't find appropriate learning in school, they also look elsewhere. They satisfy the fundamental need by finding other sources like TV, their peers and movies where learning is pleasurable as it should be. If this "education" replaces what they should receive in school, they and the nation suffer. Valuable and available stores of accumulated knowledge are unused and replaced by junk learning, just as animals or humans might be forced to eat junk food when the good food is in a location where eating is painful.

Although reasons abound why education may be unpleasant, some are especially critical:

• 1. Schools must bind students in a rigid mold where they have to receive instruction at the same pace as twenty-five to thirty others, all with different capabilities and interests.
• 2. Monotonous and uninteresting classes repel students and make it unpleasant to learn. Like everyone else, you, the reader, can remember when you were forced at times during your schooling, to endure tedious classes. Unfortunately, teachers without special talents, despite their sincere efforts, may provide classes that overwhelm the inherent enjoyment of learning.
• 3. Students with poorer grades, who account for many serious rejections of education, confront a continuous series of frustrations. They quickly get behind in the early grades and can never hope to catch up. Being behind, they lack a real opportunity to learn and miss the chance to enjoy formal education. School becomes a grating, despised activity.
• 4. Brighter students have different barriers interfering with their learning, but often they also find education unpleasant. The system bores them and fails to challenge them. Although learning new material brings them enjoyment, their delight diminishes when the pace is tiresome. Again, teachers are guiltless. If they go fast enough to make education completely satisfying for brighter children, they interfere with the learning of others.
• 5. Teaching to the exact ability of diverse students is utterly impossible without individual tutors. Enjoyable learning requires that instruction meet the intellectual capacity of each student just as food must meet individual needs in each animal.

Education of students with unequal levels of ability in the same class, with some teachers who lack stimulating approaches, has been going on for centuries. Pupils have been able to learn despite these shortcomings. Many do so under these same handicaps today, but this learning does not prove the efficacy of the educational system. It only emphasizes the strength of the innate drive that enables people to acquire knowledge in spite of obstacles. Nonetheless, millions of American students fail to learn in schools. Moreover, education bores countless others whose education falls short of their capabilities. Consequently, youngsters revolt against the educational process. Their antics create havoc within schools and obstruct learning for themselves and for others. The letter from the Philadelphia teacher quoted in Chapter 4 illustrated this devastation. Unfortunately, the usual reaction is to blame students. This scapegoating of pupils is equivalent to blaming animals that refuse to eat in a place where they have discovered they will receive an electric shock.

When pupils enjoy education, their learning will improve, and much of their current revolt against the system will dissipate. Fewer discipline problems in schools will be an immediate result. Authorities will then be able to devote more of their time and resources to improving education instead of merely holding it together.

A change in the attitude of students occurs in the Florida at-risk programs: education intrigues students who had hated school and had intended to drop out. An effective revolution in education must allow the innate pleasure to motivate students and increase their learning. Deriving pleasure from education is a valid goal, and should be commonplace since learning fills a basic need, exactly as eating fills a basic need. Schools must merely eliminate the obstacles that prevent this natural enjoyment.

How schools can tap into the basic pleasure of learning will be treated below. I will explain how education can make learning interesting, avoid condemning students to the lockstep enslavement of present schooling, prevent slower students from falling behind, and enable brighter students to avoid boredom while new opportunities challenge them unceasingly. I will also show how learning can be tailored to the individual level of each student. Schooling will then be enhanced because it is partaking of the pleasure that accompanies the fulfillment of innate desires.

In their brief time, computers have driven, with blazing speed, radical upheavals everywhere. These machines have literally upended traditional practices. Without their guidance, the space program would cease and modern telephone networks would collapse; scientific advances are dependent upon them; businesses of every size have discovered their power and versatility and would now find it painfully difficult to operate as they did before these machines arrived; financial markets grind to a crawl whenever their computers shut down temporarily. The list of beneficiaries of this modern technology is almost endless.

The only important field that computers have failed to change dramatically is education. Schools have purchased millions of computers, but with a minuscule effect on student learning.

While the rest of the world races into modernization with blinding rapidity, education continues on its familiar and well trodden path. The only major improvement that schools have universally embraced in the last two centuries has been the introduction of blackboards in the late nineteenth century . Serious changes in education have been minimal since then. As the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment complained,

in general, classrooms today resemble their ancestors of 50 and 100 years ago much more closely than do today's assembly plants, scientific laboratories, and operating rooms. A number of information technologists point out that if business organizations today evolved at the same rate as the schools, they would still be using quill pens instead of electronic word processors.²⁷

The United States confronts a frightening conundrum. Education is a disaster yet the nation misuses the most powerful and effective tool of change since the invention of printing: computer technology. This blatant waste would be horrible at any point in history. With the current conditions in American education, squandering this available remedy is a catastrophe.

Computers have taken a major position in the world because they can execute many tasks more effectively than humans. In education, they can communicate information more efficiently and they can do it with a certain panache - they can fascinate while they teach.

For computers to accomplish in education what they have done elsewhere, one new element is essential: they must be allowed to teach students without a human in the intermediary position between the child and the computer. This failure to allow computers to teach is the reason technology thus far has been a dismal failure in schools. I will show throughout the remainder of this book how and why computers as tutors of children can revolutionize education as thoroughly as they have transformed almost every commercial activity in the twentieth century, and how they must be the foundation of any enduring, meaningful and true turnabout in education.

When I use the term "computers," I mean more than the basic machine. I include multimedia capability, present and emerging, which computers can integrate and direct, and ancillary technology connected with computers like communications through modems. For simplicity, the contemplated full use of computers will be termed "computerized education" throughout this book.

Since the beginning of the industrial revolution, machines have been extending human power. Railroad engines inaugurated unimagined speed; for the first time, man was able to move faster than a horse. Railroads, however, have limits. They must follow rails that are permanently in place. Then came automobiles, not bound by rails and able to move independently. Nonetheless, they still had constraints; they had to move on the ground. Airplanes followed automobiles and enlarged those boundaries, but other restrictions remained: railroads and cars and airplanes can't go beyond the broad category that may be termed transportation. Automobiles and airplanes, for example, don't manufacture goods or keep detailed records.

Machines always had certain limited areas within which they could operate until computers arrived. These instruments serve as extensions of human minds. Consequently, they have abolished many restrictions that bound machines. Neither a mind nor a computer can carry people or materials, or cut metal or take photographs. Both can, however, direct other machines that perform these actions. Computers share the power of the mind because they are directed by, and are completely dependent upon, the directions that minds of people can give them. They then follow these instructions slavishly.

This ability to adhere to written or oral instructions differentiates computers from all other machines; it is their dominant attribute. These instructions are called programming or software.

Each instruction for a computer is a simple statement that a machine can read and interpret. One programming instruction can be joined with hundreds or thousands of others. Together they provide awesome power. They can command computers to carry out actions and ideas that are complex, and sometimes that had never previously been contemplated outside the realm of pure human intelligence.

Playing chess is an example. Great minds have long been fascinated by chess, and masters of the game have been lauded for their brilliance. Computers are now sufficiently adept at playing that they can crush almost any opponent anywhere. As the machines advance further, computers will probably be able to defeat anyone, even champion chess masters, if circumstances provide an incentive for human minds to write the intricate and essential instructions necessary.

Without this human programming, computers are useless. With it, however, they emulate the minds that guide them, but add two startling improvements: blinding speed and a massive memory. These additional attributes explain why computers can exceed the power of the minds behind them - why, for example, programmers can develop software that will defeat champion chess players although the programmers themselves are not champions. Speed and memory combined with the human minds directing them, are the attributes that have enabled these machines to pervade and conquer the world with astonishing swiftness.

Many dynamic benefits flow from programming or software, some particularly pertinent in education. I will here touch upon some of the generalized advantages, and later, beginning in Chapter 9, I will be more specific.

1. Flexibility

Human minds are eminently flexible, and computers, as their extensions, share that trait. Potential goals of programming are limitless and the possible approaches to reaching any specific objective are extensive. This flexibility will allow software writers to lavish an abundance of learning opportunities on students.

Pupils are not all alike. They differ in intelligence and interests and come from diverse backgrounds. Even an individual pupil may change from one day to the next depending on his or her emotional and physical conditions. Programming can overcome these variations. Diverse approaches can be used, not only with separate students, but with the same pupils at various times. As a child learns, the computer will continually evaluate his or her progress. The machine will review or repeat lessons as needed, and will permit and encourage the learner to progress faster when the lesson has been mastered, or will slow the pace until the pupil grasps the material. It will diagnose errors and then provide remedial exercises before moving forward. It will also make lessons stimulating and interesting to enhance learning and retention.

Moreover, software will be upgraded continually. Education will never again remain stagnant; it will mutate from a static specialty, unchanged for centuries, to an evolving and advancing science.

2. Using techniques of teachers

Programmers won't have to reinvent effective routines. They will be able to copy and use the skillful teaching techniques that minds of human instructors have developed over many ages.

An example of computers imitating teachers is in analysis of errors. Experienced teachers often uncover a deficiency through incorrect answers that a student gives on a test or during a recitation. Whenever a critical error appears, a perceptive teacher understands that the student missed a fundamental point.

By capitalizing on this background knowledge supplied by teachers, programmers can enable computers to identify the same difficulties. Although a computer cannot "understand," it can be programmed to recognize types of errors and thus to copy superior teachers. Then it can also apply fitting remedies.

Problems can be set up in the computer that will show when a specific student deficiency is present. The machines will generate and retain in their vast memories the correct answer and an extensive series of likely incorrect answers. The speed of the machine as it analyzes answers will enhance its effectiveness.

Misunderstanding of negative numbers can provide an example, and a simple problem will illustrate the principle:

+ 386
-(-125)
___________
???

The correct answer, of course, is 511. A common mistake might develop a solution of 261 or 136. Anyone confused by negative numbers might come to either erroneous solution. The computer would also find "261" and "136" in its memory. If either answer appeared as the student's response, the computer would again explain negative numbers and give a brief example or two. It would note that a fundamental error about negative numbers had occurred. Then it would provide more problems for the pupil. If a similar inaccuracy reappeared in another response, the machine would be aware of the previous difficulty and immediately provide further and more basic assistance. Additional help would continue until the student showed sufficient understanding of negative numbers. This salutary technique flows from its use of teachers' understanding of the way children sometimes confuse negative numbers.

Analysis of errors will be only one of many instances where the accumulated wisdom of teachers will aid programmers, just as the accumulated wisdom of earlier instructors has always helped new teachers. Software writers will bolster programs with ideas used for centuries. Almost all important techniques developed by teachers will be used by computers as educational programming matures.

For example, on a discussion of causes of the First World War, those who have taught the subject understand difficulties that students have when they try to sort out the conditions that led to the conflict. Teachers, from their experience, can show programmers how to emphasize frequently overlooked or misunderstood issues and to make students aware of happenings, both deliberate and unplanned. Teachers can help programmers impress on students the vast panoply of causes and pseudo-causes that are involved in major upheavals, using that war or any other conflict as an example. These teachers can also point out to programmers how they are able to make history come alive for students by stressing the personalities or strategy involved. Software writers can use this accumulated expertise to provide instructive material that will make learning lasting and more enjoyable.

When these tested deliveries have been programmed into the computer, they will be used whenever they will help educate a student. Software will enable the computer itself to determine when they are appropriate.

Improvements will continue by engaging other astute humans to work in ongoing endeavors with programmers to enrich teaching techniques. Human brilliance will be extended through computers. The combination of teachers and programmers using their immense talents while taking advantage of the resources of computers will result in a continual flow of teaching enhancements.

3. Going beyond teachers' ordinary skills.

While computers imitate and take ideas from teachers, their speed and memory will propel them beyond the natural limitations of teachers. The machines can track multitudes of happenings that would be beyond human abilities. For example, computers can count and remember how often a specific mistake is made by an individual student and by thousands of students, and then can notify programmers that a specific error or genre of error is being made frequently by students. With this information, writers of software will be able to redesign the portion of the program dealing with that confusion. They will employ a different or expanded method of instruction designed to lessen the likelihood of the mistake continuing to occur. Programmers will again be informed by feedback if the student perplexity is repeated.

Software provides additional ancillary advantages. For example, when an outstanding teacher develops a new method of improving student learning, usually only the classes of that teacher benefit. When computer programmers working with top-notch people develop a better and enriching approach, they will make it available to every student using that software, wherever machines are located.

An additional benefit will also follow. A student, because of his or her unique weaknesses, may find a specific teacher's method difficult even if that teacher is excellent at instructing other students. Software allows the machine to use ideas of different teachers to reach diverse pupils. Every computer through its programming can mimic more than one model teacher. It can use whichever style is effective depending on needs of students. I will return to this important characteristic when I cite the value of individualized instruction.

4. Enhancing other teaching aids

Another important educational improvement that the wonders of programming will introduce flows from the capacity of computers to control and totally integrate audiovisual presentations into the instruction of each student. In computerized education, these can be produced on computer screens of students and software will control them completely. Audiovisual displays are called multimedia in computer terminology. More than the name has changed; the whole concept is vastly expanded. A full chapter later in this book is necessary merely to hint at the dazzling possibilities of multimedia controlled by computers and their software.

Comparing lessons stored in the machines' memories with those found in textbooks illustrates another area where programming can improve on current teaching aids. When books are printed each copy must be identical with every other one produced at that time. Lack of absolute uniformity, however, could have advantages. For example, history might be better remembered by students if happenings in different geographical locations were highlighted for students living in those areas. Computer programs can provide valuable variations, and they won't be limited only to past happenings. When scientific breakthroughs occur, updated material can be added at once over telephone lines to all copies wherever they are used.

It will even be possible for sectarian schools to have certain concepts, which they wish to stress, easily added or inserted into the software for use in their schools. Specific school districts may want some ideas to receive more attention. Software writers will be able to accommodate their wishes, often with only minimal added cost. Obviously, this may pose philosophical problems which I cannot solve here. My only objective is to point out what can be done.

In recent years, several new technologies have been developed that were touted by their adherents as able to revitalize education. Teaching machines, audio-visual presentations, movies, and videos were hailed as potential saviors that would bring a dynamic transformation into schools. Education withstood each of these intrusions and emerged virtually unchanged. The reaction to claims that any new technology can make a major upheaval may be greeted with amused disbelief and quickly dismissed by some authorities. They've heard this trite assertion of super powers before about these other novelties, and nothing happened. Why expect this latest gimmick to upset a system that has shown itself to be inflexible for a century?

This time, however, we are dealing with instruments whose range and power are unprecedented. Their unique qualities have enabled them to revolutionize countless other fields. No previous invention has forced similar upheavals. Computers can achieve in education what they have done elsewhere: they can bring a total revolution. Merely because other educational modifications have been unduly praised, and have failed, is an ineffectual argument to prove that no invention can ever revolutionize schools. I ask readers to evaluate the characteristics that computers bring before dismissing them.

Even acknowledgment of the power and unique characteristics of computers does not ensure their immediate acceptance. Arguments against assigning a vital part in education to computers are manifold. The most obvious is this question: "How could a machine do what Miss Smith did for me in the fourth grade?"

Many other objections will also arise:

• Machines will break down, and students will be left with nothing to do.
• Computer programs always have bugs, and again the students will be left without material.
• Computers can teach only certain facts, not the more important higher order thinking.
• Some students will deliberately manhandle computers and destroy them.
• Computers can be dangerous because of the radiation they emit from their screens.
• Computers can be dangerous to the eyesight of students because of the need to read from the screen.
• Computers can be dangerous because of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome, a malady that pains thousands of people in offices where computers are used regularly.
• The cost of giving every student a computer is prohibitive.
• A machine cannot make judgments that a human can make.
• A machine cannot teach values.
• A machine cannot develop interaction among students.
• A machine cannot give necessary and meaningful personal attention to students.
• Pupils will waste time if no teacher checks on them.
• Bright students will discover how to use computers to alter and destroy the system.
• One student will be able to take the test of another student since no human will be checking.
• A school system with computers as teachers will turn out automatons, not warm, friendly humans.
• Some students will be unable to use computers either through fright or incompetence, and will receive no education.
• If computers could be teachers, schools would use them in that way since they already possess millions of the machines.

Some of these objections are valid and some are merely specious. All must be addressed. Answers to these difficulties will be brought out in subsequent chapters. Responses will be summarized in the final chapter. If any reader might be tempted to move there from this point, I must say "Whoa! Don't jump to the last chapter now! That's legal when you are reading mystery stories, but is forbidden in books on education. We'll get there, but some groundwork must be in place."

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FOOTNOTES

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