From Encyclopedia to iPhone: Knowledge and Change

Sierra Leone is renowned for the value its people have always accorded to education as evidenced by the loyalty of former pupils for their alma maters. Having a long tradition and being among the oldest schools is an honour proudly emphasized by schools but could it be that upholding tradition is at the cost of innovation? Why does Sierra Leone need to foster innovation in education?

Picture a set of encyclopedias in volumes from A to Z.  Once the foundation stone of a good education, this same icon of knowledge now represents that which must be changed to educate students for the world in which we live today.

The first encyclopedia was written 2,000 years ago by Pliny the Elder who claimed to have recorded 20,000 facts from 2,000 works by 200 authors. The goal was to collect all knowledge, order and preserve it so that it could be passed on to future generations. The word, encyclopedia, means complete knowledge.

Until the late 20^th century, a simplified view of mass education was to shift as many facts as possible from the encyclopedia into the empty spaces in students’ minds. Examinations were conducted to find out if students had learnt at least half of the knowledge they were taught and those students who had retained the most in their memories, usually through rote learning or memorizing, were rewarded with academic prizes.

What has happened to make this long tradition of education no longer useful beyond the early years? The answer lies in the amount of knowledge and the ways it is generated, stored, accessed, communicated and used around the world today. Even Pliny was not able to finish his life’s work compiling his encyclopedia before the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD killed him.  In our time, it is the information explosion that has signed the death warrant for traditional education.

Next year, CNBC, US business news website reports that the world’s store of digital information will be equivalent to a stack of books reaching from the sun to Pluto and back. The word, exponential, meaning increasing more and more rapidly in a steep curve is the one used to describe this overwhelming increase in knowledge. Knowledge is growing so quickly that encyclopedias can no longer be usefully produced because by the time they are printed they are out of date.

How must education change as a response to this new global state of the rapidly evolving flood of knowledge? Clearly, since it is impossible to learn everything, low level thinking skills like memorization are of little use and need to give way to the new essential skills. The deluge of information that is often contradictory and contested requires 21^st century skills to process it. These skills have been described by educationalists as higher order thinking processes because they provide the tools for managing masses of information. They are analyzing, evaluating, synthesizing, creating and innovating.

In the same way that the encyclopedia represents knowledge in the past, the smart phone is the icon of knowledge in the information age because memorizing facts is no longer the end goal of education when a smart phone with Internet access gives us instant factual information we carry in our pockets. The proliferation of iPhone applications means that everything traditionally taught in a general education lasting over ten or more years from how to spell words and what they mean to all the basic arithmetical calculations and answers to any questions about any topic is there on our phones.

So what are the implications for education? Much of traditional low level, rote learning is now redundant in the connected world of the high-speed information super-highway.  The limitations on current Internet access in Sierra Leone must not blind educational planners to the implications of the inevitable changes. Indeed the delay is an advantage in the sense that critical observation of the responses of other countries can save Sierra Leone from expensive mistakes made by pathfinders. What students need to learn now is not information itself but how to judge the authority, reliability, or truth of information and then how to use it to refine, create or innovate. Education must adapt to the new needs of students to prepare them for the future world of work.

We live in a world where because of the volume of information and the rapidly changing nature of knowledge, which is now generated, stored, accessed, communicated and used in digital form, computer literacy has equal importance with reading, writing and arithmetic. Teachers must be empowered to teach the new digital literacy through professional development. Every teacher is a teacher of literacy, not just information technology teachers.

The role of the teacher has changed in response to the new challenges faced by students. Throughout high school, teachers must develop new ways of progressing to higher order activities without sacrificing the thorough teaching of foundational principles. In the high-end world of work, project teams tackle much of the work formerly done by lone experts. Students learn communication and collaboration skills needed for successful team work by solving problems in small groups and then demonstrating to the class their logic rather than competing individually with each other to see who can remember the most facts or perform routine exercises and functions correctly.

The derivation of the word education can best be expressed as to bring forth what is within, to bring out potential. This is a world away from the traditional concept of filling a vacuum with facts. Successful adaptation to change is conditional upon leaders and planners embracing change optimistically while at the same time respecting those traditions that value education and are conducive to building teamwork through collaboration.

While it is incumbent upon today’s leaders in the education sector to plan, prioritize and resource reform in the delivery of 21^st century education, it should be recognized that senior student leaders and student associations have a place at the discussion table and as stakeholders in their own future.  The most startlingly original thinking often comes from young, flexible minds. The future of Sierra Leone will depend upon the innovative solutions forged by the collaborative synergy among its most sophisticated, young thinkers and visionary leaders working together for the common good.

By Lorraine Bowan, Sydney, Australia

Lorraine Bowan is a high school English teacher from Sydney’s northern beaches who has been teaching students aged 13 to 18 years who have a desire to extend their learning, work at a rapid pace and explore concepts, culture and theories through a study of pre-twentieth century and modern literature. She has been at the forefront of harnessing information technology for teaching and learning, encouraging colleagues, students and their families to embrace new opportunities for collaborative and interactive learning. She plans to explore the current ways in which technology and gifted and talented programs are providing students in Sierra Leone with creative thinking skills to tackle the foreseeable and unforeseeable challenges their generation will face with a spirit of idealism and optimism. She hopes to learn from the initiatives and innovations of the BGifted Foundation and to share her experience and skills as she works on a new program for secondary students aimed.

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