Knowing, doing, or thinking?

Why is it important:

Higher education is about more than providing qualifications. It is concerned with the intellectual, personal and social growth of learners, and about preparing them to be both the conscience and critics of society. However, many higher education courses are described in terms of the content knowledge that is to be taught and assessed with little mention of doing or thinking. That is not to say that knowing, doing and thinking are separable; but perhaps the emphasis in teaching and assessment needs to shift.

Four questions arise from this situation, they are:

-  Should more emphasis in higher education be on thinking?

- How might thinking be given more prominence in class?

-  How can we assess the process of thinking rather than its product?

-  What forms of thinking and knowing need more emphasis?

How will the session be run:

The session will be run as a thinking circle with participants sharing ideas. It is anticipated that we will go round the circle more than once with each issue and spend about ten minutes on it; and that related issues will arise from the discussion.

- In the first round people will introduce themselves, and comment on the notion that we should be concerned with more than qualifications.

- Next, the participants� ideas about the need for a shift from a content knowledge emphasis to thinking will be sought.

- The third cycle will be a brainstorm of ways in which students� thinking might be emphasised more in class.

- Then time will be spent considering how students� thinking processes might be assessed.

- Finally (if time permits) the responses will focus on specific ways of knowing and thinking that need more emphasis in our work.

Facilitator:

Andy Begg, School of Education, Auckland University of Technology

Andy Begg is an Associate Professor in the School of Education at AUT. He has previously worked at the tertiary level at Waikato University, the Open University (UK), and on short contracts at Auckland University, the Aga Khan University (Pakistan), and Monash University (Melbourne). His interests are in mathematics education and educational development (in particular curriculum development and professional development). He is currently working on a project looking at thinking in the curriculum.