Dear Organlearners,
Greetings to you all.
I have often stressed that (for me -- for others it may be different)
authentic learning begins with sensory sensations which rise into
experiences. These experiences bring a gain to experential knowledge. From
this first level (experential knowledge) the second level (tacit
knowledge) emerge. Some of the tacit knowledge itself transform into the
third level (formal knowledge) when the learner creates information with
this tacit knowledge. The fourth and highest level of knowledge is widom
(sapient knowledge).
So where does imagination fits into this stratification of knowledge?
Further- more, is imagination important to learning? It is often said that
humankind now lives in the third wave of human culture, namely the
information wave. The first wave was the agricultural and the second the
industrial expansion of humankind. Today there is far more information
available than any single human can ever hope to experience. Since
information itself never has meaning nor knowledge, letting such
information into our minds does not constitute learning. So how can we
learn from such information without direct experiences? The answer is to
use our imagination. We create with our imagination meaning and knowledge
from pieces of information.
In the weekend copy of a daily newspaper of a week ago there was an in
depth article on the chemical (poisons) and biological (pathogens)
pollution of South Africa's rivers and dams. Because South Africa is by
large an arid and even desert country, the overload of our water resources
with poisons and pathogens happens very easily. Dilution cannot hide this
overload as in water rich countries. Somewhere in the article, whether
intended as a joke or as fact I would not know, it has been said that the
pollution of our water resources with dihydrogen oxide is perhaps the most
serious of all. I am still waiting for sombody to comment on it in the
letters sections of the paper. A week has gone by and nobody made any
comment. (By the way, the formula for dihydrogen oxide is H2O and we will
soon see what it means.)
I have often heard the claim that a teacher of chemistry or physics is
fortunate because things which have to be learned can first be
demontrated. But this claim has a lot of holes. Firstly, to observe a
demonstration passively is far different from self experiencing
interactively what the demonstrator also experiences. Secondly, a student
may have observed few, if any, demonstrations in the previous years. Such
a learner has to rely on rote learning which is inherently distortive. One
demonstration cannot ever make up for the lack of hundreds of past
demonstrations or even better, self-experiences. Thirdly, much of
chemistry and phsyics happen on levels (microscopic or galactic) which
cannot be experienced directly. The learner is either to large for
microscopic experiences or to small for galactic experiences!
Here is an example. Teach a learner about perhaps the most important of
all molecules, namely the water molecule H--O--H (or H2O). It is
impossible to experience by any of the five sense organs a single water
molecule. It would be like searching with a super oil tanker a small
feather drifting upon the ocean in terms of the collision made. So enter
the vendors with demonstration units -- costing education deparments
billions of dollars. In the case for molecules they will sell sticks and
balls. The sticks represent the bonds (two sticks for the two "--" bonds
in H2O) and the balls (two small white ones for hydrogen H and one large
blue one for oxygen O). It is just here where all learners fell off from
the bus. They immediately acquire the Mental Model that molecules have
rigid shapes. They should rather have joined two tennis balls (H-atoms)
with two springs (one each for one bond) to a bigger soccer ball (O-atom).
When demonstrating this model to the pupils/students, the teacher/lecturer
must shake it vigorously in all possible manners, saying "this looks like
the H2O molecule". But this very demonstrartion may prevent the learners
to develop their own imagination. What the teacher/lecturer should have
done before the demonstration, is to tell the pupils/students to close
their eyes. Then the learenrs self have to recall from memory two tennis
balls, one soccer ball and two springs like bed springs. By recalling
these objects, they may draw on all their experiences with this objects.
Then they have to attach, using their imagination, the two tennis balls by
means of the two springs to the soccer ball. The resulting image ought to
have a angular shape
. H H
. \ /
. O
rather than the linear shape
. H ---- O ---- H
Finally they have to shake this angular shapped image in their mind. Once
they imagine this shaking image, this is like a water molecule. (The
second phase of their imagination is to get an idea of just how small the
water molecule is.) Only after all this imagination should the
teacher/lecturer demonstrate the model.
I have used this example to show that the imagination of the
teacher/lecturer should never be confused with the imagination of the
learner self. This may easily happen in a demonstration where the
imagination of the teacher/lecturer usually displaces the imagination of
the learner. Why? The learner gets some visual inputs from which
experience, then tacit knowing and eventually formal knowledge may emerge.
Although it seems to be perfect authentic learning, it is actually
blemished because it use false inputs. The very visual sensations concern
balls and springs and not atoms bonded together in a molecule. The latter
can never be observed directly. Thus the learner never become aware that
imagination is needed where sensations lack and experiences fail to rise.
In this case the necessary experiences for authentic learning come from
the imagination (and not observation) by sticking mentally the balls
together with the two springs into one vibrating object.
The previous paragraph illustrate precisely what Einstein once exclaimed:
"Thank God not all the schools destroy the imagination of all the pupils."
We can certainly destroy their imagination by offering them demonstrations
rather than guiding them how to use their experiences of other things (in
the example experiences with balls and springs) to imagine that which
cannot ever be experienced directly.
I want to end this contribution so that we rather can have a fruitful
dialogue on the topic. But since I have mentioned Einstein's exclamation,
let me tell why he made this exclamation. Einstein wrote three papers
early the 20th century of which all three changed the "eternal becoming"
of science decisively. The three papers were on Brownian motion, the
photo-electric effect and relativity theory. In each of these three papers
his own imagination was decisive in getting a positive result. How?
Brown observed in biology through a microscope that tiny pollen grains on
the surface of water were actually moving erratically around. Up to that
time a lot of theoretical physics under the name "statistical mechanics"
was done on the atomic-molecular level of matter. But little of its
outcomes could be observed directly on the macroscopic level of matter.
Einstein immediately imagined that the collisions of the unobservable
small water molecules might be resonsible for the observable erratic
motion of the pollen grains on water. From the unobservable molecular side
he then imagined just how much and in what manner they would kick the
pollen grains around. He then made calculations to predict properties of
the observable motion of the pollen grains, for example how far a pollen
would travel before changing the direction of its motion. These
predictions were amazingly correct.
I will skip photo electricity. As for relativity theory, Einstein imagined
that one point in space cannot tell instantaneously its time to another
point in space. It has to tell its time by something which moves from the
one to the other point. The fastest possible motion in nature is that of
light (electromagnetic waves). Thus one "space-time" point has to be
connected to any other "space-time" point through light with a finite
velocity. This results in a four-dimensional space-time continuum.
Einstein used his imagination further by speculating how a measured length
of its space or a measured interval of its time for one such "space-time"
point will appear when also measured from any other "space-time" using
light as the only means of communication. He made the startling discovery
that as soon as these two "space-time" points (actually called the origins
of an observer system) move with a constant velocity with respect to each
other, their measurements will differ. Length will seem to decrease in the
direction of motion and time to increase for the other observer. What
confusion and arguments will not result from this? But most curiously of
all, for both observers "rest" mass will be nothing else than light energy
frozen at a point in space.
His imagination caught all other scientists on the wrong foot. At first
they were very sceptic, but soon they realised that they could not refute
his imagination with one single shred of evidence. Then they began to
gather evidence that his imagination might be true -- and just how much
evidence they discovered would fill a book. The one which you are best
informed about, is nuclear energy (bombs and reactors).
I told about Einstein's imagination not to intimidate you fellow learners
that only people of Einstein's stature ought to imagine. I told it to
encourage you that even Einstein considered imagination as one of his most
valuable intellectual assets. He openly admitted that he use his
imagination as wildly as possible. Little kids have imaginations just as
valuable as Einstein. But, as I observe even with my own granddaughter now
in her third year on school, their imagination becomes increasinly stunted
day by day. Fortunately for Jessica, she has a grandfather who enjoys her
imagination and encourages her as much as possible to go on imagination
trips. Unfortunately for her hundreds of fellow pupils, they have many
teachers who have been brain washed that their main duty is to transfer
knowledge from the books to the minds of the pupils. Yet these very books
have no knowledge and meaning. Furthemore, it is concluded that the pupils
must have low intelligence when this transfer of no-knowing into them
results in no-knowing within them. What mad-houses have our educational
institutions turned into?
So, please, let us have a dialogue on imagination and what role it plays in
learning as well as vice versa. Let us think about questions such as
* Is creativity and imagination the same thing?
* What role does imagination plays in the scientific method.
* Should imagination be suppressed when the outcome does
not fit qualities like good, right, true and lovely?
* Can the emergence of the LO be constrained by curbing the
imagination of the organisation's members for whatever reason?
Tell us how you create in your imagination. Tell us why you use your
imagination. Tell us how you feel about imagination. Do your supervisor
likes it when you work imaginatively. Do you like it when your employees
work imaginatively.
With care and best wishes
-- At de Lange <amdelange@gold.up.ac.za> Snailmail: A M de Lange Gold Fields Computer Centre Faculty of Science - University of Pretoria Pretoria 0001 - Rep of South AfricaLearning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <Richard@Karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>
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