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Article Summary

Title : Learning from Schools

Author : Peter T . Knight

Publication : Higher Education , Vol . 44 , No . 2 (Sep , 2002 , pp 283-298

Summary

This article tries to relate the research findings of studies done with schools to that of higher education . It has to be understood that schools refer to elementary and secondary schools while higher education pertains to colleges and universities . The author argued that there has been a wealth of information from the studies that have been conducted in schools specifically to find ways in which to improve

education in general , however higher education have not made use of these findings even if the similarities of the two levels are very close . The author focuses on five aspects that have been the object of many schooling researches these include departments , school effectiveness and improvement , teacher 's thinking and planning , assessment and professional learning . The said s are then analyzed by the author and some key points in which it could be used in higher education institutions had been raised . The author says that higher education should focus more on improving the quality of departments and its leadership if it is assumed that a university is a conglomeration of departments . Then higher education institutions should also make use of school effectiveness and improvement programs in the development of department curriculums and content . In terms of teacher thinking , higher education should not rely only on goals and objectives and lesson planning but try to develop architecturally sound learning activities For assessment , it would seem that higher education fails to capture the real learning of the student when grades are used as well as no reflecting the needs of the future employers . Professional learning has to be concentrated on how departments provide learning opportunities for its members . The author concludes that much has to be learned from schooling research and it is not too late to begin

Critique

This article talks about how schools are similar to higher education institutions . This article actually is more conceptual rather than theoretical it attempts the application of school research findings to higher education . Although , the author is right to assume that the two institutions share some characteristics , I think that they have very different purposes . Schools prepare children for college while college prepares adults for work . Therefore this article does not contribute much to what we know of learning and designing learning experiences...