A Solution for Bad Teaching | Hacker News Reader

A Solution for Bad Teaching

nytimes.com

5 pointstokenadult9 comments

Over time, technology will solve this problem. Professors will get replaced by robots and pre-recorded video lectures. There's already NLP AIs that can grade research papers. Technology to check papers for plagiarism and grade tests have been around for some time. Professors will go the way of the Blacksmith...

Do you think that's a good thing?

I think ergoproxy has (unfortunately) never actually had a good teacher.

We've had textbooks for a few thousand years now (depending on how loose you want to get with the definition of "textbook" -- I mean a body of codified adn recorded knowledge). Books are great. Videos are great. MOOCS (which in most implementations are basically just fancy textbooks) are great.

They still aren't teachers, and never will be until we have Strong AI.

Teachers aren't going anywhere.

I question whether teachers actually are necessary. Most people object, but when I went to school the main function of the teacher was just to reiterate what the textbook said in lecture form and grade assignments, most of which were designed to just get you to read the textbook or pay attention in class.

The main reason textbook learning isn't effective is because it requires willpower. No ones forcing you to do it or stopping you from walking away. But that seems easier to solve.

You can't ask a textbook or video for clarification.

A textbook or video can't see your facial expression (or even read what you've written online) and figure out that you're confused or headed down the wrong track.

A textbook or video can't decide that a certain approach isn't working at all and shift to a different analogy, example, or whatever.

"Wow, the whole class looks stunned. Maybe I'd better explain that again, or in another way." Any good teacher has done this many times.

Some of these problems may be solvable, but canned video lectures aren't going to do it.

You can ask Stack Exchange type sites, IRC and forums and people who practice whatever it is you are learning. If a kid learns how to find the right person, whether it be a peer or an adult, that can help them with their uncertainties and provide clarity, that is the best teacher. The job title of teacher may go away for many out there that practice their profession, but the notion of a teacher won't. Many of us get the opportunity to play that role when someone seeks out our guidance on a subject we are knowledgable and passionate about. Hopefully this continues to escalate to the point that when those pupils reach adulthood they feel the same responsibility towards younger generations when their advice, expertise and counseling is sought.

But do you really believe those things are absolutely necessary? I rarely asked teachers questions and no one ever judged my facial expressions. If you are really confused a Google search usually works. Also this isn't even relevant to most online courses which have a forum or some kind of discussion. In my one experiment with online learning, many of the questions I had were already asked and discussed by many people in great detail before I even got there.

Exactly. The most important lesson any teacher can give you is how to be autodidactic and self-sufficient; to teach you how to learn on your own, whether it be for pleasure or so solve a problem in your life, at home or in the workplace. This, unfortunately, is not what modern educational systems are set up to teach. Fortunately, some teachers out there are an exception and have an outsized impact on the lives of their students.

Good teachers probably won't go anywhere, but hopefully bad teachers will go the way of the dodo bird. I have had both good and bad teachers and three of the most influential people in my life were teachers and I still talk about all three to this day. But I can also blame my AP Comp Sci teacher for causing me to abandon computer science as my choice of major in college, causing me to take 10+ years to rediscover software engineering as a career I'm most happy with.

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