The Feuerstein Method and the Power of Teaching Thinking

If there is a common theme in this blog, it is innovation. Part of the goal of this blog is to go past what we are currently doing in education, and explore what comes next. How are we going to teach? How are we going to enable students to learn how to learn? How are we going to teach them to think?

Data driven models are quickly becoming obsolete. What is next on the horizon? Teaching students how to explore, manage information, and teaching the top levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy(synthesis and evaluation) are the future. In fact, Rob’s Education advocates for the allowance of individualization of instruction to that extent.

I was reading the Jerusalem Post and ran across a fantastic article by Refael Feuerstein – The Feuerstein Method: An educational model prepared for the AI era – opinion, Jerusalem Post. His Institute, based in Jerusalem, meets globally with the top educators of the world. In fact, they just recently met in Chicago through the University of Illinois.

Here are three quotes from the JPost article which support what many of us advocate as the next generation of teaching and learning:

1. Educational systems and therapists are beginning to understand what we refused to recognize for decades: The emphasis is shifting from knowledge-oriented education to process-oriented education.
2. The new pedagogy we champion speaks of the need for learners to learn how to ask questions, identify knowledge gaps, formulate hypotheses, develop theories – both small and large – and know how to plan their implementation. Yes, learning to engineer intelligence – to introduce methods and processes into our thinking world.
3. We define the current state of intelligence as intuitive intelligence: We operate from the force of our previous experience, which leads us to quick but superficial responses. We find ourselves mistaken when we face new problems that differ more or less from our existing knowledge. Then, one of two things happens: either we are paralyzed and at a loss, or we simply make mistakes.

The bottom line. We need to teach students how to develop ideas, how test the value and rigor of those ideas, and then to refine those ideas if necessary. Indeed and rightfully so, it sounds a lot like the scientific method. We need to teach students how to think!!! We need to teach them how to manage information with the latest software and hardware advancements. Loosely quoting Feuerstein, “We need to teach them to use technology without becoming a slave to it.”

Further, the Feuestein Method seeks to identify strengths, not weaknesses of students. Every student can improve no matter what level they arrive. “The brain grows and develops depending on the task given to it,” according to Reuven Feuerstein. That is remarkable and seemingly common sense. If all that we do is teach to a test, we are not allowing for the expansion of learning which accompanies an approach grounded in teaching thinking and the exploration of a topic.

The great minds in education see that the current system (which teaches students how to take a test) is outdated. The current information revolution has raced by that pedagogy. We need to pivot rapidly if our students are to be equipped with the resources to compete in this new world. I would even offer that the pedagogical consequences of the NCLB Act(Bush)/Race to the Top(Obama/Duncan) are going to leave us at a massive disadvantage from a national strategic standpoint.

Many Israeli educators have long been near the forefront of education. Their country depends on rigorous education and innovation in the field of education. They don’t have time for fluff. (My main knock on Israeli education is that they need to offer more collegiate experiences.) I present this to the reader today as just another example in “the why” we need to find an exit ramp away from the data driven highway in education. We need to re-emphasize thinking, innovation, information management, and how to effectively utilize technology without losing our humanity. If we don’t, our students are going to be great test takers, but lack the workplace skills needed to thrive in the ever evolving information age. We are trying to teach students to invent the wheel, when in fact, we need to be teaching them how to drive the car which sits on those four wheels so to speak.

The way that we think affects everything that we do in our daily lives. The Feuerstein Institute

ProTip: Complementing their forward thinking approach found in the article above,The Feuerstein Institute works extensivelely to help students who have significant disabilities. The goal? To have participants live a life which is productive and meaningful.

Mainstreaming students with disabilities is the most important thing. When students with disabilities are mainstreamed into the regular classroom, they don’t just have one mediator. They have thirty mediators. Instead of just one hour of speech therapy, they have eight hours. (In the regular classroom…)Students are exposed to normative language, normative vocabulary, normative articulation of words and sentences. The Feuerstein Institute