This text was first published in Dutch on the 20th of August 2012

External versus Internal

Two visions on learning are in circulation in education. This would not have been such a problem were it not the case that both visions contradict each other and that neither one of them can solve all the problems we encounter in practice. The well-known behaviourist B.F. Skinner is seen as the progenitor of the vision that the external environment is the determining factor in the learning process. Learning would be established almost exclusively through stimuli from the environment that are interpreted either as rewards or punishment. Our need to receive rewards and avoid punishment push the development forward. On the other end of the spectrum is the view of Carl Rogers. He was convinced that the individual himself is the driving force in his development. Individual wishes and desires are the determining factor and the environment only plays a facilitating (or obstructing) role. For Skinnerians the learning environment (read: teacher + study) reigns, while followers of Rogers believe that the students themselves eventually determine what they learn.

Restrictions in practice

Both visions come across problems in practice. The philosophy of Skinner manifests itself in rigorously fleshed out educational programs in which the student is allowed restricted space to think for itself and is confronted with a lot of obligations. But completely determined and forceful programs can lead to servility, limited self-reliance, deficient motivation, and a grade obsession in students. Teachers often complain about this. The Dutch Studiehuis in secondary schools and competence oriented education in universities of applied sciences rely more on the vision of Rogers. This method, however, struggles with the educational level. It turns out to be quite difficult to keep the level of the student up, and the “rigid” method is applied increasingly rigorously to resist the downward trend.

What do we do?

As is often the case, the truth (and the wisdom) lies in the middle. Both Skinner and Rogers were right. Nobody can deny the fact that the external (learning) environment is regulatory to a certain degree in that it only accepts a limited bandwidth of behaviours per situation. At the same time, it is also true that we have a certain degree of agency in what we want to do and learn. In my book on study problems (2009), I attempt to conjoin both visions with the remark that “the external environment and the internal drives come together in the memory constructs we continually create and recreate throughout our lives.” Three years of practical experience and a whole series of essays later and it is still a challenge to truly understand this “coming together”. It is important because this is where both visions meet.

Project delineation and Goal-orientedness

The (external) learning environment manifests itself within us in a project definition. This is one of the seven skills I use to concretise effective learning. It is the answer to the question: what does the learning environment want from me? With every task, test, assignment, project, or supervision programme the teacher, supervisor, and/or study wants the student to do and realise certain things on specific terms. The better the student understands (delineates) the project, the better he will be able to attain the requirable knowledge. The internal drives manifest themselves in the second skill: goal-orientedness. Attention, interest, and concentration are fundamental attitudes in the learning process (see my essay The Zombie and the centaur). If these are lacking, a sort of zombie attitude arises that ought to be undesirable for all those involved, because a zombie is unable to learn as he is unable to experience anything. In order to experience complex things, one has to have an extensive orientation that keep the attitudes in question activated. One has to want something that goes beyond avoiding punishment or other inconveniences. The student, therefore, has to formulate his own goals within the project. The necessity of the attitudes simultaneously brings agency along. Due to the fact that we experience something continuously, one can draw the conclusion that we also continuously want things. A student who thinks he can disassociate himself from this with the remark: “I wanted to study but before I knew it, I had been whatsapping for three hours,” is mistaken: he wanted to whatsapp for three hours!

Coming together is harder than it seems

One could draw the meagrely noticeable conclusion that we are dealing with the same old song: the teacher/supervisor/study has to communicate clearly (for the student to understand the project) and the student needs to take his responsibility. This is true, but also not the whole story. The “meeting place” for teachers and students is often understood too simplistically as a place where teachers think they can offer neutral and objective information, while most students see themselves as neutral recipients of that same information. This is an illusion. Especially because Skinner and Rogers are both right, we can ascertain that objective and neutral “sending” and “receiving” does not exist. The coming together is entirely shaped by the agents themselves. This means that not only the student has to have an adequate interpretation of the project (what the teacher wants) and has to formulate his personal goals within it, it also has to happen the other way around! The teacher/supervisor also has to have an adequate interpretation of his project (what the student wants) and has to adapt to that. The attitudes of the student also have a forceful character to a certain degree for the teacher. Erik von Glazersfeld (1995) said the following: “The teacher must listen to the student, interpret what the student does and says, and try to build a model of the student’s conceptual structures. Without it, any attempt to change the student’s conceptual structures can be no more than a hit or miss affair.”

Conceptual Structures

I would like to add to this quotation that the teacher also has to communicate his own conceptual structures. The teacher/supervisor cannot escape this. Contrary to information, knowledge is not neutral and objective. Even the simplest skill that we want to teach a student has an intentionality in its definition and is therefore partly subjective and normative. Providing feedback implies, for instance, that the receiver can do something with it that is beneficial to his functioning (see my essay Chaos in the order). The teacher/supervisor always fills in (either knowingly or unknowingly) this intentionality and would do well in making this explicit. The place of coming together between teacher/supervisor and student is shaped by both their conceptual structures that are constituted by their project definition and goal-orientedness, respectively.

Thesis problems

I see many learning and supervising problems rise from incompatible project definitions and opposing goal-orientedness. I can describe this most clearly with regard to thesis supervision, because this period is an explication of the learning process in all its diversity. What I often see with students who struggle with their thesis is that very little attention has been given to the respective points of view and expectations of the supervisor and student about the thesis (both the process as the content). The period in which the thesis is written is the meeting place where both the project definition and the goal-orientedness of both parties ought to be clarified. Just like all other knowledge, the thesis is neither objective nor neutral. There might be several objective criteria the thesis has to meet, but aside from those both parties have remarkably much elbow room. The teacher as well as the student give their own personal meaning to it (either knowingly or unknowingly).

Mutual responsibilities

The supervisor has a vision on the thesis process with ideas about the self-reliance the student ought to have, which questions are to be answered, in which way and to what degree the student has to expand on his subject, etc. This vision is normative, otherwise the supervisor would not be able to supervise and grade the thesis. The supervisor benefits from sharing his vision with the student and of being open towards possible adjustments to the views and (legitimate) wishes of the student. This is only the case, however, if the supervisor truly sees the supervision of the student as his own project. At the same time, the student has to have a vision on his thesis that goes beyond, “I do everything my supervisor tells me to do so that I am finished as quickly as possible”, or the other extreme, “I don’t want to make any concessions on my ideas”. In both cases, the student would probably end up in trouble because time and again he neither takes his responsibility nor does he really look for contact with its supervisor.

Prenuptial agreement

The relationship between a student and teacher/supervisor is fine mashed and nuanced. Preferably, there is a passionate relationship in which both meet each other in shared views and wishes. Reality, sadly, is often less romantic, but a marriage of conveniences can also be enormously effective. I put the lower limit at a prenuptial agreement because there, at least, the togetherness of the learning process can be emphasised. Eventually, the student and the “learning environment” have to do it together.