The Linguist - language learning should be fun

The Internet is the new and real University.

I am enthusiastic about the Internet as a growing and potentially limitless space for learning. That is where we have positioned LingQ. We are not alone. There is a lot of competition. A lot of it is free. That is the place where we have to compete. Of course much of what we offer at LingQ is also free.

Here is a site which provides recommendations for free online education resources all over the web, and also functions as a directory of online colleges and universities for students interested in earning a degree online.

The site also lists free language learning resources. LingQ is on their list in the general category.I would have preferred to see us listed for each language, as LingQ, and as each one of our LingQ Podcasts. But what can you do?

In any case it is a great resource. Learners can go to these sites and import the content and use it at LingQ.

Boston and the pledge of allegiance

Boston is a delightful city. There are many parks, green spaces and water, both lakes and the ocean. You sense the history of America in the colonial style houses, the historical monuments and various signs reminding you of what happened there 200 or more years ago. The people are sometimes a little gruff, but usually tremendously friendly and chatty. Houses have plaques telling you that they were built in 1687 or 1756 or whatever.

We were visiting my older son Eric, who is a fellow at Harvard for a year. He lives in Arlington and commutes to Harvard by bike or roller-blades through a green bike path and then by subway. I enjoyed jogging on that trail while listening to Russian and Portuguese.

My wife and I visited towns like Concord, Salem and Ipswich and really felt the history of the country. At Concord we saw groups of school children being taught about the details of the first battle of the American War of Independence. Amongst the teachers and school children were people of East Asian and South Asian origin. It all kind of warms the heart of an assimilationist melting-potter like me.

It is great to have children of all origins feel pride in their common history as Americans. We should do more of this in Canada, instead of constantly dwelling on the differences of Canadians. There should be limits to this patriotic indoctrination, however. My 6 year old granddaughter,  has already learned to spout the American pledge of allegiance. Cute, I guess, but she certainly does not have the first clue what the words mean. I also have trouble with indoctrinating little children in causes, however noble they may be. I think children should be taught to read, and then be given as many different sources of information as possible about things like religion, politics, history, the environment or any other subject of study.

They should not be taught to interpret this information, nor taught critical thinking, just encouraged to read and form their own opinions, and then be prepared to defend them in writing and speaking. They should be encouraged to respect the views of others that may differ from their own, yet not hesitate to critique these views and find ways to support their own ideas.

How to fund post-secondary education

Post-secondary education is, in a way, the post-compulsory phase of education. It is the first part of a person's life long voluntary (or even involuntary) ongoing education. At present, society chooses to fund a limited number of institutions and educators, as well as a group of learners who are typically in their late teens and early twenties, and overwhelmingly from the middle and upper classes. Some of the funding goes to individuals in the form of bursaries etc, while most of the funding goes to institutions. The result is that the true cost of this form of education is hidden to most people, and that certain people, university employees and a certain lucky group of the population, receive the bulk of this money from the tax-payer.

It is interesting that societies that devote the highest percentage of their education expenditure to post-secondary education (like Canada) also experience very high high school drop out rates, whereas countries which spend a lower percentage on post-secondary education, like Japan and Germany, have lower high school drop out rates.

I think that we should change how post secondary education is funded. I do not have all the angles worked out, and am interested in feedback.

I think that the main thrust of education should be to ensure that as many people as possible graduate from high school, with the highest possible competence in the basic skills of reading, writing and arithmetic, much higher than we achieve right now in Canada, for example. We need to be imaginative, creative, flexible etc. We need to stop spending school time on the kind of projects dear to teachers such as "critical thinking" "values""social or environmental awareness". If the students can read, they will learn, on their own, and then form their own conclusions from a variety of sources, not just the prejudices of the teachers and designers of curricula.

The next stage, post-secondary education, should then be financed as follows.

Every person who graduates from high school, with genuine reading and math skills, will obtain the right to spend a certain amount of money, per decade, on education. The types of expenditures that will qualify should be broad, much broader than the present range of schools and learning institutions. It need not matter whether the activity takes place at home or abroad, in a school or on the internet, attending a language class or buying and audio book.

Some system will have to be put into place to measure the learning activities, and where necessary, the competence levels, achieved by the learners. Some of this can be automated, online. In may cases interviews and tests will be necessary. Private testing companies and educational coaches and consultants will cater to this demand, and the total cost will be much less than the present system with its redundant courses, text books and other inefficient learning activity.

Well, that is just a start. I look forward to feedback.

Should universites charge the full cost to their students? II

In the U.S., the average cost of a private college is about $31,000, while places like Harvard charge more. The cost of an MBA at Harvard is a whopping $77,150 , including $12,280  for room and board. I think, though, that, on average, the true cost of university, is about $24,000 per year per student in North America. Students typically pay only a fraction of the true cost. The average tuition paid by a student is between $3,000 and $9,000 per year. In addition there is apparently $150 billion in bursaries available for students without the means to pay. There are also student loans.

The average length of a University year is 8 months, so that means that the university costs about $3,000 per month. The average student takes 5 courses, so the true cost is about $600 per month per course. Most students are undecided as to what courses they want to study, and even if they are decided, they often cannot get into the courses they want. They often end up having to take unpopular courses, given by a professor who does not want to teach, just to get their credits,Yet someone is paying $600 for each student to take each one of these courses.

Now let's assume that one of these courses is a foreign language. Typically a student taking, say, Italian, would have 3-5 hours of class a week, plus access to a language lab.  Now if I had the choice between spending $600 a month to attend a university language class or getting an iPod and learning the language via the Internet at places like LingQ, I know what I would do, especially if I had to pay the money myself, or could pocket the money, as long as I achieve certain learning targets.

But it is not just languages. Most students study "Liberal Arts" or "Humanities" at university. The last statistic I saw showed that only 20% of university students studied engineering or science. (Students cannot handle the maths any more).

Most Liberal Arts subjects can be learned outside the university at least as well as at a university. I think that LingQ, with its course format, could be an excellent platform for a Liberal Arts education. LingQ could offer audio and video lectures, articles and books, reading lists, and more. Qualified people could offer courses on different subjects. As we build up our Community section and even add a Meet Up component, students and teachers can seek each other out for meetings, virtually or face to face. In other words, not only the content but also the social and intellectual interaction of the university could be recreated around the Internet.

Most Liberal Arts students are already winners in the lottery of life. They typically come from the middle and upper classes of their societies. They have attended schools in wealthier areas which are better equipped than the average school. They can, or should be able to, read well enough to study these subjects whether at university or on their own. The money that is spent on their Liberal Arts education is money that is not spent on helping a majority of people learn to read better. In Canada there is a high school drop out rate of over 30%, and well over 30% of high school graduates have trouble with reading and maths. In Canada we spend 7.6% of GDP on education, and 37% of that on post secondary education, for an already privileged minority to indulge their interests, if, in fact, they have figured what these interest are.

Something is wrong with this picture. More to come.

Should universites charge the full cost to their students?

Universities want to raise fees because of the economic crisis. Their endowment funds and other sources of income are down. They either get more from the government or they will have to charge more in fees. In most countries the fees for public universities are a fraction of the true cost of going to university. I wonder, if students had to pay the full cost, let us say, over $25,000 per year, how many students would still attend universities, especially if they could achieve the same educational results for less money.

I know there are issues of credentials, but I think these issues can be dealt with separately and more cheaply.

Many of the courses offered at university, especially in the Arts and Humanities, are of little practical use. Much of the knowledge contained in these courses can be acquired by reading books. iTunes University is offering more and more courses online. A recent report points out that students get more out of spending time on their iPods than in lecture halls. If it is language learning, there is LingQ, and other online resources.

It is unfair that governments take tax-payers' money and give it to these institutions, where a majority of professors are more interested in publishing obscure articles and papers for their peers, rather than in teaching. The universities are inefficiently run, and there is no incentive to improve their efficiency. Their true costs are not reflected in what their users, the students, actually pay.

Governments privilege those people between the ages of 18 and 25 who go to university, to the disadvantage of people who do not go to university, or who want to learn later in life. What should happen is that everyone receive an allotment of money at age 18 to be used for education, sort of like education certificates. They should be valid for the person's life. There needs to be some definition of the kind of expenditures that are acceptable for these certificates, but the definiton should not be too narrow. Then let the universities, with their real costs, try to compete for these certificates with other educational resources, such as books, CDs, websites, coaches and others.

Of course there would have to be some kind of testing industry to provide the degrees and tickets that our society requires.

This is just a rough idea and I will be getting back to it. Now I am going back to the Russian video I rented yesterday, to see the ending.

Obama is going to spend more on eduation.

I see that President Obama is committing more money to education. He especially wants more students to attend college.
I am not convinced that Universities and Colleges are essential to further and continuing education,  especially in the Arts and Humanities. These institutions are often bastions of privilege. Professors can pursue obscure studies on subjects of little interest except to their peers, in other words, other people who are pursuing research on subjects of little interest. Students can get "credits" on courses that contain very little knowledge, but are often full of fads or the latest intellectual ideology.

Most of what is valuable in the humanities programs at colleges and universties can be acquired by a motivated learner reading on his or her own, or taking advantage of the Internet. Certainly this is true for language learning, and the related study of literature, culture, history etc.

I think it is time to look at other models that take advantage of 21st century technology and social interaction via the Internet. I think that what we are on to at LingQ, although we are just at the beginning, will help to create a really universal "university" where anyone who is really interested can learn, and can learn from the most motivating and talented teachers. Learners, teachers, and content will converge and be discovered on the Internet. Those learners who are not motivated need no longer be subsidized, and those teachers who just want to study some obscure subject  for the sake of being reviewed by their peers, and who are not interested in their students, will have to support their habit by themselves.

In praise of listening.

By far my major language learning activity is listening.I listen while driving, skiing, walking, shopping, gardening, running, gardening etc.  Reading is  second, and word and phrase review is third. Then comes speaking. I hardly ever write, and only occasionally watch movies. I think listening, that is audio, should be used for a variety of educational purposes.

In response to some of the comments on my previous post, I have never understood the interest in videos for language learning. Videos ties you up. You have to watch them. You cannot multitask with them.
 Every day I go to Echo Moskvi to download Russian audio and text. There are videos there. I have watched two or three videos in 6 months. Videos are not convenient, not transportable, they are less "word intense", and I just do not find them effective for language learning.

Even movies, which can be fun to watch, and stimulating and a reward for the work I have put into the language,  are nowhere near as intense a learning medium as listening, especially when combined with reading.

Victor agrees with me in his comment, but many people seem to want videos. What am I missing?

Low cost computers

I hear about very low cast computers designed and produced in India and Brazil. Is this for real?  I have always thought of how LingQ could be used to spread literacy and language learning into countries where a majority of people cannot afford computers. Even if not everyone could buy one of these low cost computers, perhaps schools and libraries could have them. Then there is still the problem of the MP3 player. Is this all an illusion or is there something there that can be done?

7 Concepts of Natural Language Learning

7 concepts of natural language learning, an article I wrote for Pick the Brain, appeared today. You may want to have a look and if you like it please digg it, stumble it, added it delicious, share it or do whatever you can to spread it. ( I you like it and agree).

By the way, Lingq members had translated and recorded this article in German, French, Russian and Swedish. These have been uploaded into the respective libraries at LingQ. I hope we get more versions. I am also going to record it in English and put it in the library.

You will find these at LingQ with text and sound track available for free download, and for study at LingQ.

Learning instead of teaching

Learning is not the same as teaching. Teachers need to be aware of what their students are interested in. This in the view of one of the most interesting comments on the teacher exchange that I have been somewhat negative on. He posted two interesting videos.

 I would be interested in your comments. I will comment when I have to view them properly and collect my thoughts. Very thought provoking. Much more interesting than debating the ideological nature of literacy.

Learn to Change, Change to Learn

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