There is no Syllabus for Life
I’m teaching a course this semester in an experimental way using “problem based learning” –church administration( now called church leadership). In PBL the professor does not lecture the students in order to tell them what is important but rather creates a series of “problems” which the students (usually in small groups) must solve on their own with the professor only serving as consultant and coach.
Rather than hearing a lecture on “The 25 church financial terms you need to know” in PBL students have to find out what’s important on their own—like they will have to learn the rest of their lives. They can interview pastors read books, research on the Internet or use whatever resources they have but they have to come up with 25 key financial terms a pastor ought to know without getting them from the professor’s lecture. It is supposed to mimic “real life” where a person who doesn’t know a thing has to find it out—nobody is there to tell them in a lecture. It is especially good at equipping students to learn how to learn. PBL is especially popular as an adult learning method (where they know life is like this) but I’m trying it with undergraduates (mostly seniors) this semester as an experiment.
There is one big problem with PBL so far. Many seniors after four years of lectures love PBL. But some students are struggling to get up to speed on it, even some bright students. After years of experiencing an educational process that was invented before the printing press (let alone the Internet) they are used to coming, sitting, listening, taking notes, memorizing the notes, and spitting back the information on tests and papers. This shift to PBL is disorienting to some students who have “got the system down” when it come to education.
In my student evaluations from the first two weeks of class a few students were frustrated with the “lack of clarity” of this new method. They said things like “Tell us exactly what you want” or “Show us a sample of what you want.” And, of course I pandered to these customer requests. I already posted a sample paper (you can see both the first unit’s problems and one group’s paper at http://courses.indwes.edu/rel468/ ). I’ve shown “exactly what I want” (well the sample wasn’t perfect) but these follow-the-directions students now have a better idea of “what is wanted.”
But I feel guilty for doing that. Why? Because there is no syllabus for life. I’m afraid a student who is wonderful at doing assignments clearly given in class won’t be able to survive in real life where things are more vague. I may have prepared them better for real life by refusing to clarify things. Am I giving them the impression they’ll succeed in youth ministry of they “just do exactly what they’re told?” The trouble is we all know a minister doesn’t get explicit assignments in real life.
So all this got me thinking about the differences between the classes I teach at college and real life. So I’m staring a list. I want you to help me. What are the difference between a college class and real life?
The difference between a college course and real life
1. In real life there
is no syllabus and few assignments.
When you get a job in the church all you get is a “catalog description” telling you the general direction of your responsibilities. There will be no syllabus with dates of what to do and when it is “due.” There may be no specific assignments whatsoever just general responsibilities. You might get a job description at best—the rest is up to you. The senior pastor will expect you to do your job without bugging him for clarification or specific assignments.
2. In real life there
is not much feedback on your work.
You’ll get some negative feedback from a few folk but generally you’ll plan and lead an entire night of youth ministries and nobody at all will say anything at all-good or bad. Nothing. Silence. In fact your senior pastor won’t even be there—it would be like going to class with your professor never showing up. The grading feedback you expect in college that helps you constantly improve and know what fall short will mostly disappear. You’ll often have to decide for yourself how well you’re doing.
3. In real life you
are graded secretly.
As a college student you get grades for work and you know exactly where you stand all the time. In real life you are constantly being graded but nobody tells you the grade—you are left in the dark. And your grade is not given by one person but many who all have different (hidden) grading scales and criteria. And they will conclude your final grade at the end of the year in a discussion and various people who have greater weight in determining your grade—but you won’t know which ones and what their grading rubric is. The following Spring you’ll find out your actual grade when they invite you to stay another year or show you to the door—a kind of pass-fail grading system. More surprising than this will be your discovery that the largest single factor in calculating your grade will be “likeability.” I am not lying. If you get perfect scores on all tests and papers in a course can you imagine a professor giving you an “F” in a course at college just because he didn’t like you…or maybe his wife didn’t like you…or perhaps because a group of other students didn’t like you? In real life you can do everything perfectly and still get an “F” simply because people dislike you. This is the way of people-work.
5. Or here?
So, what do you think? How is “real
life” different than college classes? Click
here to comment or read comments for the first few weeks after this posting
Keith Drury September 26, 2006