“It Isn’t the Answer Anymore, It is the Question”

Visual based on Quote by Bill Sheskey (p.208) in Curriculum 21 (ASCD, 2010) by Heidi Hayes Jacobs.

Teachers are worried that students simply “google” answers to a homework assignment or “copy and paste” entire paragraphs for research papers from the Internet. They are right. Nowadays, it is very easy, fast AND accessible to find answers.

So, what do we do?

• Do we punish students and fail them if they found the right answer online?
• Do we spend our time and energy checking if they did not plagiarize by simply copying from another website into their papers?
• Do we use services such as Plagiarism Checker or Turn It In to catch students?

John Sowash, The Electric Educator, writes about Google-Proof Questioning (make sure to click yourself through to his post and read the great discussion going on in the comment section):

We are in an age of information. Storing facts in our brains is a pointless exercise (unless you plan on being on Jeopardy!). In the era of the iPhone, any fact, statistic, or desirable piece of information is only a few clicks away. The skill of the 21st century that will set people apart is what they can do with the information that is available to them. What new products, services, or procedures can be improved, created or derived from the information that we have? Knowing is not as important as using.

Maybe it is time to change the kind of assessments we are asking of our students… If we can all agree that fact based answers are only a click away and we STOP blocking sites, stop making the regurgitation of these facts the assessment, stop limiting the use of these facts, then maybe we can START moving on from there. Let’s focus on teaching the skills necessary to do something with the information that is available to us (as John mentions in his blog post above).

Dave on the Social Enterprise Blog, Attribution in a Web 2.0 World says:

“…good finders are just as valued as good creators.” Other important roles in Web 2.0? “Good connectors,” “good sense-makers,” “good aggregators,” “good weavers,” good riffers” and many, many more. In a web 2.0 world, what happens to an idea after it’s put out into the world is often of more value than the idea itself.

Angela Maiers points out in one of the slides of her 21st Century Learning presentation that Information Literacy means being able to find, decode, analyze, organize, use and share information.

Image by Angela Maiers

So, what does this mean for teachers? How do we move from wanting answers (via worksheets and multiple choice tests) to coaching students towards asking questions. What are some concrete steps we can take to “google-proof” assignments and assessments? How do we learn as teachers to inspire curiosity in our students that will lead to questioning? How do we get to the point that we accept that the “knowing” part of the information is easy, but the connecting and creating part is where the true learning happens? Where do we start?

Questions, Questions, Questions...

I posted to Twitter:

What comes to mind when you hear the quote”It isn’t the answer anymore, it is the question”

Here are a few responses.

As you can see, I don’t have the answers either, just a lot of questions Share your questions about the topic of google-proofing, knowledge of information versus creation and connection of information.