Parent Education Course Writer's Guide/Independent thinking and learning
Independent thinking and learning
Independent learning outside of school can be promoted through the creation of extensive written works and team work. To create a parent education course, such as the one you are about to write, could consequently be seen as a useful learning context. The topic is of general interest and there are extensive opportunities for literature research and research projects. Independent thought can be encouraged by a need for metacognition, through research and through extensive opportunity for discussions which can be further stimulated through questions and contradictions, or other need for clarification.
- How can you bring the motivation for independent learning into the family?
- What other topics than parent education could one work on in a similar manner?
- What other aspects of independent thought and learning could one choose to promote?
- What other methods of promotion for independent thought and learning can you devise?
A parent education course may also have the objective to train competencies in a family. An important competence, which promotes independent thought and learning, is autodidacticism. In order not to exaggerate one should also apply idiocultural competence; not everybody shares enthusiasm for lifelong learning and not everybody wants to improve his autodidactic skills. The right way can be to prefer interest-driven learning and to improve autodidactic skills only as a side effect; whoever learns according to his interests is unlikely to complain about the improvement of his learning skills. Autodidactic learning presupposes a willingness to accept that there are things which one does not understand, but which one may consider essential once they are understood. Many people fail to recognize this fact again and again.
- How do you explain to a learner that he only after understanding a topic can truly understand its benefits?
- Why is it hard to understand that the benefits of the unknown may also be unknown?
- Is this a cognitive bias?