DISCOVERY LEARNING

The Discovery Institute defines discovery learning inclusively to encompass a variety of educational philosophies and psychologies that have certain elements in common. These include a view of the teacher as primarily a facilitator of learning, a coach or mentor in the student's search for knowledge, even as a co-learner, rather than a dispenser of information.

Discovery educators see learning essentially as an active and self-directed process during which students carefully construct meaning out of their investigative experiences; they view learners as problem-solvers, but not simply of problems set by teachers, tests, or textbooks. Discovery encourages students to see old problems in new ways, or even to define new problems to pursue inquiry wherever it leads.

Discovery learners necessarily make mistakes, arrive at dead ends and sometimes come up without answers; but often they learn more from mistakes than from successes. They learn to tolerate and live with ambiguity while developing perseverance to overcome obstacles. Discovery educators accept this as natural, in fact, essential to the learning process. They embrace it. They encourage students to take risks, to extend their boundaries, and to take charge of their own learning.

The Discovery approach endorses "project" learning wherever possible, because creating projects requires students to define and structure problems for themselves. Interdisciplinary projects also break down the unnatural barriers between academic subjects, making learning more holistic and real, as well as far more appealing. Discovery is also enthusiastic about the potential for computer technology in education, not primarily because some educational software laudably makes rote learning more efficient and palatable, but because when used properly, computers place students in open-ended learning situations. In addition, computerized classrooms force radical changes away from the traditional teaching/learning relationship: the relationship moves from lecturing to coaching, from whole-group to individualized instruction, from silent to interactive classrooms, and from all students learning the same things to different students learning different things.

However, Discovery educators do not undervalue "content." True discovery educators recognize and endorse the demand for increasingly high levels of linguistic, mathematical, scientific, and cultural literacy. But discovery differs from traditional education in its convictions about how to best achieve these high levels. Discovery educators believe that the discovery approach not only motivates students more powerfully, but leads to higher levels of real achievement.

Similarly, discovery educators do not undervalue facts, but they value knowledge more, and regard facts insofar as they lead to and support knowledge. Neither do discovery educators undervalue memorization; however, they value memorization that supports understanding. Discovery educators recognize the importance of skills development in reading, writing, mathematics and scientific observation and measurement, but they prefer to see these skills learned as pre-conditions or by-products of the quest for knowledge or the act of creation. Above all, they resist the "pressure for coverage," valuing depth over breadth and quality over quantity. In the belief that "less is more," they allow students to concentrate on a limited set of powerful key ideas that underlie reality.