Deliberate Dumbing Down of America Public Education

A–12 seminar are pioneers and distinguished leaders in this field. It became very clear that programmed learning is an area in which the research and experience of practitioners in universities and in industry can be of great mutual benefit. The speakers and discussion leaders at the seminar included the following: Dr. B.F. Skinner, Professor of Psychology, Harvard University Dr. Arthur A. Lumsdaine, Professor of Education, University of California, Los Angeles, and Research Advisor for Education Media to the American Institute for Research Dr. Robert Glaser, Professor of Psychology, University of Pittsburgh, and Research Advisor, American Institute for Research In recent months the professional journals and some popular publications have had much to say about research on teaching machines and programmed learning. Because most of this research has been limited to a few specific experiments and because field application has generally been in elementary and secondary schools, very little has been said of applications to adult learning. It was our feeling, and this is why we are so pleased to cooperate with the Foundation in the holding of this seminar, that more of us should be exploring more fully the relevance and importance of programmed instruction to adult learning in general, and to business and industrial education in particular. First, I should emphasize that we here at Kodak are quite serious about this matter of programmed learning. We attempt to keep abreast of significant developments in learning theory and education because we are responsible for seeing that each one of our men and women receives the best possible training for his work in the company. We are confident that programmed learning will have great implications for our future efforts, and we look forward to providing better, more individualized instruction for our people as a result of this development. Secondly, I want to explain that our feelings about programmed learning result from two factors: the result of our own initial efforts at instructing by means of this system, and the inherent characteristics of programmed learning which will give strength to any industrial training experience. With programmed learning we can adapt instruction to the individuality of each student. Each student works at his own personal speed throughout the learning experience. Each student is constantly active, interacting with the program, concentrating on the task of learning. Each student can trace his own progress, and receive timely, individual reinforcement for correct work. To introduce the subject, we would like to have each of you work through the first lesson of Dr. B.F. Skinner’s course in psychology. We would hope, incidentally, that a portion of the material is somewhat new to you so that some learning will actually take place in your encounter with the subject matter. Further, we hope it will demonstrate certain phenomena that will be spoken of repeatedly today, such as effective reinforcement of the learner and progress at the individual rate. Imagine yourself to be a freshman student at Harvard. You are taking, for the first time, a college course in psychology. This is your first day in that course. Your introduction to the course consists of the presentation of the programmed learning sequence on the next pages. …The seminar was part of the Foundation’s continuing program to bring the results of social science research to the businessmen who can use them. From the “Introduction,” by Thomas H. Miller: