Inspection and Learning

America has conducted a decades-long education experiment. If the number of inspections is increased, students will learn more. The inspection theory has been proven wrong. Many would argue that the increased inspection has resulted in less learning. Students are inspected between kindergarten and high school graduation about 2000 times. The number comes from the chapter tests in multiple subjects, practice tests to prepare for federally required state exams, the actual exams, Advanced Placement exams, and practice tests for SAT and ACT college entrance exams. Whew!

Even though these inspections are thought to measure learning; they are based mostly upon soon to be forgotten mixture of important and trivia. Our children who enter kindergarten loving to learn soon find themselves in an inspection and ranking system. People of all ages have disdain for being inspected over and over, especially with the subsequent ranking.

The dramatic shift from an inspection system to a learning system is the purpose of Learning That Lasts™. Details will follow, but athletics provides the peak where personal bests and contribution to team success ignite learning.

The learning psychology behind the design is simple: Children do not think like adults but feel like adults. Adults and children feel the same about inspections. 2000! Good grief! No wonder the majority of students rebel.

Inspections are expensive and consume massive amounts time for students, teachers and administrators. The software to take so many inspections and to record the results is also expensive.

Measuring learning in ways that document All-Time Bests for ALL students, ALL classrooms and ALL schools costs far less because students complete all analyses with anonymous data and the time allocation for teachers and students is far less. Students love creating the learning data – more to come.