What role does our evolutionary history play in how we learn? Is it even useful to look and try to determine what’s «natural» for us humans? In what way does our biology determine what is good for us? Did evolution «design» us to be happy? What is evolutionary mismatch? What sort of skills require explicit instruction? How do we balance this need with the developmental need for autonomy and independence, which kids in our current culture get less of than before? Why is it developmentally useful to be cognitively immature, and why are young kids natural optimists?
These and many other questions are discussed in this episode, where Lars talks to David F. Bjorklund about his work on human development and evolutionary psychology. We also discuss some of the work of other researchers in the field, like David C. Geary and his distinction between biologically primary and secondary abilities, as well as some of Peter Gray’s positions on learning, autonomy, age mixing and mental health.
David F. Bjorklund is a professor of psychology at Florida Atlantic University. For more info, see: https://psy.fau.edu/people/dbjorklu.php
Recommendations:
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Our logo is by Sveinung Sudbø, see his works on originalkopi.com
The music is by Arne Kjelsrud Mathisen, see the facebook page Nygrenda Vev og Dur for more info.
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Thank you for listening. Please send feedback and questions to larsogpaal@gmail.com
There is no better way for the podcast to gain new interested listener than by you sharing it with friends, so if you find what we do interesting and useful, please consider doing just that. The podcast is still most in Norwegian, but we have a lot of episodes coming out in English.
Our blogs:
https://paljabekk.com/
https://larssandaker.blogspot.com/
Alt godt, hilsen Lars og Pål
In this episode Lars speaks with Natalie Wexler about the role of knowledge in learning, and of knowledge rich curriculums in school. We discuss the reception of E.D. Hirsch, the importance of content for writing and reading instruction, the relationship between skills and knowledge, curriculum debates and culture wars, testing reading comprehension, Bloom’s taxonomy, Montessori pedagogy, and much more.
Natalie Wexler has published two books relevant to the topic of our conversation: The Knowledge Gap (2019) and The Writing Revolution (2017), the last one together with Judith C. Hochman. She also is the host of the six episode podcast Knowledge Matters podcast, and she publishes regularly on her Substack: https://nataliewexler.substack.com/
For further reading, Natalie recommends Daisy Christodoulou’s book Seven Myths about Education.
For the debate about school reform, Matthew Iglesias and Freddie deBoer, see: https://nataliewexler.substack.com/p/reports-of-the-death-of-education
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Our logo is by Sveinung Sudbø, see his works on originalkopi.com
The music is by Arne Kjelsrud Mathisen, see the facebook page Nygrenda Vev og Dur for more info.
----------------------------
Thank you for listening. You can contact us on our facebook page or by email: larsogpaal@gmail.com
There is no better way for the podcast to gain new interested listener than by you sharing it with friends, so if you find what we do interesting and useful, please consider doing just that. The podcast is still most in Norwegian, but we have a lot of episodes coming out in English.
Our blogs:
https://paljabekk.com/
https://larssandaker.blogspot.com/
Alt godt, hilsen Lars og Pål