Consider this little gem that periodically does the rounds in education circles:
(This is just one of the very many variations on the Learning Pyramid doing the rounds on the internet. For more examples visit The Corrupted Cone of Experience.)
Seductive, isn’t it? The false sense of security comes from the fact that it bears out and validates our experience as teachers: we get to know our subjects so much better because we teach them, so it follows that the best way to retain new information is to teach it to someone else. And look: there are some numbers so it must be true!
But, hang on, all the percentages are multiples of 5. I’m no statistician, but what are the odds? It looks a little too good to be true. And guess what? It is too good to be true. The National Training Laboratories based in Bethel Maine, who are cited as having conducted the research on which the learning Pyramid is based, apparently have no real idea of its provenance despite having claimed to have worked it all out sometime in the 1960s. When asked to provide this research they said, “NTL believes it to be accurate but says that it can no longer trace the original research that supports the numbers.” (Magennis & Farrell, 2005)
But it’s not just the percentages that are dodgy, it’s the fact that the whole thing has simply been pinched from a chap called Edgar Dale. Here is Dale’s actual Cone of Learning from his book Audio-visual Methods in Teaching. (p. 39)
Dale’s actual Cone of Experience
Spot the difference: no numbers! Dale also warned readers that the cone should not be taken literally – it portrays more concrete learning experiences at the bottom of the cone and more abstract experiences at the top of the cone. “The cone shape was meant to convey the gradual loss of sensory information” as students moved from lower to higher levels. “The root of all the perversions of the Cone is the assumption that the Cone is meant to be a prescriptive guide. Dale definitely intended the Cone to be descriptive – a classification system, not a road map for lesson planning.” (Subramony et al 2014)
The problem with any representation of the learning process is the dubious idea that a one-size-fits-all, magic bullet approach to learning will work in every context for every student. Unsurprisingly, reality is a little more complex and such percentages are an attempt at simplification. Making lessons multimodal may well result in an increase in learning but not always and certainly not as a de facto cause and effect. Sometimes it could be much more useful for students to get on with practising something on their own than to have a discussion with their peers. It might be true that teaching others could be an effective way to learn, but what’s the evidence beyond our intuition? This kind of belief is an emotional one and is pretty much like everything else that gets believed: a classic case of confirmation bias. But that doesn’t excuse people making stuff up to support what they believe.
[…] The Learning Spy – The Learning Pyramid RT @surreallyno: The same skepticism I have in what regards Bloom's Taxonomy: Learning Pyramid http://t.co/4F7p9dAq by @LearningSpy #edchat #elemchat… Source: learningspy.edublogs.org […]
Great post again David. I wonder how the message can get out there that talking (lecturing) children does not bring about efficient learning? This diagram does hit the spot & if it gets some to think about their approach maybe it isn’t all bad!
I think the problem is that this message is pretty well out there. There can’t be many teachers who don’t know that their lessons will be judged as unsatisfactory if they spend an hour talking. This being the case, if we use shoddy research to try prove the point with the remaining hardcore then they are going have an excuse our arguments (rightly) as quackery. It is really important to be able to back up your methodology with some sort of trustworthy research. And as busy teachers we should, at the very least, be able to trust those paid to train us.
For pity’s sake, why do you keep attacking the straw man of lecturing? Has anyone ever advocated simply lecturing children in lessons with no interaction or activity?
Hattie shows that direct instruction is effective. Your approach seems to be cooperative learning and problem based learning which Hattie says are ineffective. I realise that this is inconvenient for you, but pretending that those who oppose your ineffective methods are actually endorsing lecturing is no argument and is becoming tiring.
You need to admit that your experience and opinion go against the research, and stop doing a Geoff Petty and reinterpreting the research to say the opposite of what it does.
This is very wearisome Andrew. We all agree that lecturing is ineffective: let it go.
We also agree that direct instruction is not lecturing. We have not had any meaningful engagement on what direct instruction is: I say it can (and should) include paired and grouped activities. You no doubt disagree.
Here is some research which shows reciprocal teaching is effective: http://goo.gl/ccpw2 and Hattie also places it above the hinge point of effective strategies so you can in no way argue that it ‘doesn’t work’.
The final point about my experience and opinion being meaningless is typical of you. Hattie makes it clear that ‘instructional quality’ ie. the students’ views on teaching quality count for more than anything except feedback. Students’ views of my teaching are positive; they behave well, make excellent progress and have outstanding attainment.
I realise you’re happy to dismiss this but the fact is, you seem to teach within a dystopian nightmare where students behave appallingly and I don’t.
It’s not just the case that neither of us advocate spending a lesson lecturing, nobody does. It’s just a straw man you raise in order to obscure what the research actually shows about the methods you advocate. Even now you are trying to make out that because direct instruction isn’t a lecture it is somehow the methods you advocate when it actually involves doing the very thing you have been condemning – directly telling the students what they need to know.
Incidentally, I never said your experience was meaningless. I am just challenging the attempts to claim that it is supported by research evidence.
As for the effectiveness of the reciprocal instruction method, are you really advocating we judge it on the basis of a single study which doesn’t appear to have made it into a peer-reviewed journal? We can usually find single studies supporting anything.
Direct instruction is simply not just telling some facts. That’s lecturing. Telling me repeatedly that I’ve constructed a straw man when in fact I haven’t is very tedious.
Nobody has said direct instruction is “just telling some facts”.
Until someone says that, it remains a straw man.
It looks like you’re being deliberately dense. I said, “Direct instruction is simply not just telling some facts.” In case you didn’t understand this statement, it means ‘direct instruction is much more than telling some facts’.
You said, “Nobody has said direct instruction is “just telling some facts”.”
Unless I’ve gone mad this is the same thing. Please stop banging on about straw men: they are of your own creation if they exist at all.
I’m not sure what isn’t clear here.
When you said “Direct instruction is simply not just telling some facts” you appeared to be arguing against the claim that direct instruction is just telling some facts.
Nobody has made this claim. Therefore by arguing against it you were arguing against a straw man. Is this clear?
How did it appear that the statement “Direct instruction is simply not just telling some facts” was in fact the opposite of itself?
This is the least coherent you’ve ever managed to be. I’m almost impressed.
You seem to be getting lost in this, there was an important point raised by oldandrew that needs addressing;
‘As for the effectiveness of the reciprocal instruction method, are you really advocating we judge it on the basis of a single study which doesn’t appear to have made it into a peer-reviewed journal? We can usually find single studies supporting anything.’
If we don’t examine the validity of claims carefully we are easily led by quackery, especially when so much money can be made by unsubstantiated claims from would be educational gurus.
It’s a fair point. And, incidentally, the exact same one I was making about the pyramid. Of course I’m not advocating that we take note pof a single study. That was just an example I had been reading at the time. What about the evidence collected by the Sutton Trust? Are we happy to ignore that? Or Hattie’s findings in Visible Learning that show reciprocal teaching to have an effect size of .74?
As for quackery. If it looks like a duck…
[…] reductive formula, but it is unfounded. David Didau lances this particularly boil to good effect here. We must go beyond these simplifications and seek answers from more reputable research to judge […]
[…] Is it better to be told, or to discover a fact? On the way I encountered problems such as The Learning Pyramid but still felt the need to justify Why group work works for […]
[…] Is it better to be told, or to discover a fact? On the way I encountered problems such as The Learning Pyramid but still felt the need to justify Why group work works for […]
[…] reductive formula, but it is unfounded. David Didau lances this particularly boil to good effect here. We must go beyond these simplifications and seek answers from more reputable research to judge […]