Looking past the 'what we do' and focusing on the 'why we do'

I was watching a movie last night with my family- Inception. The storyline is very complex but it goes something like this... invading the dreams of others to learn more about what they know and why they do what they do in order to change or explain what has been and influence the actions of the dreamer (at the subconsciousness level) to change a future outcome.  One scene has the character seeking out the sage advice from another character, attempting to dig deeper into the subconscious dreamworld of another. The advice was simple, one cannot assume that merely entering and influencing sufficiently changes the course of action. One must delve into the idea at a point of inception- the place in which the idea is reduced to its simplest form. If you enter anywhere higher up the perspective-evolutionary ladder, you risk obfuscating the idea and calling it something that it isn't holding the belief that this "is", which means that the change you incite does not change the outcome, you've simply disrupted the chain of events yet haven't changed the future outcome. In other words, same destination, a different path leads to the same place: perspectives are interminably unmalleable constructs.



As I listened to their conversation (forget the chase scene), I began thinking about how we in education operate on a similar assumption- that ideas in their purest form make for the most powerful learning platforms. For example, around the world schools continue to transform their curriculum based on essential understandings- the ideas that generate ideas and offer explanation to events. In science, the literature abounds with the need to uncover student assumptions regarding a scientific concept so that new learning is schematized appropriately and can be used later on as a reasonable lens for scientific thinking. Concepts are driving instruction rather than imposed organizers- we no longer focus solely on genre but consider purpose; we no longer teach in era but consider driving themes; we teacher mathematics with underlying critical skills, rather than by textbook units...My question isn't whether or not we're doing this, making complex ideas simple. We are. My question is whether or not we really know why we're doing this.

Do we truly know how our instruction is influencing a child at their concept-inception point? It makes me wonder about the significance of content education when concepts and misconceptions intersect.

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