Drill 'n Kill

The NY Times recently ran this little article about drilling for memory or as E.D. Hirsch called "distributive practice". Most of us know what it is if we went through any form of traditional education. It is all about memorizing basic facts for a test. It might mean flash cards or worksheets or multiplication tables or....the list goes on. Progressives often portray traditional education as all about "drill 'n kill" and in doing so highlight the "kill" part. This article in the NY Times tries to give it some more respect. In doing so they quote from Dan Willingham and E.D. Hirsch, neither of them are progressives. It would have been nice if they sought the ideas of progressives who are known to be critical of this method.

Anyway, my stance is that there is a time and a place for distributive practice. Too much of it can destroy the motivation to learn. That is the progressive argument at least. If you "drill" you then "kill" student motivation. All things in moderation. Just because something has the potential to be taken overboard does not mean you get rid of it all together. If there is another way to make mental math automatic for students I am all for it but distributive practice seems to need to be part of the process. What we can borrow from the progressives is the notion that students need to have some kind of "buy in" to the process. They need to see the importance of why they are practicing a skill or memorizing a set of facts. It may not make the actual distributive practice any more fun but they will at least have the potential of seeing its importance and be more willing to engage.

Another trick we can learn from progressives is that students need to have input on what and when they learn. So if mental math is the goal then ask students what technique they want to use in order to get multiplication tables memorized. They can choose to use flash cards, whole group game, a computer program...etc. The important thing is that they would have buy-in. Also, have them come up with the time goals. That way, when it becomes homework they understand why it is homework and does not feel like busy work. Also, many of us feel that geography is important and that students should have a mental map of the world. But should that include memorizing all the states? State capitols? How about major rivers and mountain ranges? There are so many things that could be memorized but we can't expect all of them to be memorized. The important thing is not the state capitols themselves but that they have some cognitive anchors in place. Why not let students decide what aspect of the maps to memorize and let them come up with a plan for distributive practice as well as a plan for assessment. They may choose to memorize where theme parks are located but what they will be forced to learn in that process is states and major cities.

Some may say that memorization or drilling has no place in school but I disagree. I agree with progressives though that students should have much control as possible. However, I think teachers need to lay the parameters and let the students choose the details within those parameters. For example, teachers may say that students need to memorize a set of geographic data that spans all 7 continents and is widely distributed and then let students choose what they will memorize. Not so that they can just memorize for the sake of it, but so when we talk about India a rich set of facts and ideas are automatically associated with India and so new information can be more easily integrated.