permaculture

[CtopherP@aol.com]

In a message dated 5/26/99 6:06:41 PM, you (mr hemenway) wrote:

<<The PDC mirrors this, because it has evolved far from Mollison's original
(linear?) "stand in front of a class and talk for 72 hours" format
(something that ony someone as charismatic as Bill can get away with). Many
PDCs now focus on learning as opposed to teaching. There's lots of data
showing that most people learn poorly by listening passively to an
instructor. Some PDC's now reflect this, with often less than 1/3 the time
as lectures, and the rest in cooperative learning games, hands-on work,
participant-led instruction, community-building exercises, kinesthetic
learning, and a host of other techniques. The whole point of the PDC,
mentioned in many, many posts so far, is to inspire by drawing the
participants into a new community and a more holistic, balanced way of
thinking. I think the PDC continues to evolve into a better and better
format for doing just that. It can't do everything, but it's supposed to be
just the beginning.>>

thanks toby for this message. heartily agree. I just wanted to echo what has 
been said here by letting everyone know where Permaculture Drylands 
Institute's permaculture curriculum project is. we were inspired in much the 
same way that toby suggests above to evolve the curriculum. we have received 
funding to do such and are planning on the core pieces being available by the 
end of the summer. 

the main force of the work has been to bring the process of teaching the 
content more in alignment with the content. to put it another way, we want 
the teaching of permaculture to strongly reflect permaculture principles. 
this begins with the principle of work with nature. as I interpret the 
principle in this context, it means we need to understand deeply what the 
nature of the classroom environment is, how learners and teachers function 
optimally, and what conditions need to be created to best facilitate the 
shift in perspective that permaculture requires. 

one of the choice pieces about this was given to me by a local permaculture 
school teacher, priscilla logan. it's called the learning pyramid and it 
stacks teaching methods by degree of effectiveness. at the top of the 
pyramid, at the point of least effective, is lecture. audio-visual techniques 
are slightly more effective, then reading, demonstration, discussion (about 
50% effective), learn by doing, and, at the base of the pyramid, the most 
effective techniques, are immediate use and teaching others.

I take this body of research to mean that almost all of our instruction 
should be focused on getting students to use the concepts immediately, and/or 
teaching each other about it. when I have applied this understanding to my 
own teaching, I can rationally say that the results have been outstanding. 
enthusiasm is very high, people are actually leaving the courses being able 
to do something. not everything and not perfectly, but they understand how to 
improve the skills they do have. 

we have compiled the best known to date about facilitating student 
understanding into a small book currently known as "Developing the Art of 
Teaching: Guidelines for Effective Facilitation." it will be available this 
summer. for everyone who teaches or who desires how to teach, this guidebook 
is highly recommended. humbly so of course.

by the way, I look forward to Toby-cola hitting the shelves soon.

with regards,
christophe peck
santa fe, new mexico USA