Engineering professor Barbara Oakley argues that progressive pedagogical theories have degraded American student math proficiency relative to other developed nations.
Assertion Supported
Oakley: Research Shows Visual and Auditory Learning Styles Are Scientifically Groundless
“There was a excellent study done by a woman named Beth Rogoski and what she did was she took one of the standard tests to kind of analyze a very widely used test that is used to distinguish an individual as to whether they're a visual learner or an auditory le…”
Assertion Supported
Oakley's $5,000 basement course matched Harvard's entire online course enrollment
“Our one little course that was made for less than 5000 dollars, mostly in my basement had on this order the same number of students as all of Harvard's online courses put together, made for millions of dollars with hundreds of people.”
Insight
Oakley: Conceptual understanding is insufficient for mastery without memorization
“He'd heard for so many years that all he needed to do was understand something, and that was it. That's enough. That's like the golden thing, and it's not enough. It's not enough at all. Sometimes I will say to people, like, you'll hear Poets say, memorize the…”
Opinion
Oakley: Educational psychologists push learning theories that fail in advanced STEM
“A lot of the top professionals who are in, for example, educational psychology, it's again that, that pointy discipline problem. Like they know a whole bunch about this little tiny area of their discipline. And often, the people who are in educational psycholo…”
Assertion Supported
Oakley: Neuroscience proves math mastery requires practice and repetition
“When it comes to math, it's like, ah, let's not talk about how the neuroscience supports the fact that you also need practice and repetition for math, because it, then you start getting into the math wars.”
Insight
Oakley: Good managers must think Machiavellian to anticipate manipulative tricks
“I think that administer, being a good administrator is one of the world's most difficult jobs because part of it's a, it's, it involves vision and It involves being able to inspire people. It involves being able to be a little Machiavellian yourself, because y…”