Drupal cxo on training versus educating

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mixel's picture

During Drupal cxo in Brussels we had several interesting session on training. In a personal reflection about the discussions I would like to give my understanding how we could get more young people (students) into Drupal via education.

I'm looking forward to your opinion about this reflection.

Comments

I read your reflection. I

idcm's picture

I read your reflection. I have provided both training and educational opportunities. There is a fine line between training and education as you know but I agree that distinguishing between the two can be helpful when trying to create a path forward.

You can measure the success of training and education via assessments that lead to a certification (training world) or a diploma/degree (education world) but I am not sure these (or projects like Summer Google) are the criteria best used to distinguish between them. Assessment for training can be the same as assessment for education. The distinction comes with what is being learned.

If you look up the definitions of training and education, there isn't much difference. Having been in both worlds, I believe the distinction is this:

  • Education is the process by which someone gains knowledge about the who, what, why, when, where, and how of something.

  • Training is the process by which someone learns how to do something. This doesn't mean a training event can't include some aspects of the who, what, why, when, and where but it tends to be limited.

For instance, in Drupal we create views using the Views UI module. Let's compare a views training experience with a views educational experience using the two "definitions" above.

  • A training event would provide a way for the learner to use the Views UI to create a view. There would be some fundamental concepts covered - what is a filter, what is a field, etc. and the learner would learn the clicks necessary to create specific views and their displays.

  • In an educational setting (high school or college), the process of learning how to use views might include ensuring the learner understood what is really going on behind the scenes. The educational experience might ensure the learner could set up a simple relational database, create an SQL query by hand, and cut some PHP or ASP code to display the SQL results. It might include digging into views code to see how it works. It might include taking the SQL statement generated by views and translating into English. The educational opportunities associated with just Views is huge.

An educational experience empowers you beyond the mechanical operations that are typically the focus of training. It enables you to think, understand, analyze, etc. You don't have to be in a formal environment to get an education. As you mention, the Constructivist approach to learning allows for people to educate themselves or have their education facilitated for them.

The challenge surfaces when a hiring body wants proof that you can do what say you can do. As a hiring manager, I looked at the little piece of paper that said they could do what I needed them to do but I never relied on it. I always looked closely as what they have demonstrated - past work. Together, these two "proofs" increased the probability that the applicant would be successful. Of course, asking them "how would you solve this problem ..." questions in an interview can also be revealing ;-)

That's my two cents. Thank for listening.

educating view example

mixel's picture

I was surprised how well the explanation of your educating view example fits with my exercises. To illustrate an advanced DB example with modules I let the students create a page that should show the users interactions. The interactions are retrieved from the comments table. They need to create an .install file and an update script and display their new table (sender, receiver, count).

The basic output is: http://mosi.vub.ac.be/webdev/?q=user_interaction
Next they add argument so to get both sender and receiver: http://mosi.vub.ac.be/webdev/?q=user_interaction/10
Some tables the sender and receiver are similar, so we like to know how this relates relative to their posts: http://mosi.vub.ac.be/webdev/?q=self_interaction

As the output is just a table, I start explaining about the views. In the next exercise they create first views version of the module. This is just defining the relation in the view-api (how it links with users table and what type of filter and argument you can use). The extra two features (argument and relative posts) require them to hack the handlers.

So now we get:
http://mosi.vub.ac.be/webdev/?q=user_interaction_view
http://mosi.vub.ac.be/webdev/?q=user_interaction_view/10
http://mosi.vub.ac.be/webdev/?q=self_interaction_view

Your explanation is right on

valeriod's picture

Your explanation is right on target!

The reason why we have training and certification is because software development is seen by IT as a skill like welding, not as a problem solving activity. Just as you would require a certification for a line worker that you send to repair a 17.5KV line they like to have a certification for a Drupal developer. Incidentally that's why more than one half of the IT project fail IMHO.

Of course some businesses think differently -- Google comes to mind -- and you see different requirements and different results.

Drupal Open Teaching Initiative

kaw3939's picture

Hello,

I've talked about this before but i'm developing a "Drupal Open Teaching Initiative" DOTI for short. I teach a class about web services and use Drupal for probably a lot of the same reasons you do.

DOTI is basically built around the idea that information about drupal should be free, but teachers should be paid to instruct students. Courses in this program are not "training" since the purpose of the program is to teach students how to become profesional web developers specializing in Drupal. Becoming an instructor in the program is open to anyone with a demonstrated ability and knowledge of Drupal beyond the basics. Instructors will be paid 30% of the gross revenue from a course they teach and courses will be priced at a competitive price point. All instructional content developed for courses will be contributed to the Drupal open curriculum project and content in courses will come from links to the open curriculum project. All content will be licensed with a creative commons license and be freely available to students that want to learn on their own.

I explain this because you may be interested in this and it relates to your point.

When you take a course with me as your instructor, or with someone else that has years of experience working with Drupal, you are GOING to LEARN a lot about the thought processes, problem solving, and "secret sauce" that will save the dedicated student months or years of trial and error experiences. Drupal is so flexible that its fairly easy to build a rope that you can hang yourself with and it take a lot of skill to weave a beautiful carpet out of it. That experience given to the student over a period of more than a day or two is WHY someone would pay to become educated. They may not LEARN as many skills in this process because education tends to take longer than training for teaching skills; however, they should be able to teach themselves after taking one or two courses in a given subject related to Drupal.

I love these kinds of

heather's picture

I love these kinds of debates! I cross-posted in the comments and here.

Wish I was there when you had this conversation. I have been on both sides. I have done on-the-job training, I have coordinated training, I've done training for long term unemployed, I have taught at college level.

In the college I was working in, we had to be careful to ensure that the content of the courses wasn't too much like "training".

The higher education framework here in Ireland ensures that "Level 7 - Level 8" (which is like the bachelors degree in the US) includes a range of higher order thinking and reflection, not just 'training' in procedures.

Training has an immediate application in an industry, it is closely tied to work; it is work-place learning. Training focuses on being brutally focused and efficient; time and cost are the limiting factors. Transfer of knowledge is essential. Learn X because you will need to do X on the job, next week.

Education is broader, may have no immediate application, and must strive to prepare someone for a lifetime of learning. Proposals for courses at third level (at least to the HEA higher education authority here) which focus too much on one software are not appropriate. Hence, why my proposal for a 'Drupal Course' was shot down, but my course on 'Open Source in Web Development' was OK'd.

In training we need to look at the immediate needs of people on the job, changing behavior and what they're doing here and now. In education, we must seek the transcendent lasting effects in changing the way people think, and what they will do in the future.

The errors I have seen are when I was 'training' people who were long term unemployed in various MS Office packages. The course severely lacked context for these people. They needed education, they were getting merely training.