On Tech Education and Base13
Base13 has grown out of the learning challenges I personally experienced and my desire to make an individual contribution to the development of society. To explain, I should talk a little about myself: Ever since my childhood, I have loved reading and making discoveries, and had diverse interests from opening up my computer and peering over its internal architecture to painting and playing musical instruments. Perhaps because of the solitary nature of these preoccupations, I grew a bit estranged from my peers and they found me weird. Yet this has not changed me and I guess my hunger for information only fueled new pursuits: in my adult life, I am still “weird” and full of the same desire for learning and development.
In recent years I realized that I’ve been asking myself the question “am I a productive member of society” a lot and that I wanted to do something for which I was passionate and that would help change the world.
I studied computer science at the university and discovered how much difficulty instructors had in getting across fundamental concepts. The problem seemed to me to lie in the dichotomy between theory and practice even if sometimes miscommunication also played a part. While the instructors deployed definitions really well they would often get lost in examples or flood students with assignments and projects in which the latter had little interest or a clear picture as to why these were necessary. The effect was overwhelming and discouraging the student just coming to writing code.
On the other hand most and even the best online educational platforms either emphasize rote learning with 1:1 classes or do not focus on the problem solving or computational skills of the students. As a result, when these students first start on their developer’s jobs they have difficulties and face affects like the impostor syndrome, which leads to negative self-reflection. I came to think that this long-standing problem across education and the industry would be best tackled by confronting its root cause in monolithic consumerism with a more creative and sustainable structure. Although I did not have a clear idea as to how to achieve this, I started reflecting on this matter with passion and realized that sooner or later I would need to put my dear obsessions into practice.
Few words on tech education:
No matter how intensively we use technology in our daily lives or its development seems exponential, we rarely see relevant education given at a young age. Without addressing the supporting reasons, I think that the biggest factor is that the traditional, old-school education system cannot be changed very easily. Unfortunately, we still find that most STEAM disciplines are taught in schools within the scope of rules and procedures without explaining what is taught and why. That’s why I think that the outdated educational framework is, unfortunately, hitting the very fundamental law of evolution — moving the next generation forward — seriously and having young generations became somewhat “colorless” in their education journey, no matter how much they are adapted to change and technological progress.
I would like to explain this with very simple examples: We know that coloring books are designed around the perception of “stay within the borders”. The “Fill inside the border” message is given to young minds indicates that obeying rules is a way to do things, and as a result, creativity is always kept within limits. While following the rules and doing what is asked is promoted, questioning and basic problem-solving capabilities are subsequently crippled.
Someone may not be very successful in conveying information to you, or it may even be a pure coincidence to understand what the other person is telling you. However, if the information can be acquired when needed, and if someone can be guided toward obtaining the information/resources rather than intervening only at the points where it is most needed, it strengthens the creative learning process and the ability to cope with a problem, whatever the subject is. That is why I think practice plays an important role when acquiring knowledge and make it applicable. When educating young minds is considered, shaping your own learning path within the framework of creativity actually adds a unique experience to the individual rather than following the teacher’s footsteps.
The creative learning process we envision is a guidance support system that disrupts repeating the same words to different people and the traditional old-school teaching practices by completely supporting the individual’s ability to comprehend at her own learning pace. As a Base13 team, we are designing a platform where students can develop at their own pace, completely away from competition and grade-based success, and gain internal and external awareness while understanding computer science concepts.
