Publish at September 12 2023 Updated September 12 2023
"The end is in the means as the tree is in the seed."
Gandhi
The educational paradigm of traditional teaching consists mainly in "transmitting" knowledge from the teacher to the student, with the aim of memorizing it and applying it in exams. All too often, this leads to extrinsic motivation driven by the hope of a good assessment.
The transmission of knowledge is placed at the pinnacle of teaching values. "I'm in this profession because I love passing on knowledge", say some teachers. Sometimes, the filling of a brain is guaranteed by the respect of programs and the precise scheduling of objectives. But nothing has really changed: even with enhanced technological resources, transmission has gone from the metaphor of the jug and vase being filled to that of automatic watering. Online devices (MOOCs, LMSs, various platforms) can now speed up the flow of information, to the ever more numerous and attentive sponge brains expected.
However, an alternative approach is to focus on sowing rather than transmitting. The seed is what enables the earth to bear different fruits. The cactus seed in the desert, the willow seed on the banks and the cattail seed in the swamp... But as Hervé Bazin says, "For children as for books, for ink as for seed, it always requires confirmation". In other words, the metaphor of the seed is only as good as the meaning given to the experience by the person living it.
Seeding, then, is more than passing grains from a sack to the ground; it's learning by discovery, or experiential learning, in which the pedagogue focuses on creating an educational environment of exploration, discovery and the creation of knowledge from lived experience. Teachers become facilitators and guides rather than transmitters of knowledge or seed planters. For the seed to take root, it must find a favorable space. The space will be all the more favorable if it's the learner himself who chooses the seed.
Seeding is much more than a sowing operation, in which seeds are thrown on the fly, without taking into account the context, the climate or the nature of the soil. Sowing is a moment in the life of a terroir that requires observation and a detailed knowledge of the germination process and the specific properties of each element.
The advantages of seeding are numerous. Firstly, this approach helps learners to develop a better understanding of subjects by enabling them to discover information for themselves. To achieve this, learners need to develop skills such as critical thinking, problem-solving and creativity, which are increasingly important in the professional world. These are the skills of the 21st century.
Seeding involves creating a more inclusive and diverse learning environment, allowing each learner to work at his or her own pace and taking into account individual interests and learning styles. This creates a sense of responsibility and motivation in learners, leading them to become more involved in the learning process rather than more or less passively going through it.
The extrinsic motivation inherent in "knowledge to be transmitted" gives way to intrinsic motivation and "knowledge to be explored". Energy is devoted to exploration, discovery and reinforcement. However, seeding presents challenges for facilitators and schools, who are faced with the need to design effective and engaging learning activities. This requires adequate resources to support this approach, including time, flexible learning spaces and modern educational technologies (lab, digital space).
Seeding enables learners to develop their creativity and imagination by giving them the freedom to discover and explore subjects of study for themselves. The shift stimulates curiosity and prompts deeper questions about the subject. Seeding encourages active rather than passive learning. Learners are invited to be more reflexive in their own learning process.
The activity in which I engage and about which I take a critical view encourages the assimilation of information that will be better contextualized and easier to retain. By giving learners greater autonomy in their learning process, the seeding strategy encourages learners to make informed decisions about how to continue learning, and to work more independently. Learners are not soft soil on which to throw seeds, telling themselves that one will grow and something will remain.
They choose the seeds they want to grasp and incorporate them into their own intimate soil to achieve their own goals. They are not so much plants in need of attention as gardeners building their own fertility. Seeding also encourages collaboration between learners. Seeding activities involve group projects and discussions, as well as team-based question-creation activities in which each learner realizes that he or she is both matter and a transformer of the matrix that makes matter.
Put more simply, it's by learning from each other that we transform ourselves and work at our own pace, using different learning supports to suit our individual needs. It's by working to build one's own environment that it reveals maximum meaning and offers greater scope for motivation.
Seeding is an act of cultivation that increases the individual's power to act. Rather than striving to solve a distant problem, it's better to seek a detailed understanding of the changes we need to bring about in order to learn together; rather than asserting the solution contained in preconceived ideas, it's better to learn to construct our own reasoning.
Seeding in the educational world means helping ideas to germinate. This involves describing the situations sought with the learner, constructing objectives in relation to these situations, and gaining a detailed understanding of the behaviors required to achieve the objective.
We often redefine what was problematic in the learning process, and it's on the basis of actionable resources that the learner experiments with his or her own way of learning and making progress.
Sources
Cristol; D (2022) Pour une mésologie de l'apprenance. Phronesis 2022/4 (Vol. 11), pages 112 to 132
Robbes, B. (2012). Pedagogy and the transmission of knowledge: the terms of a debate on the way to being overcome?
https:// www.meirieu.com/ACTUALITE/robbes_rayou.pdf
Thot Cursus - La limite des compétences du XXIème siècle
https://cursus.edu/fr/12182/la-limite-des-competences-du-xxieme-siecle
Balleux, A. (2000). Evolution of the notion of experiential learning in adult education: twenty-five years of research. Revue des sciences de l'éducation, 26(2), 263-286.
https:// www.erudit.org/en/journals/rse/1900-v1-n1-rse367/000123ar.pdf
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