Learning Makes Me Cry

I decided it would be a good idea to go to one of my classes that I haven't attended since the first day of this semester. Perhaps I'm a weirdo, but I don't deal well with big lecture classes. There are probably 100 kids in this class, most of them on a laptop, staring at the bulbous professor pace back and forth on the stage. Behind him a giant powerpoint projection plasters the wall. Almost every sentence he repeats. Sometimes he repeats them twice. This probably is to emphasize a point in addition to giving the note takers a chance to transcribe verbatim.

The format of large lecture classes allows for little beyond rote memorization. Really, if the University is worried about saving money and consolidating resources, they should just offer the class online. Virtually, that is the experience in a class of that size. There is no interaction, we do not discuss and analyze. We are presented with information that we are supposed to digest. The professor provides an experience comparable to reading a book. Assembling people to share the information in the same room is a facade of intellectualism. This is not a chimney-side parlor talk. This is a television channel broadcast from 100 miles away.

Again, perhaps it is just me that doesn't get much out of this method of education. I need to interact to learn. I have to pick up the ball of an idea and run my fingers over it to absorb the texture. I need to lift it and toss it to a friend to recognize its weight. I need that friend to toss it back at me, maybe aggressively, for me to feel its impact. My classroom experience was more like walking through a museum of ideas. In the distance, on the stage, the ball sat on a pedestal. We were invited to look at it and listen to our tour guide describe its characteristics. Look but don't touch is a disgusting mantra that is callous in its insult to humanity.