* James Mohr;
The problem with a "need to know" approach means that you must have a very clear idea of who your target audience before your class starts. Granted if you were providing "in-house" training to all of the secretaries it would be pretty clear. Also if you provide specific classes like KDE, kernel internals, and so forth then it is also pretty easy to make that determination. However, if you provide a course on "Linux Administration" then what a user "needs" to know is not easily determined.
Education is a continous process and one must learn to crawl first before attempting to walk. Asking to run from a participant who is just learning to walk is not the sign of a valid educational approach. It is my understanding that to design a programme which is educationally valid one must have specific, measurable, realistic, attainable performance requirements (sometimes called as learning objectives). This is valid regardless of the subject to be provided. No learning objectives, no learning. Performance requirements can also be used to measure the outcome of the education meaning they can be used as questions for exam/testing purposes. An educationally valid programme uses "mastery learning" approach. Definition of mastery in terms of learning can be described as "when the learner can demonstrate proficiency and competence of all objectives" a. Mastering a skill means being able to perform it in a reasonably comfortable, fluid, repeatable manner b. Mastering knowledge means being able to apply the knowledge to real life situations. Once the "learning objectives" defined than the educator can provide the information which meet the performance requirements. This will set the content and the scope of the programme. As I understand, someone who has just taken driving lessons and has passed the exam is given a driving licence. This does not make the person an experienced driver, yet the person is qualified to drive and in an entry level stage. Similarly someone who has taken an Linux Admin course (regardless of the scope of the content) is an entry level system admin. So in any programme the ending result is someone with entry level qualification, not a savy
A couple of years ago, I took the level II Solaris admin from Sun. In it, we were taught how to configure serial terminals. Not one single person in the class wanted to know about it. However, it was important to others and that's why they continued to include it in the course.
People learn knowledge, skills, attitude based on values. Realistic education should provide real life value (need to know). If there is no value involved with the information then human memory tends to flush unnecessary information. Do you still remember everything taught on your secondary education. You only remember the ones that have real value to you in life ( you need to know them)
Okay, how does the instructor make that determination? Assume the course is called simply "Intro to Linux" or even "Advanced Linux" , just what is "essential to get the job done"? For some it's being able to configure new hardware devices. For others its writing shell script to perform automated data import. To get **my** job done, I need to know about scripting, how process interact, how to interpret what is in /proc, and so on. The guy in the office next to me needs to know about routing, TCP/IP stacks and various network protocols. So, which should one teach in a Linux class?
The educator makes the determination based on the scope and content of the learning objectives (performance criteria). The amount and detail of information to be presented depends on the knowledge and skill level of the participant. I do not think anyone studied The Tragedy of Macbeth" and tried to figure out the importance of "... all the parfumes of Arabia will not sweeten these little hands .." while trying to learn how to read and write. Consequently education is a nurturing process. As the participant gains knowledge, skills the needs have to be reevaluted. Imagine going to a doctor who without listening you says "take two asprins and you will be fine ". Presciption before diagose is malpractice.
You also have to look at it from a business. You could create 20 different course offers, some that only address hardware issues, others that address networking and so forth. However, will you have enough students and do you have enough space and instructors?
Exacly this is the education market and you have the be as flexible as possible. An educational system is like a staircase. having enough students is basically connected to the success of the entry level programme. If people are succesful, and they are enjoying themselves while learning and they do understand the need to continue their education either for personal gratification of for career puposes then there will be candidates. Take McDonald's as an example although it looks as if their main objective is to people in a fast way, they do offer choices of different burgers and they do have meals available. An educational system is similar to a fast food restaurant, you need to offer choices else they will start to look else where.
It is extremely detrimental to the "linux on the desktop" movement to include this type of material in "luser" classes. It scares people away.
Well said unfortunately not many people realize this.
Again, I must disagree with this. If someone is going to the trouble to learn something, then they are not going to be scared away. In my experience, they are going to rely on the people providing the course to make some decisions about what is relevant and what not. Granted you may end up with cases like my serial terminal example, but I really don't see a problem with people being scared away.
My thoughts are as follows: a. People learn best when they are "ready to learn", intellectually, psychologically and physically. b. People learn best when they can use past experiences or knowledge to help them understand the new material c. people learn best from instructional repetition d. people learn best when they are at ease and having fun. In instructional design there is a theory called "Sphere of Awarness". It consists of the following. 1) Self oriented: At this stage participants focus inward. They concentrate on themselves as they strive to develop new skills and assimilate new information. Example: "I can not configure my modem please help" 2) Task Oriented: As the participant gains knowledge and skills their awareness becomes broader. The participant has mastered the basics and is prepared to interact with various environments, learn new skills Example: I want to setup a SuSEfirewall2 3) Other Person oriented: At this level the participant has gained confidence with skills, and applications. This allows them to focus on helping others. It is at this level they start providing help to others who may have problems. Example: Proving answer and solution to boot and reinstall roots's pasword 4) Leadership oriented: It's at this point particpants are ready to be role models and leaders. They broaden their focus to supervise other people and pass on their skills and knowledge to others. Example: Not only giving the answer but also taking the extra mile to explain where more information can be found how that information relates to the current situation. If you will for a second close your eyes and think about the above levels of awareness you will most probably realise this happens on this very list also. Kudos to all the list members. Now the educator must take the "Sphere of Awareness" into consideration when designing the programme and therefore it is not sounding to my ears logicall to have a programme designed to be "know it all" type. Regards ps. Sorrry for a long and drifting to an OT explanation -- Togan Muftuoglu Unofficial SuSE FAQ Maintainer http://dinamizm.ath.cx