Redesigning Education

Nobel Prize-winning physicist Wilson and journalist Daviss, who view contemporary American education as backward and static, here offer hypothetical correctives, some of them based on real-life educational programs and experiments. The authors advocate change-both specific reforms and change itself accepted as an ongoing modus operandi and a standard. ``Americans pride themselves on `can do' and `getting the job done,' not on their powers of analysis and reflection,'' they complain, arguing that only the pursuit of multidisciplinary lifelong learning can equip us to meet the future's increasingly complex challenges. Wilson and Daviss want reform in teacher training, with emphasis on inquiry as a mode of learning and of teaching; better knowledge among teachers of the subjects taught; continuing professional growth fostered by intermittent retraining; building better bridges between education research and its practice; and increased use of technology in the classroom. They stress that a more active, committed and imaginative approach to education can save us from slipping as a nation. They are persuasive. (Oct.)