Are today's students hunt-and-peck learners?

Think about this: Once upon a time, rote learning was the norm. Students memorized state capitals, the periodic table, classic poetry, and lots of dates.

That style of learning fell out of favor about the time the Beatles arrived in America and was replaced by constructivism, which encouraged students to focus on process, rather than outcomes. Students were required to come up with the right questions, and in theory the right questions would lead to the right answers.

My daughter brought home an English paper from a college course. The paper received a B, which was a small miracle considering that it was riddled with grammar errors and other elements requiring corrections. Not a single error was marked, however, so I asked why not. "Oh," my daughter replied,"we just write for creativity. Our instructor doesn't want to discourage us by marking things wrong." So constructivism was not perfect, especially when the focus on process meant never mind the results.

Today, rote learning and constructivism have been relegated to the scrap heap by technology. Students do not need to memorize facts; they can look up facts, figures, and dates in an instant on Google or Wikipedia. Why even bother with process when you can copy and paste an entire thesis from a Web site to your term paper, then use a Thesaurus to replace a few words with synonyms to "make it your own." It is what I call hunt-and-peck learning.

Is it surprising, given this environment, that students don't seem to know anything? They don't get much practice in making things "stick" in their brains. When they know that a fact can be found online, why bother to remember it?

But, facts are (or should be) the basis for forming opinions and making decisions. Without facts at hand, what goes on up there in those young adult minds? How can we expect them to think critically or creatively?

I'm not suggesting that we go back to constructivism or even rote learning, but I think educators should carefully consider whether or not we should proceed down this road.