How Much Do You Retain? | The Village Green

How Much Do You Retain? November 8, 2008

Posted by Matthew Woolums in Articles/Videos, Data, Opinion.
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There is a very interesting review of an oft cited set of statistics about how much information is retained based on the method of delivery. No need to go into great depth about the percentages here, we’ve all seen them before, about how little information is retained from lectures, a little more from reading, more from visual presentations, on up the list to teaching others. According to the blog post, the statistics have no basis in research. There is no data to back up the statistics.

Tell Me I forget, Show Me I remember, Involve Me I understand.

It is a funny thing about perceptions and what we hold to be true, especially when it relates to information we ‘retained’. Take the above quote for example. Sounds like a reasonable statement about how I view education. I’ve heard it many times. But where does it actually come from?

A cursory search through Google for the phrase resulted in 1,340 different links. Some links attribute its origins to an old Chinese saying while others point to Native American origins. If the origins of the saying are in doubt, should I also doubt the saying itself, or do I accept the quotation for what it reveals on its own merit and disregard the cloudiness of its inception? Is there even an indisputable truth to be found about its roots?

Putting on my teacher hat, I wonder how can we sift through the volumes of information to actually arrive at truth. Can we even hope to do so? How do we establish authenticity, or better yet, how do we teach our students to question enough to wonder about the truth when we (myself included) are so easily swayed?

I believe that, as we move toward data-driven classrooms, toward reliance on statistical models to illuminate student learning, we’d better make sure that our teachers are capable of questioning the statistics as they seek to inform their instruction. Taking those raw numbers at face value is likely to result in ‘retained’ information about student achievement rather than a transformational dialogue about learning.

Mea Culpa – Setting the Record Straight on Dale’s Cone/Pyramid — Open Education

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