Dear Craig,

Thank you for your insightful answer, one that is based on direct experience.

In my personal experience as a student in public schools, it wasn't until I was in high school - when the paths of students begin to diverge - that I discovered a camaraderie with students who were also interested in science and math, like myself. The prior years of elementary and junior high school were, to large extent, a waste of time - in so far as learning things of value.

I know the situation was even worse for serious students in the arts - they always found they didn't belong and couldn't relate to the schools, their teachers, or their fellow students - throughout their K-12 years.

This all seems to point to allowing students to seek their own interests, as much as possible.

These days in the USA, there are now charter high schools that attempt to foster the arts.

However getting back to my original question, what about the average student who is not a nerd or an artist? Such a student also has special talents and insights that are of great value. Just as parents, it should be the duty of teachers to be alert to detecting the gifts that each student brings, recording the supporting observations for the successive teachers to build upon by slanting projects that will allow for these talents to blossom.

The Socratic Method of drawing out from the students what they think and feel will encourage them to feel more empowered and willing to project their own curiosity and offer their own hypotheses.

Education has to get back to basic principles and allow teachers, as professionals, to decide how to teach their students.  

My organization was founded with the hope that is some small way children's curiosity should fostered through helping them in life-long learning by empowering them to answer their own questions.

After recess, if a child brings a caterpillar into the classroom, the "education set" of the total class is at a high level.  Curiosity, wonderment, apprehension, anticipation, fascination - all factors that put young people into a high learning mode.  Some of my teachers supported student-centered interests.  Most did not.

Most of my educational work has been in a museum or museum-like environment.  Real objects, authentic experiences and hand-on/on-hands play important roles.

By the end of high school, I believe a student should know 3 things.

1. Know what you know.

2. Know what you don't know.

3. Know how to get the answers to what you need to know.

A principal once gave me his 7th and 8th grade classes to try my techniques on.  He was skeptical that they had enough curiosity and enthusiasm left to get involved. 

After giving them all sorts of professional insect collecting equipment  [nets, loupes, containers, etc.], I only charged them with: "catch something!" First, they had questions about making the "equipment work better."  After the questioners were coached on "techniques," they were empowered to be coaches for others.  Then the questions became more scientific in nature.  Socratic methods came into play.  Empowerment to asked yourself questions - creative ignorance.

Mid-morning, the principal arrives to a scene of every student engaged - collecting and conferring.  Says: "What's going on?"  I said, "let me check.  I'll tell you at lunch."

Report to principal:  "All the students are gifted."  They had part of their curiosity restored and legitimized.  They had personalized/internalized the challenge. "How will "I' meet the challenge.  Socialites collaborated.  Jocks were fast. Nerds found strange stuff.  Artists were interested in the aesthetics of structure, form, or colors.

My personal experience is that it is easier to keep and foster curiosity in young students than it is to restore what is lost in older students.

Teachers should not be intimidated by their students' knowledge, but harness it.  Teachers should be ready to "mentor prep" advanced students in order to network them with scientists.  Teachers only launch their students into life-long learning. 

Dear Douglas,

What a wonderful episode you shared with us! I was excited just reading your account of it. This is what learning should be about!

Thank you.

Dear Antonio Lucero, this is a fundamental question that you offer on the question of education. 

Thank you!

I wouldn't expect a "normal" child to loose curiosity, at any age, except if the child is asbusevely exposed to wrong educational system...

This would meam the end of any scientific future...

This mischievous loss of curiosity probably in relation to the loss of innocence, masy derive from excessive imposition of information.

Permanent, natural curiosity, throughout life, is the fundamental characteristic of a good scientist.When you "kill" natural curiosity, either from excessive, premature, or boring extent of information, you soon destroy the perspective of a good scientific mind in the near future...

Should we review our earliest, elementary, educational system?

I wrtite as a Medical specialist, highly interested in teaching Anatomy to undergraduate students. (I do sometimes get some tremendously bored / and boring, first year Medical students, who believe that they know it all, and that there is little knowledge to acquire... They don't go far...)

I hope these personal notes will contribute to answer your important question...

Best regards, Maria 

When the teacher stood in front of the fifth row on the first day to resume the study, and gave the students a pleasant sentence Tmmlhm them, looked at her pupils and said to them:

I love you all ..

So did all the teachers and teachers, but she excluded a student sitting in the front row, Teddy Stoudard.

Ms. Thompson watched Teddy last year, noticed that he was not playing with the rest of the children, that his clothes were always dirty, that he always needed a bath, and that he seemed an unpleasant person. Mrs. Thompson found it fun to patch his papers Red, bold, bold, and bold, and then the word "deposit" is written at the top of the paper.

At the school in which Ms. Thompson was working, she was asked to review the previous student records. She put Teddy's scorebook in the end. While she was reviewing her file, I was surprised by something !!

Teddy's first grade teacher wrote:

Teddy is an intelligent child and enjoys a cheerful spirit. He performs his work with care and attention, and in an orderly manner, and he enjoys the gentleness of morality.

His teacher wrote in the second row:

Teddy is a student of Najib. He is loved by his classmates, but he is upset and worried about his mother being severely ill, making life at home difficult, stressful and stressful.

His teacher in the third grade wrote about him:

His mother's death had a difficult impact on him. He tried hard work and did his utmost, but his father was not interested. Life in his home would soon affect him if he did not take some action.

While his fourth-grade teacher wrote about him:

Teddy is an introverted student, does not show much desire to study, does not have a lot of friends, and sometimes sleeps during the lesson.

And here Mrs Thompson realized the problem. She felt ashamed and ashamed of herself for what had happened. Her attitude was even worse when her students brought her Christmas presents wrapped in beautiful ribbons and glossy paper, except Teddy.

The gift she gave her that day was wrapped in bland, irregular, dark-colored paper, taken from a bag of grocery bags. Mrs. Thompson was hurting as she opened Teddy's gift.

Some students burst out laughing when they found a necklace of fake diamonds with no stones, and a bottle of perfume that contained only a quarter.

But these students soon stopped laughing when Mrs. Thompson expressed her admiration for the beauty of that necklace and then put it on her neck and put drops of perfume on her wrist. Teddy did not go home after school that day.

But wait a little time to meet Mrs. Thompson and say to her:

Your smell today is like the smell of my mother

When the pupils left school, Ms. Thompson burst into tears for at least an hour, because Teddy brought her the bottle of perfume his mother used, and found in his teacher the smell of his late mother.

Since that day, she has stopped teaching reading, writing, numeracy, and began teaching children the materials of each teacher.

Ms. Thompson paid special attention to Teddy, and when she began to focus on him, his mind began to recover. The more he encouraged him, the faster he responded. By the end of the school year, Teddy had become one of the most outstanding students in the class, most notably intelligent, and he became a pampered apprentice.

A year later, Ms. Thompson found a note at her door to Teddy, telling her:

She is the best teacher he has ever met.

Six years have passed without receiving any further note from him.

Then he wrote to her that he completed secondary school, and ranked third in his class,

And that she still occupies the position of the best teacher met her throughout his life.

Four years later, she received another letter telling him:

Things are becoming difficult, he is a college resident who does not succeed, and he will soon graduate from the university with the first degree of honor. In this letter, he also assured her that she is the best and most beloved teacher to date.

Four years later, she received another letter from him, and this time he explained to her that after he got his bachelor's degree, he decided to go a little further in school and assured her once again that she was the best and most beloved teacher I had met throughout his life, :

Dr. Theodore F. Stoudard !!

The story did not stop there. Another letter came from him that spring:

He met a girl, he would marry her, and as he had already told her that his father had died two years earlier, and asked her to come and sit at his mother's place at his wedding, Mrs. Thompson agreed.

The strange thing is that she was wearing the same contract that she gave her on Christmas years ago, which was one of the stones incomplete, and more than that he was sure to perfume the same perfume mentioned by his mother on the last birthday !!

Embracing each other, and whispering Dr. Stoudard in the ear of Mrs. Thompson, saying to her:

Thank you for your trust in me, and I thank you very much for making me feel important and for being able to be distinguished and distinguished.

Mrs. Thompson replied with tears filling her eyes:

You are wrong, it was you who taught me how to be a distinguished teacher

I did not know how to know, until I met you.

Teddy Stoudard is a renowned physician who has a ward at the Stoddard Center for Cancer Therapy at Methododest Hospital in Des Moines, Iowa, and is one of the best treatment centers not only in the state but also in the United States of America.

Life is full of stories and events that, if we hope, have given us wisdom and thought

And the mind is not fooled by the crust on the pulp ..

And not the appearance of the detective ..

Dear Maria,

Your insightful commentary is helpful to try to understand what happens to children to "kill" their curiosity. As you say, the mistaken view of some teachers or educational systems of education - that  education should consist of primarily cramming facts into the children's heads - is largely at fault.

S Freud stages, oral anal phalic, latency, genital. may be the last stage starts, 

also look at Erikson's  and piaget's theory of personalty development. they will help

What have our schools done?

Taught them that there are Right and Wrong answers.

Taught them that Wrong answers should be avoided.

Taught them there is a hierarchy of subjects with the creative arts at the bottom.

Taught them that experimentation can lead to Wrong answers.

Failed to recognise that everyone is really good at at least one thing and that every student knows more about something than everyone else in the class - including the teacher.

All of these can and should be avoided.

One can kill curiosity by routine methodology of teaching, asking multiple-choice-questions, in totality and the absence of 'out-of-the-box ideas' being deliberated during the classes, so that the class schedules become monotonus and  less interesting and instructive. Following (if possible) nurturing the aptitudes in the school children coupled to interesting class-room activities. The latter could include building up small models, simple experimental schemes etc. to enhance their interest. Take them out so that they can learn from their outdoor experience as it provides a larger world to learn and employ/use their ideas i.e. ideate.

GOOD TOPIC and nice discussion

That is a multifaced question indeed and many factors may contribute to its manifestation.

Curiosity in its simplest terms can be defined as a person's desire to learn or attain more knowledge. Most education systems do not practice interactive or reflective learning.  A child's personal morals, ethnicity and goals are usually not taken into account as part of the methodology in creating the curriculum and pedagogy in teaching.

'Learning is remembering what you are interested in' - Richard Saul Wurman

A more holistic approach to education has been proven to be quite effective in recent research (Lee et al., 2014).  More of a focus on the whole person and not just the academic could go a long way in rekindling the passion in the younger generation.

Thank you for the opportunity to share.

Lee, D. H, Hong, H. and Niemi, H. (2014) A Centralized account of Holistic Education in Finland and Singapore: Implications on Singapore Educational Context. The Asia-Pacific Education Researcher. 23(4) pp. 871–884. DOI 10.1007/s40299-014-0189-y.

One of the answers is that the curriculum has not been challenging enough to sustain that curiosity.  Elementary students who had preschool are typically bored with first and second grade math and other subjects where there is very little progression from single digit equations.  Likewise, curriculum in art, science and language which is not tiered or differentiated for advanced students surely stymies a child's interest.  Just as higher education courses must adapt to serve individual learning styles and levels, primary and secondary teachers should be careful not to contribute to waning educational interests in children.

Dear Antonio,

How certain is the claim that children loose curiosity after this or that age? Is there any scientific study that proves this claim? Curiosity is our innate derive and acts of necessity that is a result of our consciousness to know what we do not know at any stage of our growth and survive, and we always  realize there are more things/ infinitely many, around us and beyond,  we do not know  than we know. That means our curiosity continuously increases, unless there is some natural breakdown or if there is an ill devised education system  that causes such a collapse on natural abilities.

Regards,

Dejenie Alemayehu Lakew 

Dear Fifi, I have downloaded the article you suggested on Holistic Education. I expect it will be enlightening. Thank you.

I agree that children do not lose interest or enthusiasm as they grow. It is the way the information is presented to them that keep them interested on any subject.

When I do presentations of minerals/rocks/fossils at schools I usually have a long line of followers (even if they are supposed to return to their classes after the show). Obviously, their curiosity has increased, even for a day.

Dear Sharon,

Extrapolating form your observations that proper student placement is very important, I would say that for elementary school (Kindergarden & 1st Grade) when students are just starting, children need to be assessed carefully and adjustments need to be made so that, for each skill, the pupils are placed in the appropriate class. Maybe most of their time is spent with their age group, but part of the day is spent with pupils with similar capabilities, regardless of age.

Dear Cecilia,

I had a very interesting experience tutoring math to a 14-year old student. As a result of an evaluation test I gave him, I found that he: a) did not like math; and b) he didn't think he was good at math.

I started with an historical approach at math, starting with the ancient civilizations and the Natural Numbers. I took an axiomatic approach with the elements and the operations, using practical examples. Soon we found, from the need to solve practical problems, that there was a need to extend our number system to Integers (including Negatives and Identity Elements). Continuing along this vein, we finally arrived at the Real Numbers (including Irrational Numbers and Exponents).

Along the way, we worked on mental arithmetic exercises and estimating answers (including the use of Logarithms). These were especially useful as warm up exercises at the start of each class.

Soon he was ready for pre-algebra. Once he got there, I introduced him to "Teaching Textbooks", a great CD-based set of courses to begin algebra, which he mastered without difficulty

He ended up loving math, and is now an Engineer.

Dear Antonio,

Here a quote I like very much from David Bohm:

'' child learns to walk , to talk, and to know his way around the world just by trying somthing out and seeing what happens, then modifying what he does (or thinks) in accordance with what has actually happened.  In this way, he spends his first few years in a wonderfully creative way, discovering all sorts of things that are new to him, and this leads people to look back on childhood as a kind of lost paradise. As the child grows older, however learning takes on a narrower meaning.  In school, he learns by repetition to accumulate knowledge, so as to please the teacher and pass examinations. At work, he learns in a similar way, so as to make a living, or for some other utilatarian purpose, and not mainly fro the love of the action of learning itself. So his ability to see something new and original gradually dies away. And without it there is evidently no ground from which anything can grow.

It is impossible to overemphasize the significance of this kind of learning in every phase of life, and the importance of giving the action of learning itself top priority, ahead of the specific content of what is to be learned.''

On Creativity, p.3

It is why I strongly believe that evaluation and exams KILL the child out of the person.

Dear Dejenie,

I guess what I meant by losing their "curiosity" was that the range of curiosity becomes constrained. Most are no longer questioning natural phenomena (e.g., why is the sky blue?); instead they may be curious about: the latest fashion, how to be popular, or how to use the latest smart phone. Where does that get us, as a civilization?

We are surrounded by so many grave global problems that are begging for people with unconventional ways of thinking, imagining, and questioning for their solutions.

I agree with @ Louis Brassard that evaluation and exams kill the curiosity within a child. Often parents and teachers have a will to have good results of child in their examinations. They try for good scores in examinations, rather than development of queries in their minds and its subsequent satisfaction. The life of today is based on school education which is based on marking systems. They forgot that a child with a curiosity has more orientations towards learning. Therefore teaching should be able to enhance capabilities of a child. Much home works without developing true skills and knowledge, blackboard teaching are problems to it.

Secondly, the child having an interest in a particular field should be trained into the same. Natural curiosity is hampered if we try to move our child on a track where it has no enthusiasm.

Experience

Dear Louis,

Good to hear from you!

Yes, "trial and error" is how we really learn. That is the basis for the Socratic Method. It is the basis for innovation. It is the basis for Biological Evolution.

Sitting and passively listening to a lecture is usually not learning.

But, being actively engaged, applying what was taught in the given context, seeing if you can replicate what was taught (filling in the gaps), applying it to a new and different context, reconstructing the lecture in your own mind, explaining it to others, imagining the implications in an imaginary world, looking for apparent exceptions, looking for similarities in other domains, thinking of its contextual limitations: these are some of the things one can do to really learn.

Whenever I hear this question being asked, I always suggest people watch the education 'goto' person for me. Sir Ken Robinson. 

Worth a look and keep it on your bookmark bar when the kids are yawning in your classroom.

https://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity

Yes, Tracey, I highly recommend it.

There is research that even 7 month old babies habituate to stimuli that are in line with a particular structure (and thus boring to them) and attend longer to novel, unfamiliar structure (see Marcus et al. 1999). In my opinion, this shows that even very young infants can loose interest if they have learned something already, and find new structure more interesting. This can be transferred to elementary school. If children become enthusiastic about new, unfamiliar problems after leaving elementary school, they might not loose interest. Of course other mechanisms probably also play a role, e.g. hormonal changes, etc.

Reference: Marcus GF, Vijayan S, Bandi Rao S, Vishton PM. Rule learning by

seven-month-old infants. Science. 1999 Jan 1;283(5398):77-80. PubMed PMID:

9872745.

This phenomenon is very interesting.

It's an indictment of rote learning!

Just like in music: To play the same note sequence, in the same way over and over again is boring.

But if you use variations of the same note sequence it can become very interesting: change the volume dynamics, change the stress, use pauses, play it in rounds, develop it into an orchestral ensemble ... Wow! It can become so interesting!

I think the problem is simple but the solution isn't. There is some truth in all of those who have posted before - motivation. Student motivation is effected by external and internal factors. The most significant however are:

• the student's perception of those who interact most with them (teachers, friends, parents), and
• the student's perception of the place in an educational institution, with all the complicating factors in that perception (efficacy, long and short term value, interest, relatedness etc.,

The biggest bang for our buck therefore is to modify those factors that impact on the 2 preceding issues. For this to happen, means however, a relaxing of curriculum and pedagogical controls so teachers can meet the needs of students, create better relationships, and focus on interest. Government needs to accept the central role of motivation in a psychological sense and use media to support it with communities, parents and teachers. Teachers need support to 'be the best' they can be to support student autonomy. Assessment and reporting needs to focus on what students can do to truly be supportive of improvement. Comparison and competition needs to be minimised.

All children, in general, want to do three things: 1) They want to play, 2) They want to live in relationships, and 3) They want to explore on their own in different proportions. A conventional and regimented schooling kills their natural development that is so individual specific that one cover doesn't fit all. On top of that we've made them dependent on cell phones and computers, by giving rationale for their cognition development. I maintain that a child deprived of normal childhood things, mainly love and security of  1) a happy and caring home for emotional bonding, along with 2) their need to play with children of their age groups in their neighbourhood would sooner or later will seek security elsewhere, i.e., in being popular among their peer group.

I've personal examples of dealing with different children in different age groups. Fallacy of scientific observation (especially where emotional needs are important) is challenging common sense in favour of testing under controlled conditions. 

Dear Cecilia,

Hopefully, we are converging towards an answer to my question. Many interesting points of view. I will try to summarize what I think are the most cogent answers (as maybe others might offer their own summaries/conclusions). After that, we need to ask another question: "How to overcome this problem?" I would expect that different countries/cultures may have different answers.

Dear Laj,

Your points are well taken.

A problem that I see is that, on the one hand, we want to acquire knowledge of teaching and learning that is evidence-based, statistical. On the other hand when we want to apply this knowledge, we, educators, must remember that each child is unique and that teaching is an art that must connect emotionally with the individual pupil.

The objective knowledge that we, educators, acquire should serve only "as a tool box" that may or may not be applicable to a given pupil or a given circumstance.

What counts in the end is establishing a positive emotional connection with the pupil and serving the pupil's needs and desires.

Dear Jabashish,

I would add to your recommendations: inviting guest speakers on a regular basis from outside of academia to speak with and demonstrate to your students the work they do (scientists, plumbers, dancers, etc.).

This enrichment can inspire and provoke questions in the minds of the students.

Dear Antonio,

maybe the question should be asked those who are successful in increasing the children´s curiosity during the studies, e.g. PK Yonge Developmental Research School (https://pkyonge.ufl.edu/) or similar... I´m just going to visit it the next week, to study more about the system of education, instructional rounds, school culture etc.

Dear Ben Lavin,

You are right to point out implicit assumptions that I had made in posing this question. They should be kept in mind and addressed when it is appropriate.

I feel in many cases these Q/A's should be dealt with as a "brain storming session". The inputs in such a session should be developed and recorded to see how it all fits together at the end. No inhibitions or dismissals should take place - No idea is too dumb or inappropriate.

Once a tentative structure appears to emerge, then we can review explicit and implicit assumptions to see if they seem reasonable or not. If the ideas seem to bear some merit, then all of the assumptions should require further investigation or experimentation before committing any resources for development. Some of the assumptions may be easily confirmed or denied by the evidence. Others may be too costly in time or money to confirm or deny their efficacy - In which case they are relagated to the status of "known unknowns."

Now, I will try to address some of your concerns:

Re. your first question -

How do you measure curiosity? By its breadth or its depth? By the number of questions asked (or thought)? Having “curiosity about some things” is the problem: the "some things" may be very limited in scope and depth and not of long lasting value.

Re. your second question -

True, human development and going through elementary school are happening at the same time; in principle, either one of them, both of them, or something else entirely may be the cause of the postulated effect. How do we distinguish between the causes? Can you repeat the experiment? Do look at case studies? Statistical studies may not get to the heart of the matter - the dimensionality is too high. This is probably an arena where our experience and knowledge can intuitively be applied to this high dimensionality problem.

Re. your third question -

The autonomy of individual schools and teachers in Finland’s schools gives one of several examples where, as a result, the students excel as compared with global standards.

My answers are by no means complete, but hopefully you will put them in the context of a preliminary brain storming session. 

Dear Martin,

I briefly looked over the website you referenced - affiliated with the University of Florida. It looks very good and addresses many of the issues we have raised here.

The only thing that should be added (I didn't see any reference to it.) is the neuroscience of how our brains go about learning. This would be a new facet of understanding how we human beings learn. Having this knowledge would make us all better at lesson planning and execution, as well as adapting to individual student's needs.  

Hi Antonio

by the end of elementary school the child has been told what to do , how to do it, when to do it and gets tested if he/she can do it the way he was asked. There is no place for curiosity. 

As an atelierista I work constantly on the issue of maintaining curiosity and creativity going. It needs dedication and open ended questions, discussions and team work and the fundamental concept of change and adaptability. What is known at 7yrs old will change at 9yrs and then again later on. A sort of layering of knowledge that shoud always leave a window of opportunity open for....curiosity.

@Asim Hakim Abbas - A moving example of what educating a young person is purely stated as. Development of a relationship with the mind and interests of the child. Facilitating the learning with like-minded people rather than limiting the learning to age groups. Great things come from small steps and lots of encouragement. The safe and nurtured environment of the learning space and not just a classroom is tantamount to students learning for meaning not to fill their minds with inconsequential knowledge.

 @Louis Brassard, I agree wholeheartedly with your core premise as stated at the end of your response. I think however that the demotivating aspect can be teased out more carefully. I dont think it is the mere act of assessment that is the problem, but the perceived purpose of that assessment. As soon as a student perceives assessment as for an outsider to judge them it is demotivating. I have shown that assessment can be perceived positively in my project, but it takes a considerable change and effort. When assessment is perceived as supporting a student's continued effort they tend to maintain their curiosity.

Mark,

We either get the reward from an act or from an external compensation for doing a boring act.  You either get your pleasure from the act itself or from being told you are wonderfull.  You are autonomous or controled.  You explore or follow orders and conform. Competition is totally irrrelevant with learning.  It substitute learning for competition.  What happen in sport when money is introduced.  The competition in the sport transform into a competition on money.  The same happen in learning, introduce marks and assessment and the later replace learning.  Assesment end up substituting to learning and the joy of learning for its own sake.

A Mathematician’s Lament

by Paul Lockhart

https://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/LockhartsLament.pdf

''Sadly, our present system of mathematics education is precisely this kind of nightmare. In fact, if I had to design a mechanism for the express purpose of destroying a child’s natural curiosity and love of pattern-making, I couldn’t possibly do as good a job as is currently being done— I simply wouldn’t have the imagination to come up with the kind of senseless, soul crushing

ideas that constitute contemporary mathematics education.

Everyone knows that something is wrong. The politicians say, “we need higher standards.” The schools say, “we need more money and equipment.” Educators say one thing, and teachers say another. They are all wrong. The only people who understand what is going on are the ones most often blamed and least often heard: the students. They say, “math class is stupid and

boring,” and they are right.''

Louis, Agree wholeheartedly. That's why I say it isn't the act of assessment that is the problem but the perception of the purpose of assessment. If assessment is seen as part of the act of learning for intrinsic reasons it stops being a problem. I have shown this to be true in my action research project.

Cecilia, the problem isn't JUST how teachers perceive assessment but how the students perceive assessment. We can think of assessment as just part of learning all we like but if the system itself tells students that assessment is used to judge them, we can't have much impact (the younger the student the more then impact but they figure out the facts of life quickly). For a significant change we need both the system and as actors in the system, the teachers to treat assessment explicitly how we want the kids to see it.

Curiosity has brought us to talk about assessment....so my curiosity is why do we formally assess students? For whose sake ? 

Curiosity needs to be looked after, feed, clothed and given enough sunshine to grow and thrive. Tests, assessments, questioning and evaluation could be curiosity's allies but  they are not. Why ? Maybe because they are given at a certain time, last a certain a time and are handed back after a certain amount of time all forgetting that we are nearly always  intimidated when asked to perform and real assessment takes TIME just like curiosity needs TIME. As a teacher I know my kids and I don't need to test them to know how much they know. I can share my knowledge of their knowledge by writing it down and documenting their work. May we as teachers need to be tested and assessed to see how much we know about them.

excellent input by all friends- nice question-appreciated

Dear Louis,

I just read most of Lockharts' Lament. I agreed with EVERYTHING in the first half, but I disagreed with much of what he had to say in the second half.

I am a staunch believer in the axiomatic development of math: Using  unambiguous definitions of elements and operations, a set of axioms, and the use of logic and previously proven theorems and corollaries  to prove a theorem or a lemma. It is a beautiful, pure process, very challenging and abstract.

This approach lends itself to teaching an historical development of mathematics - for example, the need for inverses and the identity element for each operation, for completeness.

Also, unlike Lockhart, I know that students who do not become mathematicians, will clearly benefit from the critical thinking skills they can learn from an axiomatic approach to mathematics. They will learn: to clearly define their terms; to question assumptions; to construct a logical sequence of arguments; to prove their points by mathematical induction, by reductio ad absurdum, or by construction; and to work backwards from the desired conclusion (which may be hard to prove directly) and see the lemma (the easier to prove intermediate step) that makes the final conclusion much easier to prove. 

Also, in high school geometry, we should not encourage students to draw conclusions, or even hunches, from the diagrams that they draw on paper. These can be misleading.

Instead, there is a value to being able to prove geometric theorems abstractly. They are based solely on logic (and the definitions and explicitly stated axioms); if your proof is not faulty, it is indisputable.

Later, when studying Non-Euclidean Geometry, this lesson is invaluable.

Louis, thanks for the reference. It is useful in many ways.

Dear Antonio,

The rigurous demonstration part of mathematic is very important.  I would have like to be given much more of it.  Most of the demostration I saw were given by book or teacher on the black board. While doing my bachelor in Engineering I spent a summer studying mathematics by myself using an old French math textbook used by people preparing for examination entrance in Ecole Polytechnique.  I totally enjoyed finding demonstration by myself and getting into very rigourous proof and all that. I never encounter anything close to it in all my mathematical courses.  Every students learned the theorem of Pythagore but who actually see a demonstration of it and even more rare, who would be challenge to find a demonstration.  But mathematics is far more than logic.  I thinks that the logic part which I was very good at it, is the less interesting.  The most interesting part is geometry because it is the part that is closely related to our vision and where we can solve problem visually directly, intuitively.  The  intuition is not required anymore but this is the creative and fun part.  I am on the side of Poincare and the intuitionist like him.  This movement to render mathematic all logical is hill conceived because mathematic is based in our nervous system that is visual more than logic.

Dear Louis,

You make a very good point about intuition; I was remiss in not mentioning the all-important role it plays in pure mathematics.

Starting with what is given as axioms and what has been previously proven as theorems or corollaries, it is your intuition that posits a way that might logically link some of these with the statement of the theorem you would like to prove.

Far more often than you would prefer, your intuition is incomplete or wrong. Using mixed metaphors: it usually leads you up blind alleys and leaves you with waste baskets full of discarded attempts at proofs. But, finally, your subconscious reaches an epiphany; and you have your solution, your proof.

What we see in textbooks is only the final product of mathematics (which is closer to what I was describing in my earlier communication).

As the parent of four children (ages 11, 15, 16, and 18), foster parent to 28 children, and having founded and now directed an accredited early learning center for ages birth through kindergarten for a decade, I feel I have an interesting perspective to bring to this question.

Why do children lose their curiosity? Because they begin hearing "no" the moment they start to walk. This negativity only gets worse when they learn to speak. Why do you think one of the first words they learn is, "No!" No, you can't climb on that! No, get down from there! No, sharing is caring. No, we eat food with our mouths, not toys. No, that's not the right answer. No, you can't go to recess until you finish your homework. No...no...no!

Who wouldn't get tired of being shut down every time they try something new?

In early childhood education, our goal is to reflect a positive answer as often as possible. "I see you want to climb! Here, let's go to the climbing wall and I'll watch how high you can climb!!" If a child is playing with something and isn't ready to give it up just because someone else wants to play with it now, why should he? Who said anyone should have to stop what they're doing just because someone else comes along? That's not sharing, that's victim-making. The child should be taught to say, "Sure, I'll share. As soon as I'm finished with it, I'll come find you and give it to you." If a child really wants a bucket and the other child isn't done, the teacher's response should be, "You really want to play with that bucket. Good for you! We'll get a different bucket for you."

Think this response isn't related or too simple to answer the question of "Why children lose their curiosity?" When children learn to answer their own questions, solve their own problems, and are given the freedom to explore their own creativity and not shut down every, single time by a teacher who is ball-chained to having them answer standardized tests, they thrive. Children not only thrive, they gain self-confidence and learn to trust their instincts. They learn to work with other people in ways that respect their own interests as well as other's. They learn that being curious is OK. 

I watched as my four children began as preschool children and LOVED to go to school. They were excited every day! Beginning with kindergarten, I saw that light slowly fade. And, in time, the light went out completely. My oldest son literally hates school. He could not wait to be done his senior year. These thoughts were not "senioritis." He had these thoughts beginning in 5th grade and almost didn't graduate.

My encouragement to teachers: Take your learning outside. Let children explore their own interests. Give them the ability to get to the same answer in a different way than you expect. Trust them and treat them with respect. They will learn what they need if given support, encouragement, time, and respect. They will pass those darn unnecessary tests that really don't tell us anything about how our children are actually doing or how unprepared they actually are to face life.

My encouragement to the school system: Let teachers be creative. They are the ones who see these children every day. They know the children...or...they would if they could actually spend more time engaging with the children rather than buried in test after test after test. All this testing has done nothing but frustrate parents, turn children away and left us with hundreds of thousands of burned-out teachers. Enough.

My encouragement to parents: Fight the school system when it's not working. Don't accept the status quo when it's not working for your child. Don't be afraid to demand an IEP if things aren't working. Your child's first boss won't know anything about an IEP your daughter had in elementary school. Get your child's needs met or home school them. Have you seen the improvements in home schooling? It's worth investigating if your school refuses to work with you or your child's needs.

Look at New Zealand and tell me this doesn't work. 

Excellent answer Cheri!

By the way, what is an "IEP"?

You have great insights and invaluable experience.

My daughter home schooled her two daughters to age 13. It was a challenge for her to find adequate secular teaching materials, but she succeeded. I often told her that her children were receiving a million dollar education.

But once they entered high school, the socializing took precedence over learning. I think a large part of the reason was uninspiring teachers. The older one has now graduated from UCLA and the second one in is in college.

In any case, what they learned as children will guide them throughout their lives to make them best person they can be.

An IEP is an Individualized Education Plan, which I should have specified, sorry. Any parent can request an IEP. Once requested, schools have a limited amount of time to comply. In CA I believe it is 30 or 45 days. An IEP is most often granted to children with special needs; however, it can also be used to ensure foster children receive what they need in school. Foster children tend to be behind other typical-developing children because they are moved from school to school so often and don't have a chance to get caught up. Atypical performance in this case is not due to a disability, but rather due to their need to stay in one place and do the work.

Narrowed curriculum and too much focus on using scripted curriculum where teacher and child are instructed to teach exactly as the script is written and children are told to demonstrate their learning in only the way shown in the curriculum program. If you do this long enough over several years, the curiosity of children will be blocked and in many children begin to disappear.

I agree with you Nora.  It is the perfect curriculum a dead end. Curiosity grows where there is place for it. 

@Cheri Diaz, I agree with you but it is even more than that There are many interactions at school that teach children that school is for compliance, failure and boredom. How to speak in a way that fosters effective relationships is an aspect of my pedagogy that I worked on for a long time however. One of the things I tried to teach staff at a high school where kids have already learned that 'school sux' is how to say 'yes' every time and still meet normal school expectations. Almost all of the teachers at my high school said 'no' many, many, many times a day to students. I tried to help them see that most questions requests, responses can be met with an honest yes followed by an elucidating statement if one is creative.

In our country, intimidation and discouragement have been great obstacles that stifles creativity. Also, the cultural setup in most local communities is not to question but to listen, watch and obey. Curious, mind searching kids are mostly shut up and they end up looking for keys to challenges/questions from their peers. This usually leads to misinformation, disappointment on the part of the child and his/her eventual decline of pursuing curiosity which is the only way to knowing truth. Some of us are intensifying public education to put to cessation, such counter productive cultural practices that stifle development of children- the bearers of the pipes of the future.

Children must be allowed freely without any restrictions to experiment, to search unending, the complexities of life activities so that we will nurture in them the solution searching spirit. Avenues for children to open up and mingle with especially the 'known' groups in the society must be provided. Teachers, parents etc. must give room for the containment of the curiosities of children. They should not label such fact searching adventures as unnecessary gossip but helpful training to groom them to be hollders and solvers of the problems of mankind via research...meaningful inquiry to know the unknown doors so as to conjure the appropriate keys to open them to bring relief and improve the lives of the many on the society.

Thanks

Dickson Adom

@Dickson, Well expressed with passion. Many of the observations that you describe in your country is also common in the USA. 

I am currently thinking of many factors that can interfere with full child development, from ages 0 - 5 years. A factor that is paramount is the attention/neglect that parents/carers direct toward babies 0-2 years of age.

Dear Dr Lucero,

thank you for this great online discussion. It is really wonderful to have opinions from experts all over the world.

Best wishes and kind regards,

Rainer

It is normal when a child grows up he loses his curiosity. At the same time he begins to pay attention to other things.

Best Regards Antonio Lucero

Yes, the child becomes more influenced by society and begins to forget its own true self and its own curiosity about the world. If society placed more value and emphasis on the importance of the worth of each individual's unique point of view and values; then natural, confident curiosity about the world could be prolonged and reinforced. This would benefit society in the long run to foster creativity and innovation.

Changing field of interest can have also a neurodevelopmental meaning.

Children should grow with a stronger and stronger sense of curiosity. We as adults should inspire them and encourage curiosity.

They are too often asked to follow instructions and not find ways that resonate with them. Adults can be seen as uninspiring and society's demands too challenging.

Education systems are by definition systems. They are designed to appeal to a variety of students. However, in doing so they definitely assume conformity to a single standard which again by definition does not allow for localised or personalised learning. Eventually, we have these kinds of students who CONFORM to whatever happens in society or at school. The only exception is as you said nerds which is a very racial word. But again it goes well with the idea of conformity. Very depressing answer!

Yasmine, You hit the nail on the head. What you say is the chief problem with pedagogy, and even research in education. Educators are looking for methods that do well with the middle 80% of kids. But what happens with the other 10% that are having difficulty relating or learning, plus the remaining 10% that fully understand or master the lesson at first exposure? A good education must be individualized and not be ruled by the clock.

Thanks, I am glad you find my disappointing answer good!

And what is so disappointing is that any society progress does really depend on these 10% or 20% of the students that the system kills early on. I think the future of education should primarily focus now on personalization and individuality. If we as educators accept the idea of difference, the reward is going to be immense.

The reason lies most probably in demotivating factors. Schools often kill childre'ns creativity and desire for progress.

Yes, academia kills creativity and curiosity with meticulous efforts but thanks to advancement in information and communication technologies, they will be no longer able to do so; education 3.0 and education 4.0 will be personalized, self directed, technology will play significant role, it is already happening, thank God, no more gurus in education will be there, who destroyed generations after generations of excellent students.

Yes Nazia, you are right. Only, we must remember that one-on-one contact, as needed, with a teacher who can monitor the student's progress and can share their insights and enthusiasm with the student is very important.

Creativity does need human interaction.

People need people ...their positive vibes and enthusiastic catchy energy. Technology enhances, corrects and amazes but let's cautious.

Because creativity tasks to enhancing creative think not found

Paradigm shifts in civilization depend on the people who ask "why?" People whose interests lie in asking other questions like "what" or "how" generally work within the realm of existing paradigms.

Creativity doesn't contribute to the financial model of the schools so they have no interest in fostering it.

Yes, students tend to be put into the same mold where measurable quantity is more important than hard-to-measure quality.

Focus with him on memorizing, memorizing and the vast amount of information.

Nice my dear Nazia Asad .

As a father of three I watched my kids react differently to primary and secondary schools. As a researcher I know that there are different learning preferences, but the whole problem is deeper than that. Although there is some peer pressure in the Netherlands, I've found that my kids are not too susceptible to this.

The most prominent is that when young, kids are allowed to choose their own learning goals and are cheered on by each step (literally). Most parents don't tell their kids 'This week, we will learn riding a bicycle. We will start by explaining what a bicycle is. After passing the multiple choice test on bicycle knowledge, we will do practice sessions. Raise your hand if you have questions.'

As soon as school starts, learning schemes take over. Even in the more kids-centered schools, learning schemes are fairly prominent due to governmental regulations, parental pressure or centralized exams. Let us not forget parental pressure. In the Netherlands almost all parents want their kids to go to the highest form of secondary school, needing a high test score or advise from primary school. So they want their kids to learn reading, writing, foreign languages etc. as soon as possible.

Mind you, as a Engineer in Mathematics I do think some guidance in teaching is necessary, otherwise no-one will understand statistics etc.

When sitting with the teacher of my son, in 4th grade at the time, I was confounded by the fact that the teacher, clearly more interested in arranging his musical instruments that conducting our parent conference in the subject of English, quickly ran through the facts about how they show students comprehension. He showed us a paragraph on the left side of a page and the questions for comprehension on the right.

He said, "We tell them to read the questions they are supposed to answer first so that they can look for the answers in the paragraph."

I asked, "So, you teach them to read the questions first, then read the paragraph? Isn't that basically cheating?"

"How so," he said.

"Because comprehension should be demonstrated by what they've learned and retained from reading, not how well they know to look for answers to pre-written questions."

Annoyed, he said, "This is how we do it."

He then proceeded to tell me about all of my son's missed days at school (six I believe). Since my son had only 1 missed day due to illness in the first three months, I further questioned him about these absences he marked. He said he must have made a mistake.

I have four children. This experience is not isolated. Too many teachers are not paying attention to the needs of the students in their class. Too many teachers are more concerned with "this is how we do it," rather than what the student actually needs, their wants, their creativity, their gifts.

When teachers (and I am a teacher so I am speaking for myself as well) can finally stop saying, "No, that's not how you answer that question" and instead say, "Well, that's a creative way to answer that question. Tell me how you came to that answer" we will finally begin to allow children and students to think freely, feel genuinely, be creative, and know that it is acceptable to reach for the stars in a way that is different than, "the way we do things."

Dear Cheri,

I totally agree with what you just said! This is very important.

I am planning on starting a new discussion thread on celebrating the uniqueness of each one of us. Here is a copy of my first ruminations:

A paper illustrating the wide variety of ways of conceptualizing mathematics awakened me from my life-long, egocentric projection that my personal concepts regarding pure mathematics (proving theorems) were not universal!

My way was to apply logic to the axioms and previously proven statements in order to arrive at a proof of a declaration. Others, I have since learned, may be guided by geometric forms. Still others may be guided by methods of induction. And so forth. The result being that one given explanation may be crystal clear to some mathematicians, while being totally nonintuitive to others.

This is leading me to consider that, generally, each human being’s neural networks are the product of their experiences up to that point in time. Since each person’s experiences are unique, even if they have been exposed to common regimens; they react and internalize their experiences in ways that are meaningful to their past.

Consider, for example, the familiar scene of two people studying a particular painting in an art gallery. The “meaning” of the painting to each person will usually be quite distinct. Each person apparently relating the painting to a personal framework from which to interpret the painting. The very interesting thing about this phenomenon is that there is no correct interpretation. In fact, the artist is often curious to hear the various interpretations of his/her artwork, for example saying, “Umm, that’s very interesting. I never thought of it that way!”

One takeaway of this thinking is that teachers should not project only their personal way of looking at a topic; they should try to draw out their student’s personal view too. And consider that their view may be just as valid as the teacher’s.

Antonio Lucero Your comparison example is a lovely way to demonstrate that we are all different. I work in early childhood education where our differences are CELEBRATED. We become sad and frustrated when we see our children after a few years in elementary school striped of their curiosity, uniqueness, creativity, and even GRIT! We teach these concepts in early childhood and these character traits must be perpetuated throughout elementary. The best thing we can teach our children is to be who they are, not conform to what someone else wants them to be.

Following.

Luckily many do not!

But those I have observed and interviewed often talk about a mismatch between their interests/competence and what is on offer at school. We've researched and written about this in Educating Ruby:

Book Educating Ruby: what our children really need to learn

Dear Antonio,

this is the crucial question of the education.

From my point of view, one of the possible answers is the Deci & Ryan´s theory of self-determination: http://selfdeterminationtheory.org/SDT/documents/1991_DeciVallerandPelletierRyan_EP.pdf

"The theory focuses primarily on three such innate needs: the needs for competence, relatedness, and autonomy (or self-determination). Competence involves understanding how to attain various external and internal outcomes and being efficacious in performing the requisite actions; relatedness involves developing secure and satisfying connections with others in one's social milieu; and aut.onomy refers to being self-initiating and self-regulating of one's own actions" (p. 327).

The personalized learning concepts are the concrete application of this general approach to empower the child´s internal energy to learn.

See more, for example, heree: http://www.ascd.org/Publications/Books/Overview/Teaching-Students-to-Become-Self-Determined-Learners.aspx

@ Martin: It sounds interesting. I will read it soon.

Thank you.

A supplementary viewpoint on the ills of modern education see: https://aeon.co/essays/its-time-we-revived-rousseaus-radical-spirit-in-schooling?utm_source=Aeon+Newsletter&utm_campaign=12593de87d-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2020_06_18_01_59&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_411a82e59d-12593de87d-70670633

Re: My comment above: I understand that in his time Rousseau, the idea of female education was deprecated. If one ignores that historical-cultural failing, then what he has to say is worth considering.

George Stoica

Both of these men ended up working at what would be considered mundane jobs. However, each man brought added value to his job - far beyond what their co-workers would typically provide.

However, neither of them was very happy with their jobs because their bosses or the company were incapable of fully appreciating the value of their work and did not give them enough latitude to innovative as much as they could have.

This is a very interesting question. It is quite unusual that a small number of RG members took part in the discussion on this topic. I do not remember reading any psychological research on this topic.

So true. Look at the case of the Romanian orphans. Irrefutable.

Dear Dr. Antonio Lucero ,

I believe that the main reason why a child loses his curiosity at the time he finishes elementary school is the teacher’s teaching style, the prevailing pattern of education in schools, when a student is restricted to an intensive curriculum, a traditional teaching method, and a poor learning environment, this will kill the student’s curiosity

Martin Brestovansky, Thank you very much for your cited references. The ideas that they espouse are crucially important. Upon rapid perusal, it appears to me that self-determination on the part of the student is the key. To achieve this requires many things including: a school atmosphere that encourages self-confidence; opportunities to exercise some autonomy; and support by teachers and administration to guide and encourage the student.

The authors not only comprehensively explain the ideas, they also offer pedagogical methods by which to promote the realization of the desired goals.

Now with the coronavirus forcing changes in education, there are opportunities, hitherto excluded, to make substantial changes to public education.

Let's hope some of these student-centered changes are made and sustained into the future. With such changes, we may no longer be dismayed by the general loss of curiosity by the time children leave elementary school.

Dear Antonio Lucero ,

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2020/jan/28/schools-killing-curiosity-learn

Thank you Abdelkader. This is an excellent source.

Because they learn that answers are always available when they ask. It is only during higher education that we learn about "things" we don't know.

Lou

Dear Lou, Young children often ask "why." Then when they're given an answer, they often ask "but, why is that'? And too often adults (who don't know the answer to the second question) will often answer, "because that's the way it is". If the adult, including a teacher, doesn't know the answer they should: a) admit they don't know; b) say it is an interesting question and that they will try to find out; or c) say maybe nobody knows. These more open answers will encourage the child to view the world as a complex, open system and that their questions are taken seriously.

to add, here´s one canonical text for this issue: Cordova, D. I., & Lepper, M. R. (1996). Intrinsic motivation and the process of learning: Beneficial effects of contextualization, personalization, and choice. Journal of Educational Psychology, 88(4), 715–730. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.88.4.715