Lifelong Learning

03 January 2019

Introduction

The 4^th Industrial Age has arrived. Driven by Artificial Intelligence and bio-technology,

the changes in the next 15 years will be more than what we have experienced in the

past one thousand years. Such is the awesome rate of change and acceleration

affecting our life and work. In order to be a lifelong learner, we must learn how to

manage change and accept that change is the normal. It is this ability that has enabled

the human species to evolve to where we are today. Human beings will stop evolving

the day they cannot adapt to change. .

The contours of this revolution are clearly visible, and we must brace

ourselves to adapt to change before it is too late.

Artificial intelligence and automation will dominate every aspect of our life,

our work, our bio-chemicals, our genes, our attitudes and even our belief.

About 40 percent of today’s jobs are likely to disappear by 2030. Another

40 percent will undergo plastic surgery to receive a completely new look,

with changes in roles, responsibilities and expectations. For example, we

are already witnessing the diminishing role of mechanical engineers as the

evergreen branch of engineering. Software engineers are predominantly

building drones, robots, electric and driverless cars. And with the

introduction of robot-teachers in classrooms, human teachers will be

required to re-role themselves as learning companions.

Jobs, knowledge and technology obsolescence is tomorrow’s changing

landscape, placing heavy demands on individuals to reskill themselves

continuously. Those who cannot unlearn and relearn will be illiterates -

illiterates who have no political and economic value, and are, therefore,

unemployable.

Most significantly, formal and structured education is depreciating in

importance. First, the need for continuous reskilling because of

obsolescence; and second, the rising importance of application of

knowledge - Knowledge To Do and not Knowledge About. Learning is

doing, and doing is creating. People are no longer interested in your

achievements. They want to know what you have done with those

qualifications and experiences.

Clearly, the 4^th Revolution has three implications for lifelong learning:



First, lifelong learning and re-skilling will be the mother-of-all

competencies, for one to survive and be happy. Those who lack this

competency will not be employable. And even those who inherit family

fortunes and businesses, will face hard times.



Second, schools presently prepare students to pass examination and

not prepare them for life. In order to do so, how to learn should become

the #1 pedagogy in schools; thus placing heavy demands on shifting

from the present training culture to a learning culture. As lifelong

learners, students are expected to be their own teachers, and teachers

must become their own students.



Third, the 4^th Revolution presents great opportunities - to access our

hearts and minds - to know ourselves - to become self-aware - to be

happy. In a spiritual sense, lifelong learning is learning about oneself,

about self-actualization.

Doctrine of Learnability

To be learnable is to possess an insatiable desire to learn, acquire new

competencies and skills and to innovate. In a philosophical sense, the zest for learning

arises only when there is a deep-seated longing to understand the mysteries of life.

“Man in a mystery, and if you spend your entire life trying to puzzle it out, then

do not say you have wasted your time. I occupy myself with this mystery

because I want to be a man.”

Fyodor Dostoevsky

One cannot be a lifelong learner if one is not learnable. The key to learning is

the ability to learn, unlearn and relearn. Way back in 1970, the futurist Alvin Toffler

wrote in Future Shock:

“The illiterate of the twenty-first century will not be those who cannot read and

write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn.”

If this principle or yardstick applied in real earnest, most people would be

illiterate even today. Learnability involves knowing how to learn in the first place.

Without this competency, personalization of learning and self-directed learning cannot

ever happen. Moreover, learning is about doing, about application, and about

possessing competencies to apply knowledge.

The most challenging attribute of learnability is acquiring competencies for

creative solutions to ideas and problems. We may call them as part of capacity-

building for learnability and will include:

Empathy

Technology-mindedness

The practice of deep reading

Reflection and introspection

Being concept and goal-minded

An honest competency-gap analysis will help one to identify specific

competencies one is short of. Thereafter, developing them will be a long haul.

The next attribute of learnability is to be able to learn on the fly, on the job. In

order to do so, the learner must acquire the habit of reflection-in-action, i.e., processing

information while the event is happening, and drawing upon new insights. Such

capabilities enable one in:



Decision-making, by being sensitive to the environment, and being able

to intuitively recognize patterns and define the problem solving it

thereafter is relatively easy.



Making mid-stream corrections by learning from failures while they are

happening, and seizing new opportunities.

On-the-job learning is the most practical form of learning provided it is done

correctly. The concept and application of 70:20:10 learning model is realistic and

exemplary, and is shown schematically.

I wish to show my learnability model as an example because it exemplifies the

application of the combined capabilities of head, heart and mind. True learning is

endurable as it is driven by intrinsic motivation to unlock one’s potential.

Learning must be inspired and the inspiration arises from will to meaning -

meaning to life and work. It is meaning that motivates a person to unlock one’s

potential and become self-aware in the process. Meaning, followed by deep reading

and technology-mindedness (not being technology-savvy), provide & the foundation

for learnability.

Having developed one’s capacity for lifelong learning; and formed an

unshakable foundation; I am ready to learn. A checklist of this process is shown below:

A Learning Culture

In a VUCA world, no one can ever imagine when personal disaster can strike.

Bereft of entrepreneurial competencies, there is every danger that one will not have

political or economic value; and, therefore, be unemployable. It is, therefore,

imperative we invest time, money and resources in acquiring competencies in order

to re-skill ourselves continuously.

Of the several implications of lifelong learning for leaders, four features stand

out:

 One: Learning is experiential - we learn from crucibles, deep reading

and while on-the-job.

 Two: Learning is by doing, by application of ideas and concepts.

Mindfulness, learning from failures and goal-setting are essential tools.

 Three: Application must eventually lead to innovation, and more often

than not through experimentation.

 Four: Acquiring a New Lingua Franca by teachers. This will comprise:

Basic coding and AI programming

Designing content for AI teaching

Design-thinking

Deep reading

With proficiency in these four features, we (individuals and organizations) are

ready to shift from a Training to a learning culture. The difference are stack.

For those accustomed to a training culture, shifting to a learning culture is not

easy. It is easy if the culture is introduced at the school level. The key strategies @

school will be:

1. Motivation to learn which arises from will to meaning. This is the most difficult

part, but can be the easiest also. Unless students are intrinsically motivated to

take on the responsibility of their learning, to become their own teachers, the

learning culture is not possible.

2. The motivation may be there; but students should know the process of how to

learn through self-directed learning. How to learn is fast becoming the #1

pedagogical strategy.

3. The most effective form of learning and achieving mastery is by doing, by

application of concepts to creative solutions and innovation. We are still

content-driven. Unless teachers teach competencies - education of the head,

heart and mind - learning by doing will remain a distant mirage.

4. Teachers and students should focus on extracting concepts, and understand

the relevance of why they are learning what they are learning. A special effort

in this direction is required, because text books in school teach children how to

pass examination; and not concepts. In my view, concept understanding is best

understood by deep reading, followed up by reflection.

5. Harnessing the power of collaborative learning, through either design-thinking

process, or project-based learning, helps students in understanding and

simplifying complex and inter-disciplinary problems, and come up with creative

solutions.