It appears to me that knowing and understanding are entirely different kinds of mental happenings. Knowledge is what is measured when we take an exam or a test. We take such exams constantly throughout our schooling. How well we do on these exams determines, many feel, our potential for job success in life.
Our schools generally do not give essay exams. I think writing is the only metric for determining a person’s understanding. Personally I find that essay writing is a very important component of understanding. Our schools and colleges place little emphasis on understanding, probably because it is too time consuming and too difficult to teach and to quantify for grading purposes.
I think that ‘paint-by-number’ and canvas painting might be a useful analogy for comparing knowing and understanding.
One can buy a paint-by-number kit that will contain bottles of different colored paints, some brushes, and a board upon which an image is displayed in outline. Each section of the image is numbered just as the bottles of paint so that the painter dabs on the numbered section of the image the appropriate color of paint.
Comparing paint-by-number work with a canvas painting I think will give an idea of the difference between knowing and understanding. The paint-by-number product is somewhat mechanical while the canvas painting is much more of a work of art in that it is a creative act.
I think that learning how to learn and how to understand is something that comes with the experience of trying to learn. I think that our standard schooling does a marvelous job preparing us to become good producers and voracious consumers. It teaches us what to know and what questions to expect on the next exam. To learn how to learn and how to understand is up to each of us to accomplish after our schooling is finished.
My learning circle goes like this: Reading skills are dependent upon thinking skills, thinking skills are dependent upon writing skills, and writing skills are dependent upon reading skills. We are introduced to all of these skills by our schooling system but the mature development and application of these skills wait our adult years.
I read that Van Gogh commented that a painter must first learn his craft before he can paint well. I think we must learn the craft of learning before we can understand well.
if you can find a copy of Instructional Science check out Francois Victor Tochon’s 1999 article about semiotic foundations for building the new didactics… I haven’t found a copy online but in should be in your local college library…
Of course knowing and understanding are very different.
I’m thinking of a situation in a primary school where multiplication tables are being recited. You ask little Jonny and little Meghan what 5 times 6 is and they both leap out in unison and say ‘30’. Now they’ve got the answer right, they ‘know’ the answer, but do they understand it? Do they simply know that when the teacher makes the noises ‘5 times 6’ and the pitch of their voice goes up to indiciate the asking of a question that the response that gets you the most credit is ‘30’. Have they actually done the multiplication, or are they simply trying to play the language game as efficiently as possible? In a lot of cases I imagine (though don’t know) that is is the latter…
Or extend that to understanding what math is! I mean I took many many courses in math, I am an engineer retired, and it is only in the last decade that I think I understand the answer to that question.
Yes, my biggest complaint against these schools is that you go to get a degree more than you go to get the education, itself. All of the public highschools thesze days are obsessesed with gearing highschoolers into their coming careers. A Freshman in highschool these days must feel as though he needs to have it all figured out in the first year.
You pointed out what I feel is a critical distinction between knowing and understanding. My math instructers teach me method or rules of how to solve certain types of math problems, but they rarely actually show me how it actually works.
I feel that humanity is slowing losing its ability to learn. We retain knowledge best when we understand what it is that we are learning.
Is there a difference between knowledge and wisdom? I believe there is. Knowledge is factual information that even toddler could know. Wisdom is the ability to not only have an true understanding of what we know, but also the ability to make practical use of our knowledge.
