**Learning Through Life - A Concept of Educational & Entrepreneurial Excellence by Prof. em. Dr. Jürgen Zimmer** ## 7\.1 Centers of Excellence The Centers of Excellence (see 8) are the decisive and unique answer to three problem areas in education: first, the rigidity of a subject-oriented curriculum with its lack of interdisciplinary connections and its insufficiently problem-related approach to the acquisition of knowledge; second, the weak connection between theory and practice found in many schools and universities; third, the resulting inability to transfer what has been learned to a changing and diverse reality. Topographically, the Open Learning Village is clustered around the school and the Centers, which in fact are thematically oriented resource centers with special libraries, media, workshops, laboratories, work rooms, exhibition display cabinets - all material equipment which can serve a productive, entrepreneurial kind of learning and resulting practical activities. Increasingly high demands will be made on the thoughtful powers of contemplation, creativity, incentive spirit, the ability to puzzle things out and experiment, as well as the overall perseverance of the students. The individual Centers are each dedicated to a specific curriculum, in which the necessary basic knowledge and methodical procedures are acquired; the "electives" are based on this "compulsory" foundation of the school. Entrepreneurially skilled and pedagogically experienced adults will be available to assist and support the students in each Center. The teachers will disseminate their special knowledge in interdisciplinary contexts. One of the most important, impulse- giving roles will be played by the presence of national and international personalities - masters of their field and guests, who will work with particularly gifted and highly motivated students in various workshops: such workshops can be considered as forges both for high quality and new ideas. It is not a matter of course, but rather an honor, for a student to work in a Center of Excellence. Age will play only a secondary role - mixed age groups will certainly participate together on certain projects. Of primary importance is talent, knowledge, commitment, and the ability to accept a challenge and preserve it. This is education of the best, without regard to nationality, skin color, or social background. ## 7\.2 Curriculum development The international discussion about school curriculum and its further development refers to, among other things, the following shortcomings and weaknesses: - The curriculum is geared too one-sidedly to academic subjects and the scientific disciplines underlying them, risking a loss of connection with reality. - The style of repetitive study and learning material by heart is not suited to promoting the transfer of knowledge or encouraging the skill of applying what has been learned to complex real situations. One studies for the next exam, not in order to act competently in a real-life situation. - A networked, interdisciplinary mode of thought is hampered by the fixation on subjects with their own inherent logic. The segmentation of learning material into small units hinders the ability of recognizing interconnections and relationships. The sheer amount of subject matter makes concentration on fundamentals even harder. - The development of the school curriculum takes too little account of social developments and requirements; time is not taken to make well-researched situation analyses, and too few studies examine the kinds of situations in which graduates must later be qualified to work. No one will deny that the history of the curriculum which has culminated in its present, internationally widespread structure contains a great deal which makes sense, and that a goodly amount of expertise has been gathered on the subject. Nevertheless the question remains how one can preserve some important advantages of current subject structure and yet considerably reduce the serious problems touched upon here. In view of the solution of such questions, we should consider the internationally much discussed alternative draft proposal of Shaul B. Robinsohn on the structural concept of the curriculum and the resulting situational approach. The concept is based on a three-step program: 1. Identification and analysis of situations and situation areas in which school graduates can act in the future. 2. Determination of qualifications which enable persons to act in an autonomous, competent, socially and ecologically responsible manner in such situations. 3. Development of curriculum elements which promote such qualifications. ## 7\.3 The Life-Situational Approach The Life-Situational Approach extends this concept by three important components: - Learning is oriented towards real-life situations. "Learning through life" means that learning processes should be encouraged in such real-life situations as much as possible. In this case, learning takes place not so much within parameters of a didactically arranged pretense of security (where problem presentation, solution route, and solution itself are already known beforehand), but rather in the openness of complex reality. It is an experience-oriented, inquisitive, experimenting, discovering type of learning in which theory and practice, reflection and action are all intimately interconnected with each other. - Children have a right to learn material in context, to relate social with factual learning, and not be helplessly subjected to merely reduced and tailored forms of knowledge, but rather be encouraged to understand and explain the social contexts of meaningful activity. Paraphrasing an idea from the philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Freiherr von Leibniz (17th century), this aims at dismantling the classical separation between the Humaniora and the Realia - between philosophical and scientific areas of knowledge - in order to increase a more holistic understanding of natural contexts. - Children have a right to take part in designing situations in which they learn and act. They want to be challenged in their strengths, and not spoon-fed with pedagogical tranquilizers of occupational therapy. They have a right to be children and regarded as such (but not subjected to infantile treatment). Those who desire to help children on their way should do so with awareness of their individual development and chances of growth. - To be empowered in real-life situations does not only mean possessing the necessary survival techniques, but also includes enhancing personal strength and the ability to entertain radical or different thoughts; it can also even mean the unhindered development of a craze or passion, the encouragement of wild play, or deep involvement in the arts, or expressions of feelings and bodily senses, movement and consciousness. - Norms will not be mechanically deduced and taught, but dealt with in concrete situations and made more transparent. The context of normative behavior is to be explained over and over again, to counteract the split between ‘moral’ and ‘technically instrumental competence’. - Educators and teachers do not behave as if giving orders from the command post, but rather as partners and impulse-givers: asking, curious, sensitive, also learning. An open, situation-dependent planning replaces the usual rigid ritual. - As with their children, the parents also take on a more central role in what is happening. To the extent that they can be present and want to be involved, they act as participants and active experts. Parents can offer a great variety of competent skills in key situations. They help build bridges to the community. - The Life-Situational Approach reacts sensitively to minorities, opposes segregation, favors the integration of handicapped persons, invites interaction with other strangers, and values cultural variety in one world. - The Life-Situational Approach is always a form of community education, aims to open up pedagogical institutions and remove walls that block our view. It counteracts the exclusion of childhood and youth from real-life activity, interprets learning as an integral part of community development, depends on the cooperation of professional pedagogues and competent members of the entire community, and taps learning venues within the community. With the Life-Situational Approach and the structural concept of the curriculum, a decisive step is attempted to make reality (to the extent it contains facts relevant to the issue) the immediate reference point for the development of educational processes and subject matter. This approach draws on sources of knowledge - academic as well as experience-based - and focuses them on real-life situations with their concomitant problem areas. The curriculum is hence organized according to key topics, problems, and situations and not according to subjects or departments. It does not follow the structure of any academic discipline, but rather instrumentalizes relevant methods and subject matters in order to explain and manage the situation. The life-situation approach corresponds here with forms of learning which are, for instance, common in modern enterprises for obvious reasons. The Development Forum of the United Nations has published a report on the life- situation approach with the title "For Third World countries, Life-Situational Approach makes more sense" (Vol. XVI, No.6). The paper reports on kindergartens and schools in European, Asian and Latin American countries which work with this approach. In this report we find: "Probably the greatest difference between academic schools and community schools (kindergarten or productive) is that the first is an institution and the second a dynamic process. The gathering together of concerned groups, learning about experience, finding resources and sometimes a little seed money, the participation of parents, students and community at all stages, identifying life-situations and turning them into curriculum-elements, dealing with the situations, recording and evaluating the work undertaken, planning further projects for production and development, the growing solidarity of the community as people find they can act effectively together - all these are part of the community learning process. One cannot overestimate the importance of this work. These kindergartens and schools have shown that education can encourage creativity, self-reliance and constructive community action - that through an imaginative and practical combination of life-situations and fact-based learning the three R's can be taught without drilling, stress or overtaxing the students. This is only the beginning. What these groups have done should inspire changes in static, irrelevant and beleaguered systems of formal academic schooling, wherever they are." How does the School for Life plan to deal productively with the tension between organizing one curriculum according to subjects and another by key topics? How should the transfer of knowledge gained be best promoted, and the relationship between theory and practice made dynamically effective? The main venues of these transfers will be the Centers of Excellence, where information is gathered from the store of subject knowledge and put into an interdisciplinary, comprehensive context. The subject material itself is not invalidated - only its elements put together in a more effective manner, with reference to questions which can be solved in real life. One can picture the relationship between subject or topic versus problem-oriented curricula like this: information or bits of knowledge are taken from the store of subject material and transferred to a curriculum that is designed in an applicable manner according to the theme of the respective Center of Excellence. The Centers will not be limited to stocking knowledge of the purely academic sort, but must also be able to have access to experience-based wisdom of the people, for instance the Thai cultural tradition. The topical or situation/problem oriented curricula of the Centers of Excellence consequently are fed with information from appropriate parts of the subject-oriented curriculum. The actual realization of this important transfer belongs to the prerequisites of professionally implementing real projects. ## [Concept](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/196/concept) Chapters - **[1. Little History School for Life Chiang Mai](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/210/1-little-history-school-for-life-chiang-mai)** - **[2. At First Sight](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/209/2-at-first-sight)** - **[3. Characteristics](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/208/3-characteristics)** - **[4. The Family Concept](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/207/4-the-family-concept)** - **[5. Kindergarten](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/206/5-kindergarten)** - **[6. Schooling and Deschooling](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/205/6-schooling-and-deschooling)** - **[7. Learning Through Life](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/204/7-learning-through-life)** - **[8. The Seven Centers of Excellence](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/203/8-the-seven-centers-of-excellence)** - **[9. Think Tank and Master Workshops](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/202/9-think-tank-and-master-workshops)** - **[10. The Setting](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/201/10-the-setting)** - **[11. Teachers](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/200/11-teachers)** - **[12. Guests](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/199/12-guests)** - **[13. Partners](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/198/13-partners)** - **[14. Transfer of innovation](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/197/14-transfer-of-innovation)** - **[15 ](https://phuketer.com/s/00000600/wiki/196/concept#15.-attachments)[Source PDF (external site)](https://school-for-life.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/SfL-Konzept-2003-2016_fin-1.pdf)** School for Life, 185/3 Moo 4, T. Pameing, Doi Saket District, 50220 Chiang Mai, Thailand Tel. +66 53 248194