So, please notice with these six in mind that back in the day we were calling Content-Based ‘Traditional OBE’; Competence-Based ‘Transitional OBE’; and CONTEXT-Based ‘Transformational OBE’. Why? Because that’s only as far as our work had progressed up to that time! Although our OBE work eventually evolved and progressed well beyond these original three paradigms, the lower three on this continuum weren’t even on our radar screen yet, revealing a serious example of premature closure!
Taking a Deeper Look at Higher Education
But with two years of major OBE work separating that 2015 paper and today, and with most of that work focusing on higher education in both Saudi Arabia and the Philippines, I have had an even deeper awakening about the multiple faces/applications of OBE, especially as they relates to the three ‘T’ words. So here are the changes I am suggesting about the framework in that 2015 paper. First, most higher educators are focused on training career specialists, especially in today’s growing number of technically-related fields, and those fields have well- established specialized curricula. The specialists in these fields are, therefore, expected to be highly skilled at three things: knowing, thinking, and doing. And while OBE has placed great emphasis on the ‘doing’ component of learning, the knowing and thinking components should and cannot be ignored. The key is identifying how they can be ‘authentically demonstrated’. With that said, I see a considerable distinction between the Content Knowledge aspects of a curriculum and the Concept Analysis abilities that enable one to work adroitly with that content. Consequently, I believe that a paradigm called CONCEPT Based / Analytical Thinking should be recognized, added to the 2015 framework, and placed just below CONTENT Based on the continuum. Second, since both of these paradigms are shaped by external standards of expertise and/or professionally-defined criteria that determine the curriculum to be mastered, and since people in authority are determining what students should learn and demonstrate, both fall at the System Control end of the continuum. Therefore, in taking all of the above into account, I regard both the CONTENT Based and the CONCEPT Based paradigms as TRADITIONAL implementations of OBE. Third, I believe that the distinctions made in the 2015 paper about COMPETENCE Based and CONTEXT Based still hold. Both are about ‘doing’, both require skill, and both emphasize performance, not just mental capability. However, I view the skill-building aspect of the COMPETENCE Based paradigm as having more heavily guided and managed features than does its CONTEXT Based partner – the latter requiring more learner input, sensitivity, discretion and adaptability. They each represent departures from traditional academic learning and, therefore, fit in the middle sector of my new continuum – in what I consider to be its TRANSITIONAL zone, but on different sides of its center point.
The Three Paradigmatic Dimensions of OBE
Transformational OBE’s Major Premises My confidence in this assertion was bolstered a decade ago in a two-year series of working sessions with a distinguished, widely-published group of learning psychologists. The task we set for ourselves was to consolidate the most cutting-edge theory and research about learning into an ‘enlightened’ declaration of how American/modern education should proceed into the 21st Century. Since I regard their research findings as the foundation on which Empowering, Transformational OBE rests, I present here, as TOBE’s Major Premises, their view of human nature and humans’ innate desire and capacity to learn. HUMANS are born curious and naturally explore life and their world, HUMANS vary greatly in their rates and ways of learning, HUMANS are born social, and their learning is naturally influenced by others, HUMANS can learn, create, and change throughout their lives, HUMANS naturally use all their senses to learn, HUMANS can take charge of their thoughts and emotions, HUMANS naturally appreciate and seek to create quality and beauty, HUMANS can naturally access and utilize their innate inner wisdom. HUMANS can transcend their perceived limitations, and HUMANS’ capacities for intuition, insight, imagination, and creativity are inherent, powerful, and unlimited. Since I regard these ten bold statements as the knowledge base underlying TOBE, I’ve sought to describe how they translate into actionable learning priorities that are consistent with the two Transformational Paradigms identified above: CREATION Based and CURIOSITY Based. A very satisfying answer came a few years later when I asked a large international group of progressive educational reformers to comment on the learning system priorities the original group had developed in 2008. I’ve incorporated their helpful suggestions into the following set of statements. Transformational OBE’s Learning System Priorities From this integrated perspective, then, EMpowering TOBE learning systems: Honor the diverse backgrounds and intrinsic talents, interests, motivations, and deep inner essence of each individual learner, View human learning as innate, multi-sensory, and holistic, Encourage novel, creative thought, problem framing, and problem solving, Optimize the conditions and organizational supports that foster learning success for every learner, Integrate the holistic, seamless nature of life experience, knowledge, and identity, Respect the brain’s natural propensity for meaning, harmony, and organization, Probe deeply into the innate potential of the mind-body system and the social and cultural influences that stress and undermine it, Explore significant avenues of human potential and life experience over looked in conventional academic curricula, Engage deeply with nature, the ecosystem of the planet, and one’s role within it, Utilize the benefits of collaborative exploration, activity, and work in real-life Contexts, Develop higher-order thought processes and complex life-performance abilities in all learners, and Address deeply significant ethical and moral issues directly and offer feasible ways to address them. Clearly, these twelve statements reflect the vision of a learning system that transcends established academic norms. That’s why implementing them will provide an enormous challenge to any conventional educational system, no matter how progressive its leadership and faculty. As I’ve considered this formidable task, my mind has been bombarded with ‘O’ and ‘E’ words that are vital to supporting such an effort. Those words, I realized, were the key elements in any organizational culture that was committed to, and engaged in, transformation.
Transformational OBE’s EMpowering Culture of OBEs
Eventually, I created a framework from these ‘O’ and ‘E’ words that would at least partially capture the qualities, attributes, values, and processes that support the kind of paradigms and learning systems I’ve been describing. This framework of words can be displayed in a number of ways, so I’m asking you to do some imagining with me.
First, I came up with a series of six ‘O’ words that have been central to the continuing evolution of OBE over the decades.
Openness Opportunity Optimism Options Originality Ownership
I then assembled a list of six ‘E’ words that met these same criteria: Empowerment Encouragement Enlightenment Exploration Expression Evolution
When I tried to match them up by putting the word ‘Based’ in the middle, I found that each O word made sense and could compatibly match up with more than one E word. Consequently, my list of matching OBEs got longer and longer as I reflected on the factors that had led to the frameworks I’ve been describing over the decades. So I stopped looking for ‘perfect’ matches and surrendered to the possibility that under various conditions, each O word on my list of six might actually match up with each E word, giving me a world record of thirty six OBEs, none of which included the words ‘Outcome Based Education’.
The Transformational OBE Wheel
This resulting plethora of OBEs is illustrated in the diagram on the following page that I call “The Transformational OBE Wheel.” All you have to do is follow the instructions that are provided there about rotating the outer E rim of the wheel and you’ll end up with the thirty six OBEs I’ve just mentioned. Your assignment, then – should you choose to accept it – is to keep cranking the Wheel and look at each new set of six potential OBE matches. Note down on a ‘master list’ the ones that ‘make sense and match up’ compatibly for you. Once you have matched up all six O words with each E word, add up the number of compatible matches on your master list, place the number in the blank space below, and repeat after me:
Without establishing and sustaining these supporting conditions and processes, it is highly doubtful that Transformational OBE will ever gain attraction in the educational systems of modern societies.
So as not to be dismayed by this statement, your goal and mine should be to establish and sustain these conditions wherever we can locally, regionally, and nationally. That will give us plenty to work on and work with as we traverse the OBE teeter-totter from TRADITIONAL to TRANSITIONAL to TRANSFORMATIONAL, one paradigm shift at a time.
For me, it’s a mission that’s worth undertaking, just like the subtitle of my original 2015 paper indicated:
TOBE is about “Learner Empowerment, Paradigm Shifts, Life-Performance Learning, and Fundamental System Change.”
So I invite you to join me in that mission. Where else can you engage in such challenging, inspiring, and valuable service to humanity?
The Transformational OBE Wheel
