Recent cross-university research between the University of Madeira in Portugal, Pontificia Universidad Javeriana and University of Los Andes in Columbia, Carnegie Mellon University in the United States, and Innopolis University in the Russian Federation studied how millennial students learn and what learning methods are best used to successfully engage and teach this generation.
The outcome of this study concluded that millennials learn better when technology is used rather than trying to memorize information through traditional learning methods like listening to lectures or reading textbooks.
Millennials show a preference toward learning methods that employ technology.
This technology needs to be engaging and be capable of motivating students by using modeling examples and what the researchers referred to as proof assistants.
Why?
Because as the study found, millennials love to learn by failure.
While this research centered on millennial students who were being taught Java programming, its outcomes can easily be applied to how NextGen ATC learners can learn better through applied technology.
How Does Learning through Failure Work?
Learning through failure is different from how students have been traditionally educated.
In the past, students have been told an answer is incorrect and then left to discover what the correct answer is on their own.
In some instances, students may have been told what the correct answer is without examples to back up why that answer correct.
Those methods are often frustrating for today’s learners who want to know why their answers are incorrect and see examples that show them why.
This is where the concept of proof assistants applies.
The concept of immediate feedback goes hand-in-hand with learning through failure. Millennials often seek immediate feedback with assessment results or other activities they engage in. They want to know immediately whether and answer is correct or incorrect.
Proof assistants or “provers” assist students in creating such examples that assist them with learning because they can then use those counter-examples to construct deductive proofs to understand the error they made.
Provers break down the problem at hand. Armed with that knowledge of where they went wrong, students can then learn from the error and understand why the counter-example is correct instead of blindly accepting the correction and not learning why it is correct.
Learning through Failure with SkyRadar Technology
For Air Traffic Control, the stakes are higher with a lower tolerance for mistakes. Therefore, today’s NextGen ATC students need to be continually exposed to scenarios where they learn by doing, but also need immediate feedback that shows them why an answer or action in response to a scenario is correct or incorrect. To do this, ATC facilities need to have the technology that not only attracts and engages learners but is also geared toward immediate feedback and providing proof assistants (which are traditionally called trainers, coaches or supervisors).
That technology also needs to have the ability to be customized for specific conditions and environments. This is where training equipment from SkyRadar, such as
are of value to ATC learning centers and their students.
References and Further Reading
- More articles on Millennials and NextGen Training (2018 - today)
- Engaging Millennials into Learning Formal Methods (2018), by Nestor Catano
