Today Indonesian schools have a golden opportunity to undergo a more than cosmetic revamp. The demand for good schools in Indonesia has perhaps never been higher. Furthermore, the demands of the new workplace has also changed and parents and employers want schools to produce people who will display the characteristics of the workforce of the future. In my last posting I have argued that it is important that schools in Indonesia should adopt a model where thinking and deep understanding takes center stage in the school curriculum. I have also suggested that the Smart School model adopted by David Perkins be given a serious look and that Indonesia should not settle for school curricula that is very high stakes examination-oriented.

In that first posting, I have explained a key principle of Perkins’ Smart School concept, which was generative knowledge. A school that places emphasis on generative knowledge would have to look beyond the teaching of meaningless rote learning of facts and routines. It would mean that a serious look be given to what ought to be taught. Here lies the challenge for the teachers. Would the teachers be willing to design their own syllabus as to what is to be taught, how it is to be taught, what is to be assessed and how it is to be assessed? It would require work on curriculum mapping instead of just adopting what an international examinations syndicate gives you. The curriculum would have to be mapped out to ascertain what would be taught. Schools thinking of going in this direction should seriously look at whether their teachers are prepared to put in the time for such work. They also need to see if the teachers need to undergo further training or professional development. It also implies the schools would have to have more intelligent teachers.

Another key principle of the Smart School is learnable intelligence. The Smart School stands on the belief that students can and do learn ways of thinking that can boost their performance. This view stems from the research done by Perkins and his colleagues in Harvard’s Project Zero. This contrasts with the traditional view about intelligence being a fixed quantity. Other studies also have supported this view of intelligence.

However, inteliigence can only be boosted if the teachers in the school adopt a more rigorous teaching approach that requires the integration of the teaching of higher order thinking skills. The teachers would also need to adopt an approach of teaching that calls for the use of careful scaffolding. Scaffolding is important because it guides students to develop their own thinking processes. With the guidance through scaffolding, students will learn to see that they have a more accurate picture of their own abilities and potentials and how they learn.

For most schools in Indonesia (and even in Singapore), this will represent a tectonic shift. Schools chasing high stakes examinations syllabus will have great difficulty meeting this most basic demand of the Smart School. Such schools will always be short of time and racing to complete the syllabus in time for the examinations. Secondly, it would also often mean that teachers in such schools will only teach to the examinations. All else will be unimportant because the only real assessment of learning is only done at such examinations. But schools that move in the direction of the Smart School model, including schools aspiring to be SBIs, will be a school that is truly serious about student learning and very importantly, in such a school, every student will be valued because here, truly, it is believed that every child can learn.