An exercise in making inferences
I thought we will have some fun here and hear what you think these two pictures together would infer about schooling today. Errr… for those who don’t know how, to infer you will need to do a comparison between the two pictures first. What are the similarities and the differences between the two. Then use your own prior knowledge about the subject of the two pictures to draw some of your own conclusions. That’s it! By the way, you won’t get any grade for this 
The similarity is… both have students sitting on their own chairs. The difference is… one happened in the past while the other is happening nowadays in regular schools. Maybe both are effective to be used in the classroom. So… what is wrong with “old-fashioned” teaching methods? The conservative and classical approach might be still suitable for all times (for certain conditions, I believe).
Similarlities are that students are looking at stuff on their desks. Students are also working by themselves too.
The differences are drastic. First in the first image we see students standing in an inner courtyard working on their work. Then we see a more intimate court where it appears that students are talking to, presenting or defending themselves in front of a more prominent tutor or leader. This is significant because you can see that there is an independent work time and then a time in which you must present/defend in front of a teacher. In the other picture you see students working independently on at their desks. We also see one teacher talking to one student.
The next item that we see is an issue of class. The first one you can see is a very privileged image of education, behind courtyard gates, a select number of students do independent work and then interact with a tutor. The other image is more egalitarian and open to more.
So the assertion that the next image is traditional is wrong. It does not compare to the first because the interaction with a private tutor after doing independent work is definitely different from students being tested by themselves at a desk as the end all be all assessment. The first model is one of exclusion and cultivating elite learners and leaders. The other is the factory model in which less emphasis is on learning and more on producing work.