Journal 5-Do Students Need to Memorize Facts in the Digital Age?-NETS I & V

Mahoney, R.E., & Knowles, C.C. (2010, February). Learning and leading with technology. Do Students need to Memorize Facts in the Digital Age?, 37(5), Retrieved from http://www.learningandleading-digital.com/learning_leading/201002#pg1

                 This article was about how important it is the need to memorize facts in the digital age. Robert E. Mahoney, one of the writers in this article, says it is very important to memorize facts before anything else. C.Curatola Knowles, is the other writer of the article, who believes students do not need to memorize facts in the digital age. Both of these writers argue very good points about each others’ opinions and so it is very hard to decide who is wrong and who is right. Robert E. Mahoney believes that “the failure to properly develop underlying declarative knowledge (facts) can have long term implications.” One example he uses was his experience as an algebra and technology teacher. In his experience he has observed that many students that don’t memorize multiplication facts are at a bog disadvantage when using a technology tool to solve a mathematical problem. He believe that these students are relying on technology to give them an answer but that it is not good to do this because these students do not know how and why they got the answer the calculator gave them. He thinks that the students who have memorized these facts are able to successfully grasp the entire concept of why they got the answer because they can recall their information already memorized that has been stored in their brains. He strongly believes students should first memorize the facts and from there they can build their critical thinking skills. He thinks technology should be used as a tool to assist their learning and not to be a necessity to be able to get an answer to their problems. On the other hand, C. Curatola Knowles believes that it is not important for students to memorize facts anymore. She believes it’s much more important for students to be able to analyze data which is the foundation of critical thinking skills. She explains that if our neurons have a lot of brain pathways students would be able to create long term storage of pathways to develop a better system of recollecting and using memory. This would all be accomplished by having students have critical thinking activities where they analyze their information continually challenging their brains. This would make long term memory storage to work more effectively from doing so memorization will occur because they will be thinking more about information instead of just storing data. She believes that if we only rely on memorizing that we would be reinforcing only short term storage of pathways. She thinks students will be better off when they have to make informed decisions because they would be able to analyze the situation much more in depth than if they had a few facts memorized.



Which opinion do I best agree with? It is very hard to agree with only one of these two opinions. Both writers had very good strong points to prove their opinions. I agree a bit more with Robert E. Mahoney because I think students should learn first facts and know how to use them to solve problems and only use technology as a tool to assist them. When they do use technology, they will be able to explain why they got the answer they got with the technology tool thanks to their memorization of facts.



Which method of teaching would I see myself using in my classroom? Based on these two opinions I think I would still use memorization skills first so that students can know what something is, how it works and why it works the way it does. For example, once my students are a able to use a calculator in math lessons I would expect them to be able to explain to me how the answer was obtained and what the process of obtaining the answer based on what I had them learn and memorize first.