The Xplanation

[Imagine a World... is a glimpse at products and educational realities that seem possible given current trends. All products mentioned in this post are the invention of the author.]

Imagine a world where learning is measured in terms of understanding and actual proficiency as opposed to rote memorization and flat information. Imagine a new system, widely supported, that asks teachers to become Master Learners and in which traditional tests lose their importance.

RKM and the Master Learner Movement

Dateline: February 26, 2018

Eight years ago, Leslie Smythe was busy completing her doctorate in education at NYU. One morning, while completing her daily survey of Web news, she ran across a post about the problems with “rote” learning.

As she often says in interviews and lectures, it is amazing the difference one piece of information can make.

“My dissertation research was on different models for learning,” she says. “But after reading that post, I realized I had it all wrong. I needed to focus instead on what it means to say we have learned something in the first place.”

That realization was the seed for what has grown into a powerful and controversial movement in education throughout North America — Rational Knowledge Mastery.

Smythe sums up Relational Knowledge Mastery this way. “RKM is, quite simply, a method for measuring a different kind of student knowledge. It isn’t something that can be easily done, at least not with great proficiency, via rote memorization. RKM requires that learners actually know how to apply learned information and, at higher levels of mastery, that they understand why the information is important and how it ‘relates’ to other information. With RKM, there really are no isolated facts.”

Over the last five years, RKM has polarized much of the education world. It has gained strong backing and endorsement from a majority of Fortune 100 companies and educational leaders at state and federal levels. It is seen by many as the future path for assessment and evaluation of learner performance in the K-20 world. Its detractors, however, refer to RKM as “Real Knowledge Mess” and claim that it is elitist, unfair to teachers and instructors, and diverts attention away from teaching core skills and values.

“I think RKM has gained so much support because it makes so much sense,” says John Sanders, a key government proponent of RKM. “To use a simple example, when someone learns a language, are we really concerned with how much they know about the language or with how well they can actually use it? What good does it do to memorize forms of past tense verbs if you can’t translate that learning into tangible demonstrations of conversation or writing mastery? And in order to do that, you necessarily have to move beyond memorization into actual understanding.”

Building on the premises of mastery demonstration and understanding how pieces of information interact, Smythe and others developed RKM as a pedagogical system that would begin with teacher/instructor training, move through different stages of instruction and learning, and culminate in a learner candidate evaluation administered by an RKM-certified Master Learner.

RKM requires a fundamental change in perspective and a “re-learning process” for recurrent teachers. That process includes a rigorous certification program that focuses on shifting teachers from “knowers” to “learners,” and that trains them on how to mold relational knowledge mastery in learner candidates (what we traditionally have referred to as students).

“I didn’t realize how locked in I had become in my subject,” says Joseph Larsen, a math instructor in California. “I was so focused on measuring student performance based on isolated information memory that learning had all but disappeared in my classrooms. Even worse, I had lost sight of my own learning.”

Larsen’s enthusiasm is echoed by most RKM practitioners. And, like others who have gained their RKM certification as a “guide” for other learners, he is now working toward his certification as a Master Learner.

“Master Learners have to satisfy two essential criteria for certification,” Smythe explains. “First, they must have a demonstrable mastery of a subject area as assessed by a Master Learner in the same field. In addition, Master Learners have to go through a series of training seminars where they learn how to accurately assess relational knowledge mastery by other learners.”

The actual RKM assessment process seems to be the core issue for most of the program’s detractors. It consists of one or more interview sessions, each at least forty-five minutes in length, in which the Master Learner discusses the subject matter with a learner candidate (the learner being evaluated). The conversations, as they are called, are designed to put the learner candidate in situations where they must demonstrate actual proficiency in the subject area. The Master Learner guides the conversation to determine the real understanding the learner candidate has of the information studied and the relationship between information pieces.

There are five levels of RKM mastery, and within each level, candidates can be graded as Novice, Intermediate, or Advanced. When the evaluation is completed, learner candidates receive a score that is expressed in terms like 4-Novice or 2-Intermediate. Each of the levels and its grades of proficiency are described in narrative detail within the RKM Proficiency Guidelines used by evaluators. These guidelines are a key point attacked by RKM opposition groups.

“How can we, in good conscience, turn our children over to a system that completely ignores traditional subjects and the historical standards of knowledge that have proven successful and valuable throughout history?” asks Senator Joe Marshall.

This is typical of the rhetoric levied against RKM in speeches, advertisements, and parent groups. Legislation aimed at regulating RKM or nullifying its use in public institutions has been introduced in 23 states in the U.S.

“As a Master Learner,” Smythe says calmly in a recent television interview, “I welcome the dialogue and am certain it will lead to greater understanding for all of us.”

Perhaps one of the reasons she can be so calm is that, for all practical purposes, RKM has sufficient traction to survive and continue thriving as a major force in education. In K-12, it has been implemented in a majority of private and virtual schools in North America, and has become the predominant methodology in the home schooling sector. Moreover, there are pilot programs underway in six of the ten largest school districts in the United States. Higher Education institutions are also jumping on board, with community colleges and for-profits leading the way.

“In the Higher Education space, backing of the program by industry leaders is key. Students who graduate and can show a 3-Intermediate or higher in a subject area are being hired on the spot,” says community college Vice President Marsha Finsteun. “In many cases, companies are even bringing in their own Master Learners for independent evaluations. If we want to be competitive, such as helping our students get jobs, we will embrace RKM.”