Part 1: paradigms, mental models, and mindsets in-use  (Page 8/8)

Changing mental modules

Before educators and their school systems can learn new mental models they have to unlearn what they think they already know. In some way, they have to come to the realization that they can no longer rely on their current knowledge, beliefs, and methods. People can unlearn what they think they know by engaging in structured and managed transformative learning activities. Douglas Doblar, a Ph. D. student in the Department of Instructional Systems Technology at Indiana University, Bloomington, introduced me to the concept of transformative learning in a research study he co-authored with Wylie Easterling and Charles Reigeluth titled “Formative research on the School System Transformation protocol: The development of transformational leadership capacity in a school district’s systemic change process.” Unpublished.

Transformative learning

Kegan (2000) identified two types of learning in adults—informative and transformative. Informative learning focuses on developing and deepening knowledge and skills. Transformative learning changes how we know—it creates a fundamental change in our world views. Transformative learning is a learning process of “…becoming critically aware of one's own tacit assumptions and expectations and those of others and assessing their relevance for making an interpretation” (Mezirow, 2000, p. 4). O’Sullivan (2003, on-line) defined transformative learning as involving: “...a deep, structural shift in the basic premises of thought, feelings, and actions. It is a shift of consciousness that dramatically and irreversibly alters our way of being in the world.”

When transformative learning occurs throughout an entire school system, it is called organization learning. Organization learning takes three forms: single-loop, double-loop, and deutero (Argyris&Schön, 1978). Single-loop learning happens when school system errors are detected and corrected, but the system continues with its present policies and goals. Double-loop learning happens when in addition to detecting and correcting errors, the school system questions and modifies its existing norms, procedures, policies, and objectives. Deutero-learning occurs when a school system learns how to engage in both single-loop and double-loop learning. Further, double-loop and deutero-learning focus on why organizations need to change and on how to change them. Single-loop learning, on the other hand, focuses only on creating and accepting superficial change without questioning underlying assumptions and core beliefs.

Unlearning also often begins when people can no longer rely on their current mental models (Duffy, 2003). The mental models influence their attitudes (mindsets), and, as such, they blind people to other ways of interpreting events around them (Starbuck, 1996). People do not and will not cast aside their current mental models as long as these models seem to produce reasonable results (Kuhn, 1962). As Petroski (1992) put it, people “.... tend to hold onto their theories until incontrovertible evidence, usually in the form of failures, convinces them to accept new paradigms” (pp. 180-181). However, people and their organizations are notorious for sticking with their current mental models and mindsets despite very poor and even disastrous results. Even after abject failure, some people will attribute their failures to some external event or person instead of recognizing the inadequacies of their own personal and organizational mental models.

Engaging in structured activities to uncover and explore mental models is essential if the current ones are obstacles to identifying and adopting new ones. Senge, Kleiner, Roberts, Ross, and Smith (1994) reinforced this principle when they said,

Because mental models are usually tacit, existing below the level of awareness, they are often untested and unexamined. They are generally invisible to us—until we look for them. The core task [for changing them] is bringing mental models to the surface, to explore and talk about them with minimal defensiveness—to help us see the pane of glass, see its impact on our lives, and find ways to reform the glass by creating new mental models that serve us better in the world (p. 236).