Recalling information is not the same as knowing: industrial teaching strategies favour retention and recollection, and formulaic solutions to problems, rather than higher-order or critical-thinking skills. I can study the actions of a swimmer, recall the necessary coordination of movements, so that I could be said to know ‘about’ swimming. But I still don’t know ‘how’ to swim. That requires repeated application of such knowledge, until some level of aquatic mastery (i.e. not sinking) is acquired. Schools are under pressure to get students to ‘know about’ a large amount of content, so that it
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