The next century will provide unprecedented means for the circulation, storage and dissemination of information, so it will put forward double requirements for education, which at first glance seems almost contradictory. On the one hand, education should effectively impart more and more knowledge and skills that are constantly developing and adapted to the level of cognitive development, because this is the basis for cultivating future talents. At the same time, education should also find and mark the criteria for judging things, so that people will not be confused by a large amount of information flooding in public and private places, and will not be divorced from the direction of individual and collective development. It can be said that education should not only provide a complicated and changeable map of the world, but also provide a compass that is helpful for sailing in this world.

According to this prospect for the future, it is neither possible nor appropriate to meet the endless educational demand only in quantity (increasing the curriculum burden). It is not enough for everyone to accumulate knowledge at the beginning of life and then use it indefinitely. He must be able to seize and make use of the opportunities in life to update, deepen and further enrich the knowledge he first acquired in order to adapt to the changing world.

In order to adapt to its whole mission, education should be arranged around four basic learning; It can be said that these four kinds of learning will be the knowledge pillars of everyone's life: learning to seek knowledge is not only a means to gain understanding; Learn to do things so that you can have an impact on your environment; Learn to live together in order to participate in all human activities with others and cooperate in these activities; Finally, learn to be a man, which is the main embodiment of the first three learning achievements. Of course, these four ways of acquiring knowledge are a whole, because there are many connections, intersections and communication points between them.

But generally speaking, formal education is only or mainly aimed at learning to seek knowledge and less at learning to do things. The other two kinds of learning are often very casual, and sometimes they are considered as natural extensions of the first two kinds of learning. However, the Committee believes that in any kind of organized education, each of these four "knowledge pillars" should be given equal attention, so that education can become a comprehensive and lifelong continuous experience for educated individuals and members of society in understanding and practice.

From the beginning of the work, members of the Committee clearly felt that in order to meet the challenges of the next century, new goals must be set for education and people's views on the role of education must be changed. The expanded new concept of education should enable everyone to discover, develop and strengthen their creative potential, and should also help to dig out the wealth hidden in each of us. This means that we should pay full attention to the role of education, even if people learn to be human beings and realize the role of all-round personal development, instead of simply treating education as a means, it is the only way to achieve a certain purpose (skills, various abilities, economic purposes).

Learn to seek knowledge.

This kind of learning is more a means to master cognition than to acquire classified and systematic knowledge. It is both a means of life and a purpose of life. As a means, it should enable everyone to understand the world around him, at least enable him to live with dignity and develop his professional ability and communication. As an end, it is based on the will to understand, recognize and discover. Even if there is less and less direct purpose to study, because learning useful knowledge has become very important in real life, the school system has become longer and longer, and there are more and more free time, which will make more and more adults feel the pleasure brought by knowledge and personal self-study. Expanding knowledge can make everyone better understand their environment from all angles, help to stimulate curiosity about knowledge, stimulate critical spirit and help to distinguish right from wrong on the basis of independent thinking. From this perspective, let's emphasize once again that no matter where he is, every child should be able to learn science in an appropriate way and become a lifelong "friend of science". In secondary and higher education, introductory training should introduce all the means, concepts and reference methods provided by scientific progress and contemporary thinking mode to all college and middle school students.

However, because knowledge involves all aspects and is constantly developing and changing, it is increasingly impossible to try to understand everything, and it is unrealistic to continue teaching all subjects after basic education. However, professional study, even future researchers, should not exclude the study of general cultural knowledge. "Today, a truly comprehensive person needs to have extensive general cultural knowledge and have the opportunity to study and study minority disciplines in depth. In the whole education process, it is necessary to promote the simultaneous development of these two aspects. " Because general cultural education enables the educated to be exposed to other languages and knowledge, it is conducive to communication first. Experts are confined to their own subjects and may not be interested in what others do. In any case, he will find it difficult to cooperate with others. On the other hand, culture and education, as a link connecting all societies beyond time and space, are bound to make the educated understand the knowledge in other fields, thus helping to give full play to the synergy between disciplines. Especially in research, some great advances in knowledge have been made in interdisciplinary fields.

To study for knowledge, we must first learn to study with attention, memory and thinking ability. Especially in the society where TV images dominate, young people should learn to pay attention to people and things from an early age. Media news reports change rapidly from one content to another, so it is so common to skip advertising programs by changing channels when watching TV programs. In fact, these are not conducive to the discovery process, because this process takes time and needs a deeper understanding. Learning concentration can take various forms, and it can also take advantage of various opportunities in life (games, enterprise internships, travel, scientific experiments, etc. ).

On the other hand, memory training is a necessary way to avoid being completely influenced by instant messages transmitted by the media. If we now have powerful information storage and dissemination capabilities, it is dangerous to think that memory is no longer useful. Of course, we must choose what we should "remember" People's associative memory ability does not work automatically, so it should be cultivated seriously. All experts agree that memory should be trained from an early age, and it is not appropriate to cancel some traditional training that is regarded as boring in school.

Finally, the training of thinking ability, which is the thinking that children begin under the guidance of parents and then teachers. It includes the repeated thinking process from concrete to abstract and then from abstract to concrete. Therefore, in teaching and research, we should combine deductive method with inductive method, which are often regarded as opposite methods. Depending on the subjects taught, one of the methods may be more targeted than the other, but in most cases, the coherence of thought needs the combination of the two.

The process of learning knowledge is endless and can be further enriched through various experiences. In this sense, with the unchangeable nature and content of work decreasing, the combination of learning process and work experience is getting closer and closer. If the initial education provides the motivation and foundation for lifelong learning inside and outside the work, then this education can be considered successful.

Learn to do things

Learning to know and learning to do things are inseparable to a great extent. However, the latter is more closely related to vocational training: how to teach students to practice what they have learned? And how to adapt education to future work when it is impossible to fully predict future work changes? In particular, the Committee tried to answer the second question.

In this regard, we should largely distinguish between the industrialized economy dominated by wage labor and other economies dominated by individual labor or informal occupations. Because, during the whole 20th century, in the wage labor society developed according to the industrial model, the result of replacing manual labor with machines was to reduce the intensity of manual labor, strengthen the knowledge of work (even in the industrial sector), and strengthen the importance of service industry in economic activities. In addition, the future of these economies depends on whether they can turn the progress of knowledge into innovations that can start new businesses and create new jobs. Because than can't simply understand the meaning of learning to do things as in the past, it is to train someone to engage in a specific specific job and let him participate in the production of something. Learning should have corresponding development and changes, and can no longer be regarded as simply imparting some repetitive practical methods, even though these methods still have certain educational functions that cannot be ignored.

From skill to ability

In the industrial field, especially for machine operators and technicians, because knowledge and information play a leading role in the production system, the concept of professional qualification has been somewhat outdated, and the concept of personal ability has been put in the first place. In fact, technological progress is inevitably changing the qualifications required by new production processes. As machines become smarter, the intensity of manual labor is decreasing, and simple manual labor is being replaced by more knowledgeable and intelligent productive labor (such as machine operation, maintenance and monitoring) and work in design, research and organization.

There are many reasons for the higher qualification requirements at all levels. As far as people who perform specific tasks are concerned, they often follow the practice of Japanese enterprises, that is, contrary to Taylor system, they adopt the organizational model of "labor collective" or "project team" and give up the practice of combining designated tasks with individual operations. On the other hand, the individualization of work tasks is replacing the interchangeability between working-class people. Employers pay more and more attention to the requirements of ability, not qualification; In their view, the concepts of qualification and practical skills are still too inseparable, and ability is a unique mixture of everyone, which combines strict qualifications, social behavior, cooperation ability, initiative and adventurous spirit obtained through technical and vocational training.

If, in addition to these new requirements, workers who are regarded as participants in change are required to make personal commitments, it is obvious that those innate or acquired qualities with strong personal colors, which are usually called "survival skills" by enterprises, are combined with knowledge and practical skills to form the required abilities. As emphasized by the Committee, this ability clearly reflects the connection between all aspects of learning, which should be maintained through education. Among the above qualities, communication ability, cooperation ability and conflict management and resolution ability are becoming more and more important. The development of service activities has further strengthened this trend.

"dematerialization" of labor force and the rise of service industry

If we observe the quantitative and qualitative changes in the service industry, we can see that the "dematerialization" of developed economies has a particularly obvious impact on learning. Service industry is an extremely diversified industry, especially its scope can be defined by the activities it does not include, that is, it is an industry that neither includes industrial activities nor agricultural activities; Although its activities are diverse, the common point is that it does not produce material products.

Many services are mainly determined according to the interpersonal relationships they cause. We can find such examples in the commercial sector and more traditional non-commercial sectors (social welfare, education, health, etc.). ), due to the increasingly complex management (all kinds of expertise, technical monitoring or technical consulting services, financial, accounting or management services) and constantly expand. In both cases, information and communication activities are extremely important; In this regard, the focus is on capturing and processing specific information of specific projects in a personalized way. In this kind of service, the relationship between the provider and the user also depends on the user to a great extent. Therefore, we can understand that this kind of work can no longer be prepared like plowing and producing steel plates. The relationship with material and technology should be supplemented by the ability to deal with interpersonal relationships. Therefore, the development of service industry forces people to cultivate and improve the qualities that traditional education does not necessarily instill, which are consistent with the ability to establish stable and effective relationships between people.

Finally, we can imagine that in a highly technical organization in the future, difficulties in relationships may lead to serious dysfunction, which requires a new qualification based mainly on behavior rather than knowledge. This may be an opportunity for people with no or few diplomas. Intuition, perception, judgment and the ability to unite closely with a group are not necessarily the unique abilities of the people with the highest degree. How to teach these somewhat innate abilities and where to teach them? We can't simply infer the content of the plan aimed at cultivating the required ability or talent. This problem also exists in vocational training in developing countries.

Labor force in informal economy

In a developing economy where salaried occupations are not dominant, the nature of labor is very different. In fact, in many countries in sub-Saharan Africa and some countries in Latin America and Asia, only a small number of people have got paid jobs, and the vast majority still participate in traditional independent economic activities. To be exact, there is no professional reference standard; Skills are often traditional. In addition, the role of learning is not limited to what you do, but should be in line with the broader goal of formal or informal participation in development. This often involves both social qualifications and professional qualifications.

In other developing countries, besides agriculture and small-scale formal sector, there is also a modern and informal economic sector based on handicrafts, commerce and finance, which shows that there is enterprise potential that is very suitable for local conditions.

In both cases, the Committee's many consultations with developing countries show that these countries have realized that their future is closely related to the acquisition of scientific knowledge that will enable them to get in touch with modern technology, but this has not ignored the special innovation and creativity closely related to local conditions.

This brings us back to a common problem faced by developed and developing countries: how to learn to effectively deal with changing situations? How to participate in the future creation?

Learn to live together: learn to live together and learn to live together with others.

This kind of learning may be one of the main problems in education today. Today's world is often a world full of violence, which runs counter to some people's expectations of human progress. Human history has always been a history of conflict. However, some new factors, especially the unique self-destruction ability created by human beings in the 20th century, are increasing the risk of conflict. Through mass media, ordinary people become weak observers or even hostages of those who create or maintain conflicts. So far, education has failed to change this situation. Can we design an education that can help people avoid conflicts or resolve conflicts peacefully by expanding their understanding of others and their cultural and spiritual values?

It is commendable to teach the idea of non-violence in schools, even if it is only one of the means to combat prejudice that leads to conflict. This task is arduous, because naturally, people overestimate the strengths of themselves and the group more and more and are biased against others. In addition, the general competitive atmosphere has become the characteristic of economic activities within countries, especially internationally, which increasingly highlights the competitive spirit and personal success. In fact, this competition eventually led to a ruthless economic war, which led to tension between the rich and the poor, thus splitting the country and the whole world; This kind of competition has also intensified the hostility that has existed in history. Unfortunately, due to the incorrect interpretation of the concept of competition, education sometimes contributes to the persistence of this atmosphere.

How can we do it better? Experience has proved that in order to reduce this danger, it is not enough to arrange contacts and exchanges between people belonging to different groups (for example, in schools shared by multiple ethnic groups or religions). If these different groups are in competition, or their status in the shared environment is unequal, then this kind of contact may intensify potential tension and then turn into conflict. On the contrary, if such contacts are conducted in an equal atmosphere with common goals and plans, prejudice and potential hostility may be eliminated and replaced by a relatively calm cooperation or even friendship.

Therefore, it seems that education should adopt two complementary methods. The first is to find others step by step; Then make some common plans in life, which seems to be an effective way to avoid or solve potential conflicts.

Discover others

The mission of education is to teach students to understand the diversity of human beings, and at the same time teach them that all people on earth are similar and interdependent. Therefore, since childhood, schools should seize every opportunity to carry out this kind of dual education. Some subjects are especially suitable for this kind of education: teaching human geography from basic education, and then teaching foreign languages and foreign literature.

To know others, you must first know yourself; If teenagers want to know the world correctly, whether in family, society or school education, they must first know themselves. Only then can they really put themselves in others' shoes to understand their reactions. Cultivating this attitude of emotional assimilation in school will have a positive impact on a person's social behavior throughout his life. For example, teaching young people to adopt the views of other ethnic groups or religious groups; It can avoid the situation that mutual understanding leads to mutual hatred and violence between adults. Therefore, religious history education or custom education can be used as a useful reference standard for future behavior.

Finally, the teaching form itself should not violate this recognition of others. Some teachers arbitrarily stifle students' curiosity or critical spirit because of dogma, instead of repeatedly cultivating their curiosity or critical spirit, which may not be worth the candle. If they forget that they should be teachers, they are likely to weaken students' ability to be open to the opposite sex, and always cope with the inevitable tension between people, groups and nations because of their attitude. It is an educational means in 2 1 century to explain one's reasons through dialogue and argument.

Strive to achieve common goals

When people work together for some valuable projects that can get rid of daily habits, the differences and even conflicts between people will gradually weaken. Sometimes it disappears. From these projects that help people transcend personal stereotypes and highlight commonalities rather than differences, a new way of identity can be produced. For example, through sports, the tense relationship between different social classes or nationalities is finally transformed into unity and mutual assistance in the joy of competition and joint efforts. Similarly, in work, if a common project does not transcend the conflicts that usually exist in superior and subordinate organizations, then many things will not succeed.

Therefore, formal education should leave enough time and opportunities in its plan to teach such cooperative projects to young people; This kind of education should be given to students from early childhood, in sports or cultural activities, and by participating in social activities, such as transforming residential areas, helping the most vulnerable groups, participating in humanitarian actions and intergenerational mutual assistance. Other educational organizations and associations should continue to carry out this work instead of schools. In addition, in school daily life, teachers and students participate in some projects together, which can provide opportunities for teaching some conflict resolution methods, provide reference standards for students' future life, and strengthen the relationship between teachers and students.

From the first meeting, the Committee on Learning to Be a Man firmly reiterated a basic principle: education should promote everyone's all-round development, that is, the development of body and mind, intelligence, sensitivity, aesthetic consciousness, personal responsibility and spiritual value. We should make everyone, especially with the help of the education he received in his youth, form an independent and critical ideological system, cultivate his own judgment ability, and make him determine what he thinks he should do in different life situations.

Learn to survive

Learning to live (1972) report expresses the concern in the preface that the development of science and technology leads to the dehumanization of the world. Since then, all the changes that have taken place in society, especially the great development of media capabilities, have aggravated the above concerns and made the indispensable practices arising from such concerns more legal. 2 1 century may make these phenomena appear in a wider range. By then, the problem will no longer be to train children to prepare for a specific society, that is, to constantly provide each of them with strength and knowledge standards to help them understand the world around them and become responsible and fair participants. The basic function of education seems to be more than ever to ensure that everyone enjoys the freedom of thought, judgment, emotion and imagination needed to give full play to his talents, and holds his own destiny as firmly as possible.

This is not only the urgent need of individualism. Because recent experience shows that things that seem to be just individuals protecting themselves from restrictive or hostile systems sometimes provide the best opportunities for society. The diversity of personality, autonomy and initiative, even hobbies and challenges are the guarantee of creativity and innovation. New methods derived from field experience have become very effective in reducing violence or combating all kinds of evils that affect society.

In a rapidly changing world with social and economic reform as the main driving force, imagination and creativity may be paid more attention; They are the most obvious manifestation of human freedom and may be threatened by the standardization of some personal codes of conduct. 2 1 century needs all kinds of talents and personalities, not just excellent individuals. Of course, such people are also very important in any civilization. Therefore, teenagers should be provided with every possible opportunity to make discoveries and experiments in aesthetics, art, sports, science, culture and society, which will complement the attractive introduction to the creations of previous generations or modern people in these fields. Many countries attach importance to utilitarianism rather than cultural education, and art and poetry should regain their important position in schools. Attention to improving imagination and creativity should also lead to further attention to oral culture and knowledge gained from children's or adults' experiences.

Therefore, the Committee fully agrees with the principle put forward in the report "Learn to survive": "The purpose of development is to make people improve day by day; Make his personality rich and colorful, and his expression complex and diverse; Let him take on different responsibilities, as a person, as a member of family and society, as a citizen and producer, as a technological inventor, as a creative idealist. " This kind of human development is a dialectical process from birth to death, starting with knowing yourself and then opening the relationship with others. In this sense, education is first of all an inner journey, and its stage is consistent with the stage of personality maturity. Therefore, as a means to achieve a successful professional life, education is a very personal process, and it is also a process of establishing interactive social relations.

Needless to say, the four pillars of education mentioned in this chapter cannot only involve a certain stage of life or a single place. As we will see in the next chapter, we should rethink all stages and fields of education, so that they complement each other and penetrate each other, so that everyone can make full use of the expanding educational environment in his life.