The problem is that every time a student takes a course because he has to, he finds himself faced with a serious motivation problem. If you don't know why you need to know something it is difficult to learn it and what you learn won't stay in memory for long. If we don't use something, or at least see how we might use it, it is difficult to retain it. A course in calculus may well be useful for an economist, but since the actual course likely has very little to do with economics and the calculus that would eventually be used by the economist, the student will have trouble caring about or retaining what he learned. If he never uses what he learns, he'll forget it entirely.

JB: How long should a college course be?

SCHANK: The current answer is about forty hours of seat time spanning a twelve-week period. Does some great educational truth underlie this? No. It simply has always been done this way. How long should a course actually be? As long as it takes to learn to do what the course is teaching you to do. This is so obvious it seems almost absurd to mention it. And, it would be absurd if it weren't for the fact this ideal is violated in nearly every college course.

JB: Isn't one big exception the PhD thesis which takes as long as it takes.

SCHANK: Right. By and large graduate education is much closer to a learn by doing philosophy. In fact, courses that take as long as they take are really not possible in current university environments. Each student can't get his own length course; professors can't be available for as long as this takes. There had to be some standardization on time.

The web changes all that — take a course when you want and learn as much as you want until you can demonstrate that you can do what the course is trying to teach you to do. This makes sense. Naturally, this is not what current web-based courses are doing for the most part. Just as early films were just filmed plays, early web courses are just regular courses on the web. This will change. And when it does the structure of the university system will have to change with it. You won't need so many course credits to graduate because the concept of "credits" will have become meaningless. What is needed is a new concept, based upon performance. Graduates should have accomplished certain things, not necessarily have sat through certain courses.

JB: Let's talk about how the computer fits in to all of this.

SCHANK: Education on the computer has been, by and large, a disappointment, over-hyped and under-realized. Computer-based training has meant putting a book on a computer, allowing the student to press a button to get the next page and take a quiz at the end. Edutainment has meant some silly game that purported to be teaching valuable facts to children.

JB: So can we do better?

SCHANK: You bet we can. The air flight simulator is a very good piece of educational software; there is no better way to learn to fly that isn't dangerous. Learning by doing is a practical reality given good simulations. The problem is both to build those simulations and to reinvent a curriculum based upon this new technology and the idea of learning by doing.