his episode is about the reasons for creating this podcast. I hope this podcast can help me find partners, cooperators and friends who have same interest in education. As saying does, many roads lead to Rome, I may be one of them, and because of my limited experience, my thoughts can be immature, but I sincerely hope you can share your points of view or suggestions with me and I am glad to hear about that.

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Please feel free to leave your comments and/or opinions to [email protected]

Listen this on MyAudioCast: http://www.myaudiocast.com/andiemarcle/episode/40912/

This episode is about the relations of 9 topics I have recorded. In this episode, I will give and explain the relations of 9 topics one by one. In general, the first 4 topics are the basis of my stance on education reform/revolution, the next 2 topics express education from an individual aspect, and the last 3 topics are about the significance of education reform/revolution. As for the relations among them and more other details, it is better to listen to the podcast.

Thanks for listening!

Please feel free to leave your comments and/or opinions to [email protected]

Listen this on MyAudioCast: http://www.myaudiocast.com/andiemarcle/episode/40911/

Thanks for listening!

Please feel free to leave your comments and/or opinions to [email protected]

Synopsis of Today's Topic:

In ecosystem, diversity depends on variation of life and places species occupy. Education needs diversity, but so many people treat diversity by our appearances, identities and ethnic groups, which are learned from statistic data. Somehow, the statistic data is incapable of proving anything, and it can only bring more and more serious prejudice, if we can’t see the facts behind.

Another aspect we need to think about is information spread. We used to think information needs carriers to pass on data, and the carriers are technology and data is the data. However, if the carriers are human and data is their stories, information can be spread to every corners of the world, while, in the former way, information can only reach where technology exists.

It is said that whoever saves one saves the world entire. For example, if we save an alcoholic, he will be the man who knows the alcoholics best, for he knows the feeling that drinking is everything and knows how to get rid of it. He used to be there. So is education, it is not to give but to care about something we cannot see, just like what Mother Teresa did is not so much a glory as a warning that there are so many things we never cared and saw before. When education can be passed on to one person to another person, it is not a commodity or a company for profits. Sometimes, it is enough if we can bring up a good mother.

Listen this on MyAudioCast: http://www.myaudiocast.com/andiemarcle/episode/40910/

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Synopsis of Today's Topic:

Isaac Newton said, “If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” I sincerely thank and respect the ancestors’ work and efforts, and I think we should follow their steps to improve education as they did. The conflict happens because the definition of “better” is changing all the time. It is not always inevitable if we give each other chance to express our own concerns. Change will come to us but first it comes from us. It is not to replace but to repair, and someday our children will also follow our steps to repair the faults they see.

Listen this on MyAudioCast: http://www.myaudiocast.com/andiemarcle/episode/40909/

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Synopsis of Today's Topic:

This society never lacks wealth and talents, just as this world never lacks gold and diamonds. However, they both need a way to find them. The first one who found gold and diamonds is only a spreader of the news, but as for the way to detect the precise locations, purify or extract from the raw materials, and find and produce massively, it takes time to complete the whole process. It’s the same thing as education we are doing. Before knowing the existence of the wealth and talents, we need to think of how to find them. And before finding them, we have to think what they really are before they can be called wealth and talents. We need to rethink of our attitude toward these precious and valuable things, and rebuild the trust among people. Also, because hope is after actions, which means, hope will appear after we act. It works for education, too. If education didn’t serve or make efforts, there would be no hope and future, but if it did, even a little, we would have hope and future. Change starts from us and comes to us. We need to find a way to treat the precious.

Listen this on MyAudioCast: http://www.myaudiocast.com/andiemarcle/episode/40727/

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Synopsis of Today's Topic:

Lifelong learning, as Wikipedia explains, is the "ongoing, voluntary, and self-motivated" pursuit of knowledge for either personal or professional reasons… It not only enhances social inclusion, active citizenship, and personal development, but also self-sustainability, rather than competitiveness and employability. Therefore, the lifelong education is to perform lifelong learning. Now, what is lifelong education for? According to ecosystem, species is affecting environments as environments affects species. Therefore, they adjust to each other as they affect each other. However, as an individual, it’s hard to affect environments as environments change it. Therefore, the lifelong education is adjustment to the environments, and such a process may extend to one’s life. However, the best way to adjust to the conditions is not to follow the rules but to create your own road.

Listen this on MyAudioCast: http://www.myaudiocast.com/andiemarcle/episode/40726/

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Synopsis of Today's Topic:

The ability to choose helps us cope with future’s uncertainty, and the ability to learn deals with the past and the present. One who has ability to choose must own the ability to learn, but not everyone who is able to learn knows the way to choose. Because self-taught learners have to seek instruction and guidance on their own, they must know how to choose the useful information and give up the useless one. And in order to choose, they must know where to draw a line between the useful and the useless. The traditional learning only teaches useful things, so that the traditional learners don’t bother to think about “what is useful”. Therefore, the self-taught learning is not only ability but a sense of responsibility for one’s own life, because life is about choices. SAT can tell you that the answers are presented or implied in the passages and even give us 5 options to choose, but life has no such a prompt, not mention the options. So, why not teach our children how to choose when teaching them how to study, understand and apply knowledge?

Listen this on MyAudioCast: http://www.myaudiocast.com/andiemarcle/episode/40725/

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Synopsis of Today's Topic:

Should we use our definition of excellence to decide others’ future, or should our views are being changed by others’ excellence of all kinds?

SAT, for example, brings convenience to the evaluation process, but it is not always reliable because people are different and some ability cannot be found by tests. The standardized test, to some extent, like the currency exchange rate which bridges countries and economy, brings a lot of convenience, but it will be the same as the exchange rate which brings not only convenience but financial crisis. When people put their judgments on these measures, they may be misled sometimes, and in terms of education, we will miss talents. What’s more, although it might be no effect for a school to miss a talent, it means different for the talent. So, there is no wrong to have such measures, but it is so wrong to rely completely on these measures.

Listen this on MyAudioCast: http://www.myaudiocast.com/andiemarcle/episode/40724/

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Synopsis of Today's Topic:

When education is for everyone, it is only a privilege to keep giving to fill a bottomless hole. When it is for all people, it helps people realize what they need and then helps them to satisfy the needs. As Chinese proverb goes, “give a man a fish you feed him for a day, but teach a man to fish you feed him for a lifetime”. For a normal child, it is better to give him a book than a new cloth if there is a chance to give him a gift, because generally, the former one may teach him how to live but the latter one only improves living. A book may open his eyes and bring him to a world he never met and heard before. However, not every child will feel the same. So, what if they can know the person who owns this book, so that they can get a booklist rather than a book? What if we teach them how to read a book and choose a book while giving books? Sometimes, education is not only to serve but to help with continuous assistance, which is the same as the proverb. Therefore, when education is for everyone, it only gives fish, but when it is for all people, it teaches men to fish. That’s the difference.

Listen this on MyAudioCast: http://www.myaudiocast.com/andiemarcle/episode/40702/

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Synopsis of Today's Topic:

What is the biggest risk when improving education system? Financial barrier or our avarice for talents and our indifference to unequal opportunities?

The main difference between people and things is that things are born the way they are, but people can be changed all the time. Today, talent becomes a label this world gives to it, and it is just another price tag. If we find a person only because he has been discovered as a talent, we are just trading, and there is no gratitude and responsibility. Therefore, speaking of education, we always idealize that education is the worthiest investment, but the truth is that the talents we see today are the survivors (not beneficiaries) of the current education system and the excellence we value today has becomes a filter (not a reference) that we never think of the difference between nothing and an opportunity. The best investment we think is only to pay for talents rather than do for them before they are called talents. The biggest risk of education reform is our greedy for the talents, that we treat them as commodities. That’s why sometimes change should start from us.

Listen this on MyAudioCast: http://www.myaudiocast.com/andiemarcle/episode/40701/