Three Types of Students

  


Which type of monkey student are you? College can sometimes feel like you're just hitting random keys on a type writer and hoping your professor thinks it's Shakespeare. In her Times Magazine article about Ken Bain's book "What the Best College Students Do," Annie Murphy Paul provides a nice summary of his theory. Now I don't have to buy your book Ken! (this isn't an affiliate link, maybe I should start doing that.) And now you don't have to read Annie's article!

To quote Annie paraphrasing Ken "there are three types of learners: surface, who do as little as possible to get by; strategic, who aim for top grades rather than true understanding; and deep learners, who leave college with a real, rich education." Which monkey student do you think matches with which learner? Annie thinks that the deep learners are the most successful and should emulated the most. Obviously, I think that the monkey student on the right is the deep learner, the only one with both receiving systems unimpeded. You’ll notice that is also the only monkey not speaking evil, in the traditional meaning of the monkeys.

I’ve always wanted to be the monkey student on the right, diligently observing and soaking it all in. But a lot of times I’m the surface learner, learning just enough to skate by and then promptly dumping everything I’ve learned. Does this mean I’m not successful? I think there’s another way of looking at these three learning types. Academic learning is often not the only thing one learns in college. Famously President George W. Bush was a poor college student telling Yale students in a commencement address "To the C students, I say, 'You too can be president of the United States." This hardly jives with Annie’s idea of the deep learner’s being the one’s who are most successful.

I think that deep learners get the most of out of their academic pursuits, but college is often times about networking and just having that piece of paper. An individual defines success for themselves. Surface learners might have jobs and don’t have the necessary time to invest. I don’t buy the argument about “true” understanding. I read Atlas Shrugged for fun (I am super fun at parties!) but didn’t pursue it the same way someone who studied it, wrote reports on it, answered study questions and had to discuss it in a college setting. Does this mean I have less of “true” understanding as a surface learner, probably yes. But I’d argue that the strategic learner who got an A+ in Randian Objectivist Thought class and remained unconvinced of the morality of that economic theory understands it just as well or probably better than the deep learner who received a B in the class but started wearing “Taxation is Theft” T-shirts.

Success is entirely dependent on your goals. And while for myself, the deep learning strategy is the goal, it isn't for everyone. Everyone defines success differently. For instance, this is the first image that Pexels.com , a free stock photo website, has when one searches for "success." Is this your version of success? I took the liberty of editing this photo. Let me know how you define success in the comments