CivieBlog

There has been wonderful discussion with a few folks around my post: Life is an Open Book Test. The most recent was a comment by Bill Brantley who generally agreed, but added:

In Boy Scouts, I use to teach wilderness survival which required a lot of memorization. You couldn't count on having the Boy Scout Manual with you during a survival situation so I had the students memorize what plants were edible, different ways to purify water, and first aid techniques.

So, life can be an open book test or a closed book test depending on the situation.

So, he made me go back and change my slide to say Life is MOSTLY an Open Book Test.

Of course, that's really more in line with I'm really saying - it's all about anticipated information needs. The right answer depends on where and when you need the information and what your expectation is around what you have available. What's changed is that we more often have some kind of computer probably with web access which gives us access to a ton of information and people - that definitely changes the thinking about what you have to have in your head.