Learning In 3D

A version of this was previously published at Forbes.com

Recently the Burj Khalifa -- the world’s tallest tower -- opened in Dubai. At 2,717 feet tall it easily outdistances the previous record-holder, Taipei 101, by 1,047 feet — and is almost twice as tall as the Empire State Building. Aside from questions about the money spent or whether this was a good use of resources, the sheer achievement should be celebrated, not just by architects, engineers or photographers, but by educators – K-12 educators – in 3D.

The bulk of classroom teaching, particularly in math, is 2D. We look at numbers, we compute numbers, we teach kids to compute numbers. That’s it. But what if we demonstrate those numbers -- make them come alive in a spectacular, 3D way? Wouldn’t that help make the numbers more meaningful? It’s one thing to say the Burj Khalifa is almost twice as big as the Empire State Building, but if we get students to design and build scale models of both and compare them side-by-side, they’ll learn things they can’t learn any other way:

• They’ll learn to calculate on a large scale, the way architects/engineers do
• They learn to build scale models as part of a team
• They’ll find ways to get their scale models to stand up without toppling over—learning basic principles of engineering and science. These principles were brilliantly outlined by the late Mario Salvadori in his seminal book, “Why Buildings Stand Up”.
• They’ll see and appreciate just how amazing an achievement Burj Khalifa is—in 3D—by comparing their scale models of the Burj and the Empire State Building
• They’ll have a better understanding of the math, science, teamwork and genius involved in Burj Khalifa because, literally, they’ll have done the same thing, in their own way

In education this practice is called project based learning, but at Salvadori, we could just as easily call it Learning in 3D. For one thing, kids would understand concepts better—and be more motivated to learn it. For another, we already have the technology and means to do it in our classrooms. So why don’t we use it more?

It’s an accepted fact that the U.S. lags far behind other developed countries at the K-12 level in terms of measured performance in math and science. Since our current math and science education isn’t working--why not try it in 3D? We practically invented the skyscraper. In the 21^st century, shouldn’t we reinvent it—along with the educational system that helped bring it about?