“Hands On:” A Thought

What’s so great — and so different — about “hands-on” learning?  It seems to characterize…everyone — and therefore to characterize no one. I’ve seen that term used to describe nearly every education service or offering recently! The term is thrown around loosely. Yes, “hands on” is important when learning about machines, baseball, tennis, knitting, and cooking. But not war or death. Do we want children to have “hands on” experiences of driving or flying? Do they need to? There is nothing special about “hands on” as such. Dogs and cats have “hands on” learning…and how far do they (not) get? How about some “concept-on” or “reason-on” learning for a change? The latter is what Galileo did. The former is what any monkey can do.