Memory cannot be observed directly; cognitive science infers memory from behaviors, test performance, and brain traces rather than showing an internal store. Classroom assessment always evaluates observable products of performance—recitation, writing, problem solving, experiments, composition, and presentations—rather than invisible memory traces. Evident recall of facts or rules only shows the ability to produce certain responses when prompted, not depth of understanding or reasoning ability. The rise of AI that produces similar outputs reveals the collapse of memory-based assessment as a reliable measure. Emphasizing memory as an explanatory entity gives educators a false sense of control over unobservable processes.
When educators panic about artificial intelligence in the classroom, they often fall back on a familiar definition of learning: a change in long-term memory. It sounds scientific. It gives the impression that what matters is happening deep inside the brain, at the level of neurons and synapses. But here's the problem: Even cognitive science, which gave us this definition, cannot show memory itself, only behaviors and traces that are interpreted as memory.
In classrooms, teachers never see memory traces. They see students doing things: reciting multiplication tables, writing essays, solving equations, conducting experiments, composing music, presenting arguments. Every grade, every assessment, every comment we make as educators is based on performance, not on an unseen "storehouse" inside the head. Consider a student who still recalls the capital of France, learned in elementary school. Does this prove that their long-term memory is "strong"? Does it mean they have "learned a lot"?
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