Rote learning or learning by memorizing is not the optimal learning method since it focuses only on the transfer of information and misses the purpose of learning. Although it is a crucial learning method to start of, employing such method as the only method of learning in the formal education system will stagnant the growth and advancement of a whole nation since it tends to produce a generation of uneducated people.
Memorizing by repetition is absolutely necessary for younger children who are still developing much of their neurosystem in the brain. Indeed, rote learning does have its benefit upon younger children (0-6 years old). Younger children who are taught using rote learning will usually be a step ahead of their peers when they begin their formal education as compared to those who are just left to learn on their own. This is greatly due to the greater amount of information that is already in stored in their brain through the discipline of rote learning. Therefore, it is agreeable that rote learning is a great beginning method of learning. However, when rote learning is used as the only method for the whole education system in the country, it will eventually nullify its own benefit.
At its best, rote learning can be described as a one-legged learning method because it emphasize only on the transfer of information. The grave effect and result of implementing rote learning in the education system can be observed in the continent of Asia. Many Asian countries have fallen into this trap and implement the method for decades. In many Asian countries, primary and secondary school students are assessed by how much information they can retain in their brain. Such countries view academic success, by which it means students obtaining good grades in exams, as the measuring rod in the education system. Every year they will assess the success of the education system by the number of students scoring A in their graduation examinations. However, they fail to observe that in the real world, many of the A-scoring students are not able to use the information and knowledge that they have painstakingly committed to memory.
In one of the Asian country that use rote learning in the formal education system, it is a common understanding that a student who score A in his english or other language subject, may not necessarily able to write or form a proper sentence or paragraph. So, how did he score A for his essay writing? By memorizing word by word, the essay that the teacher has given beforehand. How did he score A in his grammar exam? By doing a whole lot of review exercises that will repeatedly ask the same questions. What is the result of such education system? A generation of young people who score many many A's in their exams yet completely uneducated.
Looking at these countries, it does not take a rocket scientist to see that rote learning is not the best way of learning. It is a great method of learning and crucial in the early childhood development. However, it cannot be a sole learning method in the formal education system of a whole nation. Education or learning is as much about the impartation of understanding as it is about the transfer of information.