by HiPHInch on 11/10/24, 11:11 AM with 57 comments
by cen4 on 11/10/24, 11:52 AM
And Pedagogy is all about getting the student into constant practice rituals until they have mastered the subject. Without practice there is no education/learning.
Herbert Simon - "Criticism of practice called "drill and kill" is very common. Nothing flies more in the face of the last 20 years of research than the assertion that practice is bad. All evidence, from the laboratory and from extensive case studies of professionals, indicates that real competence only comes with extensive practice. In denying the critical role of practice one is denying children the very thing they need to achieve real competence. The instructional task is not to "kill" motivation by demanding drill, but to find tasks that provide practice while at the same time sustaining interest"
by danlitt on 11/10/24, 12:21 PM
There are also lots of valuable intellectual tasks that appear more fun than effortful at face value. Watching talks at conferences springs to mind.
by phrenq on 11/10/24, 12:59 PM
It’s been a while since I read it, but Koster essentially proposes that fun literally is learning at an evolutionary brain chemistry level. That the games we play as children prepare us, in a no consequence environment, for the problems and dangers that we’re going to face as adults. The thing that makes games “fun” is the solving of puzzles and mastery of problems, and we’re much better at learning when it’s fun.
[0] https://game-studies.fandom.com/wiki/A_Theory_of_Fun_for_Gam...
by namaria on 11/10/24, 11:56 AM
Rants on social media are an easy outlet for frustration and should not be conflated with insightful opinion piece journalism.
by pchangr on 11/10/24, 10:11 PM
“Motivation plays a crucial role in facilitating LTM retention. It may derive from external incentives (i.e., reward and punishment) or/and intrinsic incentives (i.e., personal curiosity) [29]. During the learning process, students, driven by external incentives such as high scores in exams, are more likely to focus only on unfamiliar items to “recognize” them in exams, whereas items “recognized” but not yet “rehearsed” are skimmed. As a result, these items may never be recalled outside of testing, resulting in limited access to LTM storage [23,29]. On the contrary, students with high intrinsic motivation might find studying more effortful and thus develop personal insights into the content. Therefore, spaced repetition may indirectly influence LTM storage strength through the intermediary of intrinsic motivation. Specifically, it elevates students’ learning capacity, self-efficacy, and incentive for self-growth, while controlling for their baseline proficiency [29]. The underlying reason is that spaced repetition helps students maintain the conscious effort to continue engaging with the spaced learning schedule.”
You can find the original references in the quoted paper below:
Yuan X. Evidence of the Spacing Effect and Influences on Perceptions of Learning and Science Curricula. Cureus. 2022 Jan 13;14(1):e21201. doi: 10.7759/cureus.21201. PMID: 35047318; PMCID: PMC8759977.
by viraptor on 11/10/24, 12:33 PM
For example I've done beginner's programming lessons with kids. Using Scratch, at the level of explaining what a variable is. There were 2 kids who would consume any knowledge given out of pure interest and everyone else who either was entertained while learning or immediately switched to playing ready games from the Scratch library. Anything close to "you're going to do learning/mind workout for the next hour" would just alienate all of them.
That's without even getting into how funny this idea would be to people with executive issues (which we have a decent representation of in tech) "allocate 4 hours" haha.
Don't get me wrong, I'm glad it works for him and if anyone finds it useful/motivating, I'm happy for you. But presenting this as something universal really annoys me. To be a bit more positive - any workout you actually do is better than the one you don't. If you need fun to continue, that's awesome. If you like a challenge, awesome. If you like goals, awesome.
by cloogshicer on 11/10/24, 12:29 PM
The main barrier to learning, for most people, is emotional, not intellectual.
Because of that, I disagree with most of what Karpathy wrote here.
by dr_dshiv on 11/10/24, 12:22 PM
Good quality learning materials can be fun if you want to learn — or miserable if you don’t.
I learn way more when I’m personally driven than if it feels like “I have to.” But that’s me.
by peter_d_sherman on 11/10/24, 12:32 PM
This idea is not wrong; however, I would rank 'persistence' (the willingness and ability to engage in learning down a specific path during many days, many weeks, many years, etc., etc.) as being higher in a "hierarchy of necessity for learning" than that of effort.
And I would rank 'unlearning' (the willingness and ability to "let go", become looser, less intransigent, entertain other opionions, other points of view, of what was previously learned down a specific path during many days, many weeks, many years, etc., etc.) as being higher still in a "hierarchy of necessity for learning" than even that of 'persistence'...
Finally, at the pinnacle of such a "hierarchy of necessity for learning" (should one ever exist!), I would rank 'Imagination' itself (AKA "the goal sought after", or more simply "The Goal!") as the highest tier, the pinnacle of such a "hierarchy of necessity for learning"...
(Also, if effort is to be made, it should be desired effort as opposed to undesired effort... i.e., effort coerced by other people and/or systems...)
But -- that's just me... :-)
Those above values are just mine and mine alone... one insignificant man's humble opinion...
Other people can and will have other "what's necessary for learning" hierarchies; other sets of values, as pertain to education as applied to themselves and groups of other people...
Related:
by nunez on 11/10/24, 3:49 PM
B) Also incredibly wrong. It is absolutely possible to educate in an entertaining way; loads of teachers do this daily! See also: Duolingo; early education learners; many educator YouTube channels
C) The gym analogy is also incorrect. The likelihood of someone dropping out from an exercise program skyrockets if they see it as a slog. It is possible to find ways of exercising that are fun; in fact this is the ONLY way to exercise in a long-term way.
by HarHarVeryFunny on 11/10/24, 4:12 PM
If you just consume educational content, without trying to use it (and learning from the failures and successes than ensue), then you are at best just memorizing, or at worst just entertaining yourself.
In order to learn how to actually DO something, whether mental or physical, you need to be actually DOING it yourself. The more you practice, and overcome failures, the better you will become.
The main reasons for needing to learn by DOING are that:
1) No author/teacher is going to 100% describe all you need to know. There will be omissions due to assumed knowledge, omissions due to limited examples, miscommunication due to teacher-student knowledge differences, etc, etc. You may watch a lecture, or read a book, and think "I get it!", but you'll only discover all these gaps and misunderstandings once you try to actually apply yourself.
2) The decision making involved in acting will be based on what's in YOUR head, not that of the teacher. The words in the book reflect what was in the teacher's head, but when you are hands-on trying to solve a problem it's YOU that has to make decisions, and how the teacher may have perceived the same problem and tackled it is largely unknown and irrelevant to you. You need to learn to bridge the gap between the transmitted knowledge and your own thought processes when trying to apply it.
by H8crilA on 11/10/24, 12:30 PM
by hamilyon2 on 11/10/24, 12:55 PM
God, it is painful. I think of myself as motivated and talented. It is a torture. It is rote and repetitive to no end. I feel helpless all the time. Progress is slow. Just nothing helps besides considerable concentrated effort. Not fun. Fun XOR progress.
by jacknews on 11/10/24, 12:31 PM
For example, my kids watch 'how to draw' videos on youtube, but they pause them every few seconds to copy the work, and then watch the explanations of how shadows work and so on.
There is some research on the effectiveness of videos in education, and how to use them properly (just watching is usually not enough), I'll try to dig up refs.
by indigo0086 on 11/10/24, 2:33 PM
by valval on 11/10/24, 3:28 PM
Nowadays I can force myself to learn topics that I don’t care too much about by dividing it into tasks, and “levels” that leads me to feel that I’m making progress on a classic progress bar type interface.
LLMs are pretty good for this, they help a lot with coming up with targets and such.
by zigzag312 on 11/10/24, 3:53 PM
The important thing is the result. That the person learning has learned the topic.
Which is better, learning with great effort or with low effort, if the quality of learning remains the same?
by agumonkey on 11/10/24, 1:12 PM
by auselen on 11/10/24, 8:07 PM
by croes on 11/10/24, 12:36 PM
> Learning is not supposed to be fun. It doesn't have to be actively not fun either, but the primary feeling should be that of effort.
by moogly on 11/10/24, 1:35 PM
OK. <closes Twitter tab>
by ignoramous on 11/10/24, 12:33 PM
by returnInfinity on 11/10/24, 1:57 PM