[squeak-dev] Re: How people learn

Ronald Spengler ron.spengler at gmail.com
Sun Nov 22 19:51:54 UTC 2009


I'm pretty visual, but I'd say there are only certain kinds of
concepts that are expressed well visually. I think it has to do with
what parts of the brain do what. For example, syntax/grammar is
something that the linguistic parts of the brain process "natively."
Even railroad tracks (which are a great formal visualization, and can
show me exactly how a grammar works visually) don't teach me how to
toss a language around like some good examples do. Then again, when I
was nine I couldn't wrap my head around what an array was. I asked my
uncle to explain it, and he tried twice, and I just looked really
confused. Then he drew one up on a scrap of paper and I got it right
away.

In spite of the fact that we've been doing it for longer than we can
regularly fathom, I think teaching is still a young art, and a younger
science. We still understand so little about the goop in our skulls.

I *really* dig the explorer thingie. If I'm having any trouble
grokking something I can just send it explore and then wander about
the object in a way that visually describes the internal tree
structure. I have to say: it's absolutely beautiful that folks thought
to create a computing system that was optimized for learning.

The beauty of Smalltalk is that once you've learned to fish, you have
good odds of figuring out what you need to know without asking anyone.
(I would think that if someone ever does an O'Reilly book on it, it
should have a nice fish on the cover.)

Trygve's project is very interesting to me, as a visual learner.

2009/11/22 Randal L. Schwartz <merlyn at stonehenge.com>:
>>>>>> "Alexander" == Alexander Lazarević <laza at blobworks.com> writes:
>
> Alexander> So your visual perception is something like this [1]? ;)
>
> More or less... that was a good metaphor.
>
> In my world, it doesn't exist until it is named.
>
> --
> Randal L. Schwartz - Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc. - +1 503 777 0095
> <merlyn at stonehenge.com> <URL:http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/>
> Smalltalk/Perl/Unix consulting, Technical writing, Comedy, etc. etc.
> See http://methodsandmessages.vox.com/ for Smalltalk and Seaside discussion
>
>



-- 
Ron



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