----- Original Message -----
From: <G.J.Tielemans at dinkel.utwente.nl>
To: <squeak-dev at lists.squeakfoundation.org>
Sent: Monday, October 29, 2001 7:54 AM
Subject: RE: Lots of concurrency


> For a beginner all the activities in a problem space are loose ends.
> Who does not remember driving a car for the first time,
> All these things you have to do together.
> And now you drive a car, talk to your friends in the car, wave to that
> walking lady..
> Most of your loose ends of the beginning are now integrated in patterns,
> lots of them even subconsious:
> - Oops are we already here..
> - With which hand do you control the direction-lights, yes try to remember
> that.
> - If you drive a not automatic car: which foot do you use for the very
> imprtant break?
>
> Having lower things organised in patterns, makes room for higher or other
> skills.

Hello,
Well I can see that in the real world, and would have to agree.

> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Alan Kay [mailto:Alan.Kay at squeakland.org]
> > Sent: maandag 29 oktober 2001 8:31
> > To: squeak-dev at lists.squeakfoundation.org
> > Subject: Re: Lots of concurrency
> >
> >
> > If one is actually playing *music* when playing Bach on the pipe
> > organ, than one is indeed thinking deeply about all the parts at
> > once, how they intertwine and what they might "mean", both separately
> > and in combination. Same when one is improvising in counterpoint.
> > Same, if one is sight reading and trying to have real music flow out.
> > I'm afraid that one really does think about these in parallel
> > combination (as I said, very much like watching a theatrical
> > production with multiple actors on the stage, but sonically). It's
> > learnable, and lots of people have learned how. I believe that many
> > advanced thinking "skills" have quite a bit in common with all this.
> > You can learn how to have multiple "thinkers" working on different
> > aspects of ideas, all together.

Yes Alan,
You probably do, but I've seen enough to know there is an automatic pilot
that you sometimes see switched on for the same activities, where there is
no thinking except for pressing the "start button". From what I see there's
three and maybe more levels of thinking (automatic pilot, conscious action
and a level where you do something so well you don't know how you did it but
you'd love to be able to do it all the time but can't).
Regards,
Gary
PS. You're teaching methods are quite cool in combination with other
methods. I've learned quite a bit trying to figure out what you were talking
about for your increment methods. But its seems a teaching method for those
teachers who are brave or bigger than their students or distant from their
students because it may cause a tantrum or two.;-)
Regards,
Gary