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I think the persistence of the myth is at least partly due to the fact that it aligns well with informal observations. You have a class, and some of the studen
by abruzzi 11y ago
I think the persistence of the myth is at least partly due to the fact that it aligns well with informal observations. You have a class, and some of the students have difficulty absorbing the material. So those students are taken aside and taught to in different ways, which are, sometimes, successful. So, informally, people come to believe that those students were better reached by the alternative methods, when in reality it may have been the repetition, extra attention, or something else that improved their scores.
- mhuffman 11y agoI might be missing something here but isn't there a big difference between "we don't have any conclusive evidence yet" and "this is a myth and is false"? Also, I think some of the persistence of this "myth" is that people (adults) will flat-out tell you that they may not be able to absorb certain information without seeing some visual representation of it, whereas others will tell they can understand more easily, for example, just from a verbal description.
- dhimes 11y agoThus far, falsifiable hypotheses test to "false." Perhaps we are not framing the problem properly. Here's a quick assessment: When somebody gets directions from Google maps, do they prefer the written, listed directions, or the map (in the happy circumstance where both conveyed the same information)? Some people prefer the lists; some the maps. So we might think of the former as verbal learners and the latter as visual. The problem is, in the context of learning, both (self-described) verbal and visual learners seem to learn better visually.
- vorg 11y ago> both (self-described) verbal and visual learners seem to learn better visually Though I'm guessing verbal learners and visual learners both learn better when doing a task utilizing both visual and verbal senses, than they would doing either a visual only or a verbal only task. The verbal-visual distinction could be a distinction between 60% verbal / 40% visual on the one hand and 40% verbal / 60% visual on the other. I'd also guess that if students are forced to make some body movements (kinesthetic learning) at the same time as speaking/listening (verbal) and watching/diagramming (visual), retention of material is even greater for virtually all of them.
- analog31 11y agoI have worked in manufacturing plants. One thing I've observed is that a unit will be tested after assembly. If it passes, it gets shipped. If it fails, it's tested again, perhaps with some token adjustment or swapping of components with other units.
- mcnamaratw 11y agoCareful! Think back to those plants. How many people, especially higher-ups, wanted to hear about that problem?
- analog31 11y agoThankfully, yes. This was in an industry that had evolved from a market, where customers kinda expected occasional problems. It was like 1970s cars. Or, maybe like racing cars, where the customer accepts a risk of failure in order to receive the highest possible performance. The business was interested in modernizing, and gradually weaned itself away from practices such as I described. We had to find a way to make it happen, that would also make the higher-ups happy about the effect on the bottom line. I don't want to name names, but today, it is a much different place. To get over this issue requires something analogous to unit testing in software: You have to understand how the correct functioning of the full system builds on the properties of the units.
- mcnamaratw 11y agoI've been there. That's great to hear.