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I completely agree. I try to do it as well, but my biggest issue with it ends up being time constraints and the teacher I mentioned in another post who wants us

I completely agree. I try to do it as well, but my biggest issue with it ends up being time constraints and the teacher I mentioned in another post who wants us to all be doing the same thing on the same day (said teacher also prides herself on how fast she covers the material... Kids don't like it as she never reviews or spends more than a day on any topic)

ddingus 8y ago
Too bad the students are not at the same frame of mind each day.
ddingus 8y ago
Just revisited this. There should be topics and time. How that time gets used is really driven by students. They get there, or they do not. And, doing all this is expensive human time. They really want, need and should get there. One thing I get to do, as my role is rarely formal education, is prepare 200 percent topic agendas. Prep as if I have Feynmans in the room. Look out! Here they come. :D (And I am always hoping, because when that happens I myself am definitely going to learn something. Often pain in the ass learning, but it keeps my blood pumping, leaving nothing but getting after my own understanding.) Then, assign priorities. Basics get done no matter what. I do not want fails. Just quietly drop extras. From there, I am highly likely to be golden. Usually, someone asks something new. Good. I got the prep done solid, so I research that one, add to the library of stuff I have ready. Then, I coach them, they tackle stuff, wash, rinse repeat. I will, depending on material, also show a solution or few, again depending. Discuss, on to the next. Over time, I get super good at whatever it is, and students can generally max out, getting all they can. When I can, I set a chunk of the time aside as open time. People can fill a gap with that. Or explore, seek. Whatever. I am there to assist and challenge as they need. This is a challenging way to do the work, but it works well. Often, I am doing this for people who just took jobs, or who have some requirement. Fails are painful. That is why I do it this way. Just some context for my comments above. There is a bonus. Once I have prepped and delivered a few times, I can often do the course by rote. My own mastery ends up solid, and I've got a ton of context, accumulated one student at a time, to work from when identifying where people new to me are, and what they are likely to need. Those go into the chalk talk, which almost always has custom bits tuned for the group at hand. And that is tools, not solutions. They do that, picking up the reference material, exercizes, and the bits from the coaching talk. Competency tends to come reasonably quickly. Then we do fun stuff, entertain any seeking, special needs, wants as time allows.

ddingus 8y ago

Too bad the students are not at the same frame of mind each day.

ddingus 8y ago

Just revisited this. There should be topics and time. How that time gets used is really driven by students. They get there, or they do not. And, doing all this is expensive human time. They really want, need and should get there. One thing I get to do, as my role is rarely formal education, is prepare 200 percent topic agendas. Prep as if I have Feynmans in the room. Look out! Here they come. :D (And I am always hoping, because when that happens I myself am definitely going to learn something. Often pain in the ass learning, but it keeps my blood pumping, leaving nothing but getting after my own understanding.) Then, assign priorities. Basics get done no matter what. I do not want fails. Just quietly drop extras. From there, I am highly likely to be golden. Usually, someone asks something new. Good. I got the prep done solid, so I research that one, add to the library of stuff I have ready. Then, I coach them, they tackle stuff, wash, rinse repeat. I will, depending on material, also show a solution or few, again depending. Discuss, on to the next. Over time, I get super good at whatever it is, and students can generally max out, getting all they can. When I can, I set a chunk of the time aside as open time. People can fill a gap with that. Or explore, seek. Whatever. I am there to assist and challenge as they need. This is a challenging way to do the work, but it works well. Often, I am doing this for people who just took jobs, or who have some requirement. Fails are painful. That is why I do it this way. Just some context for my comments above. There is a bonus. Once I have prepped and delivered a few times, I can often do the course by rote. My own mastery ends up solid, and I've got a ton of context, accumulated one student at a time, to work from when identifying where people new to me are, and what they are likely to need. Those go into the chalk talk, which almost always has custom bits tuned for the group at hand. And that is tools, not solutions. They do that, picking up the reference material, exercizes, and the bits from the coaching talk. Competency tends to come reasonably quickly. Then we do fun stuff, entertain any seeking, special needs, wants as time allows.