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> Kids learn simple activities this way, but they won't learn complicated ones. That is why all larger civilizations had tutors or schools for those expected to

> Kids learn simple activities this way, but they won't learn complicated ones. That is why all larger civilizations had tutors or schools for those expected to do non-simple work (read not poor). No reference to age, claims that all non simple skills were learned from tutors or schools. If you read Anthropology of Childhood hunter gatherers really don’t do explicit instruction in anything resembling structured lesssons, ever. Children and adolescents watch, imitate, beg to be left to do things and occasionally get maybe five minutes of an explanation that amounts to “That’s wrong, do it like this.” And that’s really, really rare. Farming is very far from being simple or easy work and no peasants taught their children how to farm, they got them to be useful where they could, as they could. There’s a certain amount of explicit instruction in apprenticeship but there’s a hell of a lot more practice and observation than explicit and deliberate information or skill transfer.

watwut 8y ago
Peasants did taught their children to farm and craft to the extend that was possible. There is a lot of knowledge captured in sayings (at least in my language) that rhyme for better recall. When literacy started in region, farming advice and hints written into book are first usages of it. It is that useful. Writing changed farming, effectively. This kind of learning had definitive limits. Great example of it is Russia which had feudalism longer then west and had large illiteracy rates. When literacy started to be a bit more common, before WWI essentially, the way they farmed became way more effective - they used much less effective methods before. The style of learning you describe happen to coincide with low effectivity, poverty and social problems. The reason apprenticeship learning could be based on observation only is that the amount of knowledge to learn was smaller. Landlords and aristocrats had tutors and teachers - because you won't learn that by observation only. You don't learn history or math or chemistry either. You don't learn reading like that (there are only few exceptions).

watwut 8y ago

Peasants did taught their children to farm and craft to the extend that was possible. There is a lot of knowledge captured in sayings (at least in my language) that rhyme for better recall. When literacy started in region, farming advice and hints written into book are first usages of it. It is that useful. Writing changed farming, effectively. This kind of learning had definitive limits. Great example of it is Russia which had feudalism longer then west and had large illiteracy rates. When literacy started to be a bit more common, before WWI essentially, the way they farmed became way more effective - they used much less effective methods before. The style of learning you describe happen to coincide with low effectivity, poverty and social problems. The reason apprenticeship learning could be based on observation only is that the amount of knowledge to learn was smaller. Landlords and aristocrats had tutors and teachers - because you won't learn that by observation only. You don't learn history or math or chemistry either. You don't learn reading like that (there are only few exceptions).