3 ms·
> But I certainly remember writing like mad for a long time while trying to catch what the teacher told, only to be told somewhere around lunchtime I think that
by srean 2y ago
> But I certainly remember writing like mad for a long time while trying to catch what the teacher told, only to be told somewhere around lunchtime I think that this wasn't actually important for engineering or even the exams, only included because it was interesting.
Depends what you are getting trained for. An acceptable cobbler who can patch up a broken shoe into something usable would have different pedagogic needs than one who is training to become a designer of the next-gen shoe. A vibrant economy needs both kinds.
That said, a big part of 'hacking' used to be about the pleasure of deeply understanding a topic, not necessarily just as means of earning or employment.
Was it Feynman who said something about whats the utility of physics and why do people engage in it ? I am paraphrasing his comment from faulty memory: sex is useful for reproduction but that's not why we engage in it.
Many here are into it for that other reason of hacking.
- nonrandomstring 2y agoMuch agree, and one of the reasons to try to make hacking and fun practical stuff part of a course is that the knowledge is stickier. You'll remember the Moog filter you built on a breadboard which made weird noises after you calculated the RC values wrong. Maybe not so much the perfect stopband you got a solver to make for you in a DSP simulator. Feynmann was all about that teaching realism. Also it takes about 6 months to a year of tinkering to really get "the pleasure of deeply understanding a topic". Many uni departments scrapped the electronics labs because it's all a bit messy, expensive and time consuming and I think the demand for people who teach it is getting smaller, at least here in UK. Last time I was asked to give an electronics class it was mainly digital switching of loads and hooking up I2C sensors. Still we had fun. That "just get the certificate" mentally of education doesn't leave much room for the play factor.
- srean 2y agoThe tension between who is the university for (students or their potential employer) and the tension around what is the university for (knowledge acquisition or for earning an accreditation) is a problem that society has not solved very well. I had hoped that online learning platforms such as Coursera and Edx would solve this by occupying the "for students" niche and the "for knowledge acquisition at the students preferred pace" niche. It did not quite turn out that way. Glad you and your students had fun tinkering.