4 ms·

Call me obtuse and change my view please: I'm actually quite interested in this spatial learning thing. I had an aboriginal acquaintance who explained to me ho

by chewxy 12y ago

Call me obtuse and change my view please: I'm actually quite interested in this spatial learning thing. I had an aboriginal acquaintance who explained to me how his culture would attach meaning to places and even physical orientation (North South East West etc). However, it has been so far very very difficult for me to wrap my head around that. Visual notation imo, has been the most efficient way of communicating between humans. It also helps a lot in understanding. A lot of what he says harks back to a 1980s/1990s/early 2000s style of teaching with an increasing use of "aids". Using props to teach math is a bit silly (well, asides from geometry, which is inherently spatial). I really cannot see how we can represent the learning of linear algebra in a dynamic spatial manner. How for example, would one represent higher dimensional spaces spatially, when you really are limited to only 3 dimensions in real life? I am aware that Iron Man style projection tech may actually help in visualizing it, but again, that's a visual aspect of learning, not spatial. The most efficient way of doing so unfortunately is still in algebraic notation. Perhaps I'm doubtful because the use of props, spaces, songs, moving your body etc has never worked for me in school. Ever. Can anyone share any studies done on the use of these cheesy 1980s-1990s educational aids (the closest analogue to all the things Brett mentioned) in aiding learning? EDIT: If you're interested, there's been a good book that I read, in attempt to wrap my head around the concept (however to no avail) - Wisdom Sits in Places.

schoen 12y ago
One of the educational techniques you're alluding to is probably TPR (total physical response), for foreign language teaching. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_physical_response https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_physical_response I had a Spanish teacher and later a Latin teacher (teaching adults) who favored TPR and would tell people to jump a specified number of times, or to touch their heads, and so on. I don't have a clear opinion about the effectiveness of TPR but I thought I'd mention the name so you could use it to search for research if you like. There is also a century-old approach to using colors to visualize 4D geometry (I think the color represents the offset in the 4th spatial dimension), proposed by Charles H. Hinton; they're called "Hinton cubes". Martin Gardner describes them and reports that some people have found them too effective, I guess becoming mildly obsessed with them or having the learned associations interfere somehow with day-to-day visual perception.
shkkmo 12y ago
When I learned/taught myself algebra in an experimental school in 6th grade, we had these alegrba blocks and 2x2 grid, the left/right sides representing the sides of the equation and the top/bottom sides representing postitive/negative. There are some pretty big limitations on how far in algebra you can go with that. I do think it created a solid foundation for my mental model as I transitioned to only using symbolic equations.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
justifier 12y ago
i think the word learning is a misnomer here, the term learning in itself is dubious enough look to the best line, and i'd argue one of the most important ideas to ingestively portray to a mainstream population, in 2008 cinema, also an argument could be made to increase that reach.. perhaps in the last decade, century, however hyperbolically you care to extend the reach.. from the film burn after reading(i): CIA Superior: What did we learn, Palmer? CIA Officer: I don't know, sir. CIA Superior: I don't fuckin' know either. I guess we learned not to do it again. CIA Officer: Yes, sir. CIA Superior: I'm fucked if I know what we did. i think what victor is suggesting here would aide moreso in efforts to improve understanding than facilitate a traditional understanding of learning when quantum mechanics was young there was a sudden rush of interest in quantum understanding and one of the modes of expressing improvements in that understanding was to create models(ii) sometimes completely replacing old models, if i remember victor even says bohrs name in relation to this concept this i think is the sorts of things victor is alluding to, stead seeing it as learning think of it as new perspectives to improve understanding.. interestingly though one would have to learn the concepts, both current and avant, in order to know when a new expressive medium improves on the old so knowledge accumulation is a part of this sort of environment, but arguable only subordinate to the true goals the shot of the stick figure pushing on a bond between elements in a molecular model i feel is the best representation of this idea i'd love to have a room like that: a central tool with supporting data surrounding it the central tool is imbued with evidencial data w when i manipulate the tool new data is expressed in different ways around me i apply my changes physically the the data maps all changing in sync lets say i want to try to bond a new element in place of an old one, i can do it physically and watch as the object changes before me in the picture the stick figure is applying force on that bond, perhaps the idea the figure is testing is what if i bend this bond or strain it, what then? or if i move this bond over here does this better represent our understanding of molecules? . my issue with the talk was two fold, i thought victor tended to talk down efforts others have already made or are making to do something with similar goals but in a wholly different means, and victor also failed to mention the number of people already doing the very things he is suggesting, it came off as unnecessarily dramatic and i found those were the times when he really lost me to wandering thoughts and also i found it interesting that victor seemed to suggest this new dynamic reality would manifest without the use of current forms of creation things like, ~programming of the future will be different than programming of today~ which i both agree and disagree with, i think both the current and future ways to program will be in tandem and it will be more of a matter of who touches what aspects of it, i think like hardware design and manufacture programming will become a specialised field look at compilers, that is people really interested in low level bit moving granting people with high level interests.. in the programming sense stead some cogitive nobile sense.. access to their expertise from within the comforts of the higher level the same i believe will be true but that gap will likely grow as it has with hardware manufacture there will always be a need and opportunity for tinkers to challenge the manufacture to keep it fresh, like the hardware scene(iii), but realistically this shift in software will most likely have the same dramatic effect on quality of life as the hardware model has . (i) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0887883/?ref_=ttqt_qt_tt http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0887883/?ref_=ttqt_qt_tt (ii) https://www.timetoast.com/timelines/atomic-model-timeline--3 https://www.timetoast.com/timelines/atomic-model-timeline--3 (iii) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdcKwOo7dmM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdcKwOo7dmM

by chewxy 12y ago

schoen 12y ago

One of the educational techniques you're alluding to is probably TPR (total physical response), for foreign language teaching. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_physical_response https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_physical_response I had a Spanish teacher and later a Latin teacher (teaching adults) who favored TPR and would tell people to jump a specified number of times, or to touch their heads, and so on. I don't have a clear opinion about the effectiveness of TPR but I thought I'd mention the name so you could use it to search for research if you like. There is also a century-old approach to using colors to visualize 4D geometry (I think the color represents the offset in the 4th spatial dimension), proposed by Charles H. Hinton; they're called "Hinton cubes". Martin Gardner describes them and reports that some people have found them too effective, I guess becoming mildly obsessed with them or having the learned associations interfere somehow with day-to-day visual perception.

shkkmo 12y ago

When I learned/taught myself algebra in an experimental school in 6th grade, we had these alegrba blocks and 2x2 grid, the left/right sides representing the sides of the equation and the top/bottom sides representing postitive/negative. There are some pretty big limitations on how far in algebra you can go with that. I do think it created a solid foundation for my mental model as I transitioned to only using symbolic equations.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

justifier 12y ago

i think the word learning is a misnomer here, the term learning in itself is dubious enough look to the best line, and i'd argue one of the most important ideas to ingestively portray to a mainstream population, in 2008 cinema, also an argument could be made to increase that reach.. perhaps in the last decade, century, however hyperbolically you care to extend the reach.. from the film burn after reading(i): CIA Superior: What did we learn, Palmer? CIA Officer: I don't know, sir. CIA Superior: I don't fuckin' know either. I guess we learned not to do it again. CIA Officer: Yes, sir. CIA Superior: I'm fucked if I know what we did. i think what victor is suggesting here would aide moreso in efforts to improve understanding than facilitate a traditional understanding of learning when quantum mechanics was young there was a sudden rush of interest in quantum understanding and one of the modes of expressing improvements in that understanding was to create models(ii) sometimes completely replacing old models, if i remember victor even says bohrs name in relation to this concept this i think is the sorts of things victor is alluding to, stead seeing it as learning think of it as new perspectives to improve understanding.. interestingly though one would have to learn the concepts, both current and avant, in order to know when a new expressive medium improves on the old so knowledge accumulation is a part of this sort of environment, but arguable only subordinate to the true goals the shot of the stick figure pushing on a bond between elements in a molecular model i feel is the best representation of this idea i'd love to have a room like that: a central tool with supporting data surrounding it the central tool is imbued with evidencial data w when i manipulate the tool new data is expressed in different ways around me i apply my changes physically the the data maps all changing in sync lets say i want to try to bond a new element in place of an old one, i can do it physically and watch as the object changes before me in the picture the stick figure is applying force on that bond, perhaps the idea the figure is testing is what if i bend this bond or strain it, what then? or if i move this bond over here does this better represent our understanding of molecules? . my issue with the talk was two fold, i thought victor tended to talk down efforts others have already made or are making to do something with similar goals but in a wholly different means, and victor also failed to mention the number of people already doing the very things he is suggesting, it came off as unnecessarily dramatic and i found those were the times when he really lost me to wandering thoughts and also i found it interesting that victor seemed to suggest this new dynamic reality would manifest without the use of current forms of creation things like, ~programming of the future will be different than programming of today~ which i both agree and disagree with, i think both the current and future ways to program will be in tandem and it will be more of a matter of who touches what aspects of it, i think like hardware design and manufacture programming will become a specialised field look at compilers, that is people really interested in low level bit moving granting people with high level interests.. in the programming sense stead some cogitive nobile sense.. access to their expertise from within the comforts of the higher level the same i believe will be true but that gap will likely grow as it has with hardware manufacture there will always be a need and opportunity for tinkers to challenge the manufacture to keep it fresh, like the hardware scene(iii), but realistically this shift in software will most likely have the same dramatic effect on quality of life as the hardware model has . (i) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0887883/?ref_=ttqt_qt_tt http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0887883/?ref_=ttqt_qt_tt (ii) https://www.timetoast.com/timelines/atomic-model-timeline--3 https://www.timetoast.com/timelines/atomic-model-timeline--3 (iii) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdcKwOo7dmM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdcKwOo7dmM