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Not All Practice Makes Perfect

nautil.us

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Re: Not All Practice Makes Perfect

#51

Post by eitally »

andrewvc wrote: post #10
YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #5

Something I've noticed, which the article doesn't quite say (but sure hints at): you can accidentally teach yourself performance-degrading "techniques" if you keep practicing beyond a certain point. I used to study (modern) drums 5+ hours a day. This would happen sometimes, around the time when I was learning a new technique: I'd start on the new material, practice it for a while, then I'd get it to a so-so point and…

It's the same thing for sports. Even with pain as feedback something happens during sleep that helps you better absorb new lessons. The other thing is that for an athlete learning a new movement pattern they need time to build supporting muscles and perhaps improve mobility.

I was going to make a similar comment but take it a different direction. With sports, just like with music or anything else, you need to understand the context and reasoning behind skills training. A lot of people -- for example, playground ballers -- are awesome basketball players, but they're awesome at 1-on-1 and if you throw them into a structured, officiated game they'll contribute far below their raw abilities. Football is probably even more extreme.

With anything, you need to practice & study with intent, and with almost everything, having a coach/teacher/mentor/guide makes this much, much easier.

Re: Not All Practice Makes Perfect

#52

Post by nekomancer »

Sukotto wrote: post #36
Ma8ee wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it is a common mistake by people starting to learn for example an instrument. You play the new piece, often a bit too fast, and make a mistake. Then just repeat in the same way, making exactly the same mistake over and over again. The hope is that if you play it enough times and put in enough effort you will cease making the mistake. That is of course wrong. Instead you learn the mistake really really well. W…

Something else that really helps is backchaining. Split the thing you are learning into chunks... making each chunk as small/simple/easy as you can. Learn the chunks in reverse order. Starting with chunk N, then N-1, all the way to chunk 1. This way, you always start with the hardest part and then move onto the easier (more practiced) parts. This keeps the focus on the part you are trying to learn, and reduces learni…

With memorizing numbers as well, splitting them into chunks is also a good tactic, for example 392619582767 -> 392 619 582 767. It makes the whole thing a lot more tractable.

Re: Not All Practice Makes Perfect

#53

Post by codersteve »

siegecraft wrote: post #50
onion2k wrote: post #17

Really interesting. I wonder how you could use a similar technique to improve your code? Things like code reviews would give you the necessary feedback, but I can't think of a rigorous way to make sure you'd always be on the limit of what you're capable of, pushing a little further with each project.

You can certainly practice improving your mechanics, by which I mean your IDE/development environment whether it's keyboard shortcuts or workflow imrpovements. You can also do katas whether it's practicing TDD or setting up a new instance of a project in whatever framework you're using. I also find katas useful for keeping familiar with syntax of languages that I don't use a lot, which is useful if you do a lot of la…

>You can certainly practice improving your mechanics, by which I mean your IDE/development environment whether it's keyboard shortcuts or workflow improvements.

Maybe practicing this allows you to get into the zone more easily since you won't be thinking about the mechanics. Getting into the zone more easily can lead to getting better and deeper understanding of the material.

A guitar player practices repetitive drills that aren't creative to help improve.

Re: Not All Practice Makes Perfect

#54

Post by TheTrotters »

notacoward wrote: post #32

For those who might have missed it, one of the authors (Ericsson) is the same person who originally came up with the "expertise requires 10,000 hours of practice" idea that Malcolm Gladwell later popularized. Unfortunately, Gladwell mangled it as badly as he mangles everything else. As I had to point out on another story here recently, Ericsson was talking about 10,000 hours of highly focused and disciplined practice…

Actually Gladwell presented the idea pretty well in "Outliers". However, it quickly became a watered-down meme. People latched on the 10,000 hours and forgot about the deliberate practice part.

Re: Not All Practice Makes Perfect

#56

Post by HiroshiSan »

notacoward wrote: post #32

For those who might have missed it, one of the authors (Ericsson) is the same person who originally came up with the "expertise requires 10,000 hours of practice" idea that Malcolm Gladwell later popularized. Unfortunately, Gladwell mangled it as badly as he mangles everything else. As I had to point out on another story here recently, Ericsson was talking about 10,000 hours of highly focused and disciplined practice…

Ericsson clears up this misconception in PEAK.

Re: Not All Practice Makes Perfect

#57

Post by HiroshiSan »

krosaen wrote: post #6

The article keeps hinting at deliberate practice including, > The approach that he took, which we will call “purposeful practice,” turned out to be incredibly successful for him. It isn’t always so successful, as we shall see, but it is more effective than the usual just-enough method—and it is a step toward deliberate practice, which is our ultimate goal. but then cuts off before it actually describes deliberate pra…

I've bought the book and would highly recommend it to others wanting a glimpse into what it takes to become an expert performer.

There are two main differences between deliberate practice and purposeful practice.

Deliberate practice requires a well established field where there is a clear gap between the top performers and those entering the field.

The second difference is having a teacher who can design practice activities to help you improve on very specific skills.

Taken from the book "Deliberate practice is purposeful practice that knows where it is going and how to get there."

Re: Not All Practice Makes Perfect

#58

Post by tripzilch »

e12e wrote: post #37

Wasn't there an article on motor skill recently, how practising variations of a motion (or two different motions) can be wildly more effective than simply focusing on one single movement? I can't seem to find a hn posting, but this one is along the lines of what I'm thinking of: "The Fastest Way To Learn" http://www.jonahlehrer.com/blog/2016/2/15/the-fastest-way-to... While looking, I also came across: "Why Slow Move…

Yes, I am reminded of having read the same. Was it not the first link in your post? The skill subjects had to learn was based on a mouse-like control operated by squeezing.

Re: Not All Practice Makes Perfect

#59

Post by e12e »

tripzilch wrote: post #58
e12e wrote: post #37

Wasn't there an article on motor skill recently, how practising variations of a motion (or two different motions) can be wildly more effective than simply focusing on one single movement? I can't seem to find a hn posting, but this one is along the lines of what I'm thinking of: "The Fastest Way To Learn" http://www.jonahlehrer.com/blog/2016/2/15/the-fastest-way-to... While looking, I also came across: "Why Slow Move…

Yes, I am reminded of having read the same. Was it not the first link in your post? The skill subjects had to learn was based on a mouse-like control operated by squeezing.

Quite sure that the link I found was not the one I was thinking of. But I believe it probably was a link concerning the same paper.

Re: Not All Practice Makes Perfect

#60

Post by e12e »

e12e wrote: post #59
tripzilch wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I am reminded of having read the same. Was it not the first link in your post? The skill subjects had to learn was based on a mouse-like control operated by squeezing.

Quite sure that the link I found was not the one I was thinking of. But I believe it probably was a link concerning the same paper.

Came across the link by accident, apparently I had posted it to my facebook feed, here's the HN link:

"Researchers have discovered a much faster way to learn new skills" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11168515

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