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The Lesson to Unlearn

paulgraham.com

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Re: The Lesson to Unlearn

#571

Post by halflings »

kudokatz wrote: post #393
halflings wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW this wasn't my experience when interviewing with Amazon; I felt the bar was much lower than other companies I interviewed with, even when I wasn't that good at algorithmic problems. That's just one data point, and maybe what you're describing is for more senior hires?

I've found a generally higher bar than places like Microsoft but definitely a much lower bar than other FAANG companies, unicorns, and even tiny-but-potentially-elite startups run by people who know what they're doing.

Agreed, Microsoft was an even lower bar... but in a good way: I felt they just wanted someone with basic CS knowledge, whereas the Amazon interviewers seemed to think they were some sort of elite group of engineers.

Re: The Lesson to Unlearn

#572

Post by sirspacey »

This is the difference between project-based learning and standardized testing.

When you learn through projects your ability to apply concepts is tested by the results you generate, connecting to our intrinsic motivations.

Standardized testing is, functionally a disease. Check out “DIY University” to see the effect it has on society long-term.

If you think projects can’t be the path to teaching highly abstract disciplines, such as physics, check out “Surely You’re Joking Mr. Feynman.”

“Most Likely to Succeed” is probably the best book written on this topic.

I spent 10 years as an edtech entrepreneur. It is hard to overstate the degree to which we have built a Testing system at the expense of an educational one.

Re: The Lesson to Unlearn

#573

Post by ALBERT300 »

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Re: The Lesson to Unlearn

#574

Post by Doxin »

speleding wrote: post #566
prox wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember this history teacher who was a breath of fresh air. He told us in advance his test where very simple. And the reason was quite genius: if you just listened and took a few notes here and there, you’d pass the test. Which freed the mind to really absorb the knowledge and have fun with the subject matter. He was also very good in discerning knowledge and teaching why a certain topic was good to know. I think…

Sounds good, but I could easily see this backfire with students that have been taught to hack the system: "Great, we're getting an easy pass here, let's spend zero time on it and focus on those other subjects that require rote memorising"

Right, but that same thing would happen with more intensive testing anyways. You can lead a horse to water but not make him drink and all that.

Re: The Lesson to Unlearn

#575

Post by Kaiyou »

taeric wrote: post #570
Kaiyou wrote: post #567

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If your model can't be used to predict things in reality, then what good is it? If I throw a feather down from a rooftop and then I let a brick fall down, the brick will hit the earth first. The heavier thing falls "faster". You can use a bunch of words to explain what's really going on there, but it won't change that the brick hits the earth first, hence it falls faster. Unless you can predict the future correctly a…

I distinguished between velocity and acceleration. My point was strictly that many people will falsely think gravity somehow meaningfully pulls lighter objects at a lower rate. This despite days off lessons that gravity on Earth is basically a constant. That is to say, if your model of speed of things falling is hinged solely on gravity, it will not be predictive in the extremes. Of course, most folks aren't playing…

Doesn't explain why the paper plane glides, though. I was always frustrated in physics class. There just wasn't enough precision to describe reality and everytime a test said "ignore friction" I would mentally shout out "but there is friggin' friction". Math made a lot more sense and it was only with advanced math knowledge that I would finally be able to make sense of some of the entry physics stuff.

If only they had told me everything (including friction), then maybe phyics would have made a lot more sense to me. But then again, school math never even mentioned imaginary numbers. School is very incomplete.

Re: The Lesson to Unlearn

#576

Post by grappler »

Coming back to this discussion a few days later as I've just started an online course on Kubernetes from the Linux Foundation and I came across this section in the introduction materials that seemed very relevant here. Quoting from it:

  Training/Certification Firewall

  The Linux Foundation has two separate training divisions:
  Course Delivery and Certification. These two divisions are
  separated by a firewall. 

  The curriculum development and maintenance division of the
  Linux Foundation Training department has no direct role in
  developing, administering, or grading certification exams. 

  Enforcing this self-imposed firewall ensures that
  independent organizations and companies can develop third
  party training material, geared towards helping test
  takers pass their certification exams. 

  Furthermore, it ensures that there are no secret "tips"
  (or secrets in general) that one needs to be familiar with
  in order to succeed. 

  It also permits the Linux Foundation to develop a very
  robust set of courses that do far more than teach the
  test, but rather equip attendees with a broad knowledge
  of the many areas they may be required to master to have a
  successful career in open source system administration.
Running with this idea a bit, suppose schools were organized this way, with a similar "teaching/testing firewall" across everything they do. This doesn't get us all the way to solving problems around "teaching to the test" but it does put in place separate entities with the explicit mandate of making tests less 'hackable'.

Re: The Lesson to Unlearn

#577

Post by taeric »

Kaiyou wrote: post #575
taeric wrote: post #570

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I distinguished between velocity and acceleration. My point was strictly that many people will falsely think gravity somehow meaningfully pulls lighter objects at a lower rate. This despite days off lessons that gravity on Earth is basically a constant. That is to say, if your model of speed of things falling is hinged solely on gravity, it will not be predictive in the extremes. Of course, most folks aren't playing…

Doesn't explain why the paper plane glides, though. I was always frustrated in physics class. There just wasn't enough precision to describe reality and everytime a test said "ignore friction" I would mentally shout out "but there is friggin' friction". Math made a lot more sense and it was only with advanced math knowledge that I would finally be able to make sense of some of the entry physics stuff. If only they ha…

And yet friction alone wouldn't do it, either. Consider balloons.

Same goes for everything underwater. Which follows from viewing air as a medium you are traveling through.

Are there bad teachers that need to more honestly cover some of the assumptions? Yes. They are a useful tool, though.

Re: The Lesson to Unlearn

#578

Post by aprdm »

quantdev wrote: post #466
arman_ashrafian wrote: post #452

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look up "edit distance"... it is one of the first problems an Algorithms course will discuss that can be solved by dynamic programming. But ya, no way anyone is coming up with that unless they have seen it before.

I 100% would be able to solve this problem without seeing it before. Yes, this is because I've practiced a lot of algorithm problems (and I enjoy them, frankly). Yes, this is hackable, but relying on resumes like every other industry (which is implicitly relying on hoop-jumping and college prestige and GPA) is a much worse form of hackable. This levels the playing field and is a signal for (1) how smart someone is an…

I don't think it is a proxy to how smart someone is. I will take point (2) tho.

Re: The Lesson to Unlearn

#580

Post by tempodox »

eeZah7Ux wrote: post #137
manmal wrote: post #20

My wife and I are contemplating unschooling our kids. The longer our son is in primary school, the more we see the deterioration of his willingness to learn anything school-related. He hates homework (as do most kids), and this is even more painful to see given that it has been shown that homework is essentially useless for learning performance. He still likes to write and do math, but as long as he is in school, we…

> The longer our son is in primary school, the more we see the deterioration of his willingness to learn anything school-related Been there myself. Most school systems have been developed to produce workers, not scholars and researchers. Hence, rota memorization in prioritized. Getting people to hate learning is not seen as a serious failure of the school system. Also, students are never encouraged to question the in…

> learn anything school-related

non scholae sed vitae discimus.

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