Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Fuck Your Miracle Year

rogersbacon.substack.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 169 posts

Re: Fuck Your Miracle Year

#141

Post by mkl95 »

ciphol wrote: post #137
mkl95 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was able to do that while I was still studying, which mostly involved memorizing a bunch of stuff. The software industry and its endless meetings drain my energy way more

Are there any other pieces of software you want to write? Depending on your financial situation, see if you can quit or take off your job for a year and write it. The years aren't going to come back to you, and you don't want to die having pushed off your dream until it was too late...

The number of side projects I have had to leave aside in the last few years is close to a dozen. I was able to implement some of my smaller ideas and I open sourced them, which boosted my career. But I don't want them to be a means to an end, I want to actually have the time to build them properly and make a living off one of them some day.

Unfortunately my country has infamously low salaries while having a relatively high cost of living. I have some savings, but I would burn them at a pretty fast rate if I quit my job. My best chance at having another "miracle year" is getting fired, which would immediately provide me with some more liquid cash plus monthly unemployment benefits for a while. At that point I could move to one of the cheaper areas and be financially independent for years.

Re: Fuck Your Miracle Year

#143

Post by shakezula »

ajmurmann wrote: post #74
jameshart wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the things that is deeply ingrained in education curricula, yet which doesn’t seem remotely justified pedagogically, is the timetable. The idea of studying lots of subjects, all at once, via daily or weekly sub-hour-long bite-sized lessons. If you threw out all the context switching and review and catch-up, you could probably teach most year-long high school subject curricula in a week.

I think you are on to something. At the same time I wonder about content sticking if you don't practice the subject for months. Doing math two months of the year (ignoring the math you might need in physics class) might mean you have to rehash a lot. That said, for many subjects this wouldn't even change anything. How often does learning something in history class currently rely on what you learned a few months ago?…

Year-round schooling has proven this point time and time again. Students in summers-off schedules spend months catching back up to where they left off.

Re: Fuck Your Miracle Year

#144

Post by javajosh »

mattkrause wrote: post #102
javajosh wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I learned algebra in middle school, in one year. What is this insanity of which you speak?

“Algebra” by itself is meaninglessly broad. You could certainly teach “solve [some simple kinds of] equations for an unknown” in a few months; you could also have a whole mathematical career as an algebraist.

The term is not meaninglessly broad here in the US. We use the term "abstract algebra" to describe the more general subject, usually taught in college-level courses in groups, fields, and so on. Mere 'algebra' does indeed mostly mean "solving for an unknown", although I'd argue there's an important, more general concept of 'equation' introduced. From what I've read the concept of 'variable' is tricky for a lot of kids.

Re: Fuck Your Miracle Year

#145

Post by BeFlatXIII »

nsxwolf wrote: post #50
nerdponx wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have become convinced that inadequate public schooling is the reason why America has come to rely so much on college to make people "ready for society". Teachers are criminally underpaid, unsupported, and overworked, while parents are not engaged with their children's learning. It's a bad mix. Not to mention the politicization of teacher unions.

If they’re overworked, what is it they’re working so hard and so ineffectively at?

They're ineffective precisely because they're overworked.

Re: Fuck Your Miracle Year

#146

Post by BeFlatXIII »

jameshart wrote: post #42
spir wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember how slowly high school math moved. How uninspired English class was. The poor curriculum and tools in programming class. imo, there is definitely a primary and secondary education problem vs. the early-life academic environments that helped to produce yesteryear's great thinkers. https://erikhoel.substack.com/p/why-we-stopped-making-einste...

One of the things that is deeply ingrained in education curricula, yet which doesn’t seem remotely justified pedagogically, is the timetable. The idea of studying lots of subjects, all at once, via daily or weekly sub-hour-long bite-sized lessons. If you threw out all the context switching and review and catch-up, you could probably teach most year-long high school subject curricula in a week.

I slightly disagree. It takes time and repetition for some things to sink in. IMO, moving to more college-like A/B days would be better. I would not expect history lessons to stick if you compressed 180 days of AP Euro into two weeks at eight hours a day. Likewise, math classes moving that fast would give students the feeling they learned a ton without any retention. That said, I feel like literature and writing could be subjects that fit into this model of intensive week-long workshops once each year.

Re: Fuck Your Miracle Year

#147

Post by BeFlatXIII »

vostok wrote: post #52
nostrebored wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We send some of our worst thinkers to educate children. Trigonometry didn’t make sense to me as a kid because I was learning from someone who didn’t understand it. They could memorize a lot of rules, but they didn’t understand it. In the face of this, what makes the most sense is fostering curiosity. Your teachers not understanding material doesn’t matter if their role is prompting you to ask the right questions and…

> We send some of our worst thinkers to educate children. I wonder if this is the sort of thing that could be fixed by paying teachers more. Why would a smart person become a teacher if a professional industry job will pay $300-500k and a teaching job will pay $100k? Is paying teachers so much even palatable to the general public?

It's not just pay. Teachers will willingly take pay cuts to teach at private schools. Why?

1. Students with chronic behavior problems are easier to throw out

2. Parents are less likely to go on idiotic crusades about the content of the curriculum

3. The school board (or, more likely, the state legislature) isn't going to make irrelevant changes to appease voters

Private schools are more likely to treat their teachers as independent professionals rather than glorified babysitters or McEducation employees.

Re: Fuck Your Miracle Year

#148

Post by dylan604 »

brtkdotse wrote: post #131
dylan604 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear this a lot, but what exactly is administrative tasks they are being burdened with that is not part of being a teacher?

From what I’ve heard from acquaintances who work(ed) as teachers, there’s a lot of of documentation of the students’ progress that takes a lot of time to enter but usually is write-only.

If it's known to be write-only, then only they are to blame for wasting time. They could literally write anything, or nothing, and nobody would ever know, right? Otherwise, it's not write-only.

Re: Fuck Your Miracle Year

#149

Post by sydthrowaway »

queuebert wrote: post #91
apples_oranges wrote: post #13

The miracle year will be when we will stop obsessing about success so much. Must be a perceived lack of love. So: Love your kids better, that's how you produce future miracle years.

I thought raising kids in dysfunctional households was how you imbue them with an insatiable thirst for validation that leads them to found companies and become billionaires.

Billionaires yes, amazing discoveries, no.

Re: Fuck Your Miracle Year

#150

Post by sydthrowaway »

mkl95 wrote: post #30

My miracle year was when I was 18 or 19 and I wrote my first large piece of software by myself. I'm approaching my late 20s now and I haven't had as much sustained fun ever since. Being a wage slave sucks.

I have an idea.

Stop working at work and code what you want.

Post reply on HN