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The EdTech Revolution Has Failed

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Re: The EdTech Revolution Has Failed

#501

Post by dennis_jeeves2 »

tptacek wrote: post #498
dennis_jeeves2 wrote: post #495

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heritability: Black kid born to black parents. The blackness is heritable Innate: Albino kid born to black parents ( mutation, etc..) So here Albinism is innate to kid but not inherited. That's a black and white definition ( for the sake of conversation). There can be intermediate states. For example even if the kid's skin is black there can be variation in skin tone, so slight mutation, but still largely inherited.

Heritability is the ratio of genetic variance to phenotypical variance. How heritable do you think the number of fingers on your hand is?

Anyway to answer your question the number of fingers in one's hand would be nearly 100% inheritable. A more accurate figure would be 99.

tptacek , I'm not sure why you are hung up so much on the specifics, haven't we veer well past the main topic? My getting the definition of heritability, innateness etc. in this should not matter beyond a certain point. I understand that if we were experts debating a certain tropic definitions matter. Quirks , physical trait, depression, mental illnesses, and by extension IQ would run in families, this was common knowledge in the pre-modern era. ( and probably is still so in many parts of the an on urbanized world). Ofcourse one has to separate out the external factors like common food habits (that was common to these families) would impact psychological traits.

Re: The EdTech Revolution Has Failed

#502

Post by oytis »

shortrounddev2 wrote: post #406
oytis wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair - maybe that's what the product mentioned should have been doing? You can focus on general problem-solving ability by giving talented kids hard problems with the amount of knowledge adequate for their level rather giving them more an more material and making the whole learning process less manageable.

"general problem solving ability" isn't a real thing. Proficiency in solving, for example, math problems, does not confer the ability to draw conclusions based on evidence in history class. If you require a kid who's already mastered fractions to simply do harder and harder fractions rather than allowing them to continue onward, they will become bored and distracted, and ultimately burned out or resentful of the educ…

OK, not general problem-solving ability, but subject-specific problem-solving ability. And I don't mean more tedious problems, but rather those that require self-discovery of non-standard approaches while not relying on any knowledge from further grades. E.g. for maths Olympiad problems exist for at least as early as 3rd grade, it might be possible to figure out something for younger children too.

Re: The EdTech Revolution Has Failed

#503

Post by tptacek »

dennis_jeeves2 wrote: post #501
tptacek wrote: post #498

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heritability is the ratio of genetic variance to phenotypical variance. How heritable do you think the number of fingers on your hand is?

Anyway to answer your question the number of fingers in one's hand would be nearly 100% inheritable. A more accurate figure would be 99. tptacek , I'm not sure why you are hung up so much on the specifics, haven't we veer well past the main topic? My getting the definition of heritability, innateness etc. in this should not matter beyond a certain point. I understand that if we were experts debating a certain tropic…

No, it is the opposite: the number of fingers on your hand has virtually zero heritability. Variation in the number of fingers on your hand is virtually always a result of environmental influences (for instance: thalidomide during gestation).

If you don't understand what heritability means, (a) you shouldn't be using it to make points about the connections between phenotypical groups of people and their measured IQ, and (b) the links I have for you aren't going to do you any good.

Re: The EdTech Revolution Has Failed

#504

Post by shortrounddev2 »

oytis wrote: post #502
shortrounddev2 wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"general problem solving ability" isn't a real thing. Proficiency in solving, for example, math problems, does not confer the ability to draw conclusions based on evidence in history class. If you require a kid who's already mastered fractions to simply do harder and harder fractions rather than allowing them to continue onward, they will become bored and distracted, and ultimately burned out or resentful of the educ…

OK, not general problem-solving ability, but subject-specific problem-solving ability. And I don't mean more tedious problems, but rather those that require self-discovery of non-standard approaches while not relying on any knowledge from further grades. E.g. for maths Olympiad problems exist for at least as early as 3rd grade, it might be possible to figure out something for younger children too.

I don't see why would shouldn't make it a goal to allow more advanced students to learn at a more advanced pace. They shouldn't be held back by the other students

Re: The EdTech Revolution Has Failed

#505

Post by dennis_jeeves2 »

tptacek wrote: post #503
dennis_jeeves2 wrote: post #501

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyway to answer your question the number of fingers in one's hand would be nearly 100% inheritable. A more accurate figure would be 99. tptacek , I'm not sure why you are hung up so much on the specifics, haven't we veer well past the main topic? My getting the definition of heritability, innateness etc. in this should not matter beyond a certain point. I understand that if we were experts debating a certain tropic…

No, it is the opposite: the number of fingers on your hand has virtually zero heritability. Variation in the number of fingers on your hand is virtually always a result of environmental influences (for instance: thalidomide during gestation). If you don't understand what heritability means, (a) you shouldn't be using it to make points about the connections between phenotypical groups of people and their measured IQ,…

Fair enough. I that case I don't understand what the formal definition of heritability. ( I could some time and understand it but that beside the point)

So what term would you use to describe individuals inheriting trait from their parents eg, skin color ? especially the colloquial term.

(and again aren't we veering way off topic?)

Edit/Addendum - I looked at the colloquial definition of heritability/heritable, I think I'm essentially correct: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/heritability , https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/heritable . You need not reply. I have a feeling that our discussion is missing the forest for the trees. (And yes you can have your gotcha moment)

Re: The EdTech Revolution Has Failed

#506

Post by snowfarthing »

somethingsome wrote: post #410
donatj wrote: post #10

I work in EdTech, I have for a very long time now, and the problem I have seen is no one in education is willing to ACTUALLY let kids learn at their own level. The promise of EdTech was that kids could learn where they are. A kid who's behind can actually continue to learn rather than being left behind. A kid who's ahead can be nurtured. We had this. It worked well, in my opinion at least, and the number of complaint…

Personally I have bad experience with edTech because when a student is young, he is not disciplined enough to do hard things alone or even just annoying things, and studying can be both. So when they have an app with for example a qcm in front of them, the first times they try to do well, then they learn that if they randomely click buttons, at some point the app validate the answer, even if they didn't read the ques…

There is value in asking the question "when should an individual start studying anyway?" I don't have a link at hand for a discussion of studies comparing no pre-school to "play" pre-school" to "rigorous" pre-school -- and the studies find that the children who go through the rigorous pre-school -- usually 5.5 hours of instruction -- are ahead of their peers in the first grade, even out by third grade, and then fall behind. The study that followed kids into adulthood found that they had a higher rate of criminal activity.

I cannot help but think that we shouldn't be forcing kids to learn if they don't want to learn -- and rather than try to force every kid to be "grade level", we should go back to 1-room schoolhouses (for elementary levels, at least) and teach each student at their own pace.

Re: The EdTech Revolution Has Failed

#507

Post by snowfarthing »

miningape wrote: post #344
williamcotton wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are concrete objectives for educating a voting public in a democracy that would be entirely unserved by this proposal.

They're not any harder to manipulate once educated

I have seen the cynical observation, made more than once over the years, that an uneducated population is easier to manipulate, and thus it's only natural for government-run schools to get worse over time.

Re: The EdTech Revolution Has Failed

#508

Post by snowfarthing »

johndhi wrote: post #178
donatj wrote: post #10

I work in EdTech, I have for a very long time now, and the problem I have seen is no one in education is willing to ACTUALLY let kids learn at their own level. The promise of EdTech was that kids could learn where they are. A kid who's behind can actually continue to learn rather than being left behind. A kid who's ahead can be nurtured. We had this. It worked well, in my opinion at least, and the number of complaint…

can you give an example of someone being upset and what the thing they'd learned that they "shouldn't?" as a parent I find it confusing that I'd consider getting upset if my kid was learning 6th grade history as a 3rd grader (or 2nd grade art as a 3rd grader). what actual examples are there? the only examples of parents being upset about learning I'm aware of lately is, like, critical theory and marxism

This is a problem that has been around for years, perhaps decades. One memorable example comes from "To Kill a Mockingbird", where the teacher complained about the main character Scout having learned to read before her 1st grade -- when Atticus had nothing to do with it, because she learned how to read on her own at the age of 4.

Others have given their own experiences in this thread -- some teachers are encouraging, others get frustrated.

Re: The EdTech Revolution Has Failed

#509

Post by oytis »

shortrounddev2 wrote: post #504
oytis wrote: post #502

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, not general problem-solving ability, but subject-specific problem-solving ability. And I don't mean more tedious problems, but rather those that require self-discovery of non-standard approaches while not relying on any knowledge from further grades. E.g. for maths Olympiad problems exist for at least as early as 3rd grade, it might be possible to figure out something for younger children too.

I don't see why would shouldn't make it a goal to allow more advanced students to learn at a more advanced pace. They shouldn't be held back by the other students

We'll need to get rid of grade system then and let students advance on different tracks independently for that. Might be a good idea, but nobody is going to redesign the whole educational system because someone made an app.

Re: The EdTech Revolution Has Failed

#510

Post by tptacek »

dennis_jeeves2 wrote: post #505
tptacek wrote: post #503

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it is the opposite: the number of fingers on your hand has virtually zero heritability. Variation in the number of fingers on your hand is virtually always a result of environmental influences (for instance: thalidomide during gestation). If you don't understand what heritability means, (a) you shouldn't be using it to make points about the connections between phenotypical groups of people and their measured IQ,…

Fair enough. I that case I don't understand what the formal definition of heritability. ( I could some time and understand it but that beside the point) So what term would you use to describe individuals inheriting trait from their parents eg, skin color ? especially the colloquial term. (and again aren't we veering way off topic?) Edit/Addendum - I looked at the colloquial definition of heritability/heritable, I thi…

The technical definition matters because the evidence people supply about the genetics of intelligence is based on that technical definition, not your intuitive definition. You said intelligence has been shown to be heritable. Indeed, it has. But that doesn't mean what you think it meant.
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