In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
Thom <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>Herman Rubin wrote:
>> Yes and no; it has even recently been shown in articles in
>> strong science journals (NOT psychology or education) that
>> some aspects require the use of both sides simultaneously.
>> MRI was used to find out what is happening.
>Well ... at the risk of being a wet blanket, I can't think of a task
>that doesn't require use of both sides simultaneously (except possibly
>with eye patches and anaesthesia).
There are many which can be done with one side, and MRI
studies show little on the other. These are "thinking"
tasks, not those involving vision or bodily motion.
.................
>> >And then there is this complication: Our measured IQ strongly
>> >does reflect something cultural and educational, particularly for
>> >those tests of 'abstract reasoning' (Raven's progressive matrices)
>> >that still are (I think) regarded as having the strongest genetic
>> >loading.
>> I doubt that the psychologists can understand abstract
>> reasoning, especially that it is not incremental. The
>> place where it is most clear is in mathematical concepts,
>> and few outside of abstract mathematicians even see these,
>> which can be understood without too much difficulty by
>> children, but apparently not by those in "education".
>I'm not quite sure what you mean, but there is a lot of research on
>insight and intuitive problems solving and much of suggests that the
>division between sudden and incremental solutions is rather fuzzy.
It is rather difficult to check this; I do know of a
study by Suppes and others around 1960 on mathematical
concept formation in children. This involved teaching
simple concepts, and using multiple choice tests, on
children aged 5 to 7. The results clearly show that
there is only a small amount of learning before the
concept is completely learned (no further errors); there
is no gradual decrease in errors.
BTW, the study also checked for "transfer". The results
again were clear; children taught one concept took longer
to learn a related one than those learning that as the
initial concept, and the interference was greatest in
going from more special to more general. This agrees
with my beliefs, and suggest that we are using the worst
order in teaching.
We can teach concepts and formalism directly, and then
apply it. The practice of "working up" to a concept is
both time wasting and requires UNlearning, most difficult.
--
This address is for information only. I do not claim that these views
are those of the Statistics Department or of Purdue University.
Herman Rubin, Department of Statistics, Purdue University
[EMAIL PROTECTED] Phone: (765)494-6054 FAX: (765)494-0558
.
.
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