Education

Going to a conference? Don’t waste your time

September 28, 2015 Leave a Comment

If I could go back in time I would have ample opportunity to fix some mistakes (but I would be scared to do so, else who knows what butterfly side effects there would be!) One general change I would make is how I spend time before, during, and after a conference that I went to.

I wasted a lot of time at conferences. It isn’t that they were a waste of time at all, but I could have gotten a lot more out of them if I handled things differently.

The biggest mistake I would make is how I thought of a “talk”. I would often sit there and take notes. Maybe I would blog about the talk. If you asked me anything about those talks today though, have I retained much? I doubt it.

I think you should look at these talks as inspiration to explore. I would now focus on really listening, and taking the odd note on topics that I want to go deeper on later. Later on I would then elaborate on these notes, create some tasks to explore, and maybe put some questions and answers into my spaced repetition system for anything that I actually want to retain and consolidate from short term to durable long term memory.

As you weed through the content, when there is something of interest expect to really put in some time to dig!

The same can be said for time outside of the presentations. The hallway track has always been an important one for me at conferences as I learn so much for talking to other practitioners about the craft. There is so much value in going deep on a topic and comparing experiences. Once again though, when something potentially fruitful comes about, make sure to note it and revisit later to go deep on.

Present to retain

I have given a few presentations in my time (in the thousands at this point) and I feel a bit bad about them now. Some of the high level “keynote” style ones with Ben were very much in the “inspiration” style. I am proud of some of those, especially one talk that we both knew so well that we had a period of delivery where a randomizer would BEEP, and the person who hadn’t been talking had to instantly take over, even if mid sentence. It kept us on our toes, made each talk different, and I hope was a bit of fun for the crowd?

I am cheesed off about the talks where I went deep and was trying to really get a lot of concepts across. I wish that I would have structured these differently, to help the group be set to retain. For example, I would get more questions going before the content was delivered to get them thinking, and I would make sure that everyone got to walk away with a series of questions. We vilify “tests” these days as they have been so abused as assessment tools, but we shouldn’t throw the baby out with the bath water and ignore how amazing they are as learning tools.

On the coding side I should have not just handed out questions, but also unit tests that are all red allowing you to work through them to turn as many green as possible. I have often dreamed about creating a ton of these for popular open source frameworks. I always enjoy finding unit tests as they can be great examples of how to use an API, since that is what they are often doing!

Beyond

Conferences and presentations are just the beginning. I now think about all of the articles, books, and podcasts that I have consumed but didn’t put the effort in to retain information that I cared too. The research that has been done on learning over the last twenty years makes past truth into myths. Although we are stuck with a paradox where the hard work of real learning doesn’t feel like you are learning as well as the easy work of your short term memory kicking into gear, we have efficient systems that beat rote repetition. I have been excited to see these work, and at least feel good that my kids won’t have to go through brute force time sinks that I did.

As I look at my calendar and see an upcoming conference, I hope to heed my own advice this time around. I will spend some time before hand on what I hope to get out of it: What topics do I want to explore and why? Who do I want to see? And after the fact I will add any knowledge any further investigations into my system to keep building for life long learning.

Have you explored any new learning strategies recently?

Maybe we should teach cooking before coding?

September 17, 2015 Leave a Comment

There is a strong push to get computer science into schools. We need engineers, stat. Computing is a growing industry and we expect it to continue to grow. Doesn’t it make sense to get kids into coding as soon as possible?

I love the vision, and I have been teaching computing in various forms to my own kids. I think that we have a long way to go on the implementations though, and I am keen to see what systems we will put in place for these kids.

Knowing computer science is a great skill to invest in, as are the side effects around creativity and empowerment when you make something. The best teaching doesn’t silo a topic, but rather brings a context and tie in a variety of learning. This strengthens the understanding and allows multiple avenues to trigger each other.

How about cooking?

What if there is something else that has similar side effects and is also very practical? A skill that everyone will hopefully use in their life (unless we seed that role to delivery services and cooking professionals…. which I hope isn’t the future!)?

Cooking is a great example that is a fantastic learning tool. I was talking to a neighborhood friend who had just had a fantastic experience with his daughter taking a class. He explained the positives:

The kids can be treated as full adults from day one
They use the same tools (“wooah we get to use knives and fire!”)
The “hello world” project does something useful. You can eat it!
The feedback is clear (does it taste and/or look good?)
You can start doing quickly, and can gain knowledge over time
You work in a team, with a concrete outcome
You can teach adjacent topics easily (“Why do we put salt in the water? Oh! that changes the boiling point….”)
God forbid we teach nutrition to our youth!
It is incredibly hands on, with all senses being used (great for learning!)
You can be really proud of your work
You make a meal at home and you are a hero!
You can run experiments easily
You can add your own personality
There is a fantastic learning curve where you can progress but each step of the way is useful
Everyone has a lab at home (the kitchen).

We do need more engineers and I understand why leading VCs, entrepreneurs, and CEOs of tech companies in New York were pushing for this. I long for a revolution in the education system that offers a step change in learning experience.

For loops?

We need to iterate quickly on what we actually teach our kids, and what tools do we use. I cringe a little when I see the basics of loops and conditionals. Is that the best way to go about this?

I have had the best success when someone wants to make something, and they what they learn is a necessary evil to get that thing done. Having my 9 year old sit down and go through basic programming was OK, but get him talking about the mod that he could make for Minecraft and his eyes lit up!

“Wait, I could do that??”

Video games are probably a pretty darn good vector for this (one of many). Unreal engine has tools that keep getting easier. There are various research projects out there such as Kodu and Project Spark from Microsoft.

Building a rich curriculum is really tough, and anyone who is working away on that has my utmost respect.

Before I write my next bit of code though, I should probably make myself a meal. Unfortunately though, I never had “home economics” in my school. At this point, I wish I could swap some of my other classes for these!

Pair Programming? Pair Teaching!

August 18, 2015 Leave a Comment

With a circle, the kids run around and around!

The summer is coming to an end, with the kids heading back to school this week. It is at this time that I tend to ponder areas of improvement in the system.

I feel particularly fortunate. The pre-school that my kids go through allows you to spend most of the time in a lovely backyard atmosphere. One day when I was dropping Sam off, I distinctively remember smiling over the fact that I didn’t want to leave. Surely that is a good sign, and can be quite different than many of the grey boxes that we call schools. Fortunately there are a lot of interesting layouts that play to kids nature.

I wonder if we are missing the big picture, and suffer from a school system aimed at the industrial age of the past.

At the same time, when I come down to Earth, it seems like there are smaller changes that we can employ (and some schools and societies already do) right now.

Single Point of Failure

As an engineer, when you look at a classroom situation one of the most glaringly scary things is the single point of failure that is the teacher. This one decision will make a huge difference to an entire school year of your child’s life in elementary school.

The quality of the teacher is one thing, but in my few years with kids at school we have run into illness, pregnancy, and a teacher leaving half way through the school year.

Every classroom should have more than one teacher. This year, there is a chance that my kindergartner gets such as class, as one of the three rooms has two teachers who split their time.

Ben and Dion

It is the day before school kicks in, and I am picturing what that is like for a teacher. I am sure there is a lot going on in your mind. I have had the pleasure of working closely with my best mate for a decade now, and I know that it is a lot more comforting, and enjoyable to be chatting with him before we go on stage for a talk. You know that someone has your back. You have confidence. You know that if you make a mistake your buddy can pick up on it.

Shared Nothing?

There are multiple ways to read the sharing of a classroom. If you think of it as having multiple teachers in the same class then the question of cost comes up quickly. Although I believe we should be funding the schools to a point where they could double down, it isn’t possible to just hire twice as many teachers right now, even if we can show that this cost is more than recouped by society over time.

What if you aren’t doubled up, but rather do a class swap? This is exactly what Emily did one year. She was in charge of the math and science aspects and another teacher took the social sciences. This was huge for the teachers, as they had to prepare and master half of the material. I also think it was better for the students as they got to experience different teachers and some of the classes had had a run through of the material. I know that for one of my presentations, the third time is often the best (rarely one of the first two!)

The other option doesn’t split on topic and involve a swap, but allows teachers to be part time. The students once again get the benefit from different teachers, styles and strengths, and the teachers get to work together. Being able to spend time discussing their plan of attack, what they are teaching, and how to best help particular students can only be a good thing.

Master and Apprentice

When you pair up teachers you also get a great way to bring up young energetic talent. A master teacher can bring their experience to the table, and I would love to see the impact this would have on teachers dropping out of the profession.

It’s time to take the lonely out of teaching. We talk about pair programming and discuss various side effects in engineering. I am not religious about pairing, and have seen it misused, but I do know that I very much want to talk through hard problems and various solutions with others. This would only become more important if it allowed me to focus on students more.

It is always interesting to join the streams. What else can we learn from the practice of engineering and science when it comes to setting up school systems that can scale and be resilient?

ps. I also wish that our kindergartener wouldn’t be coming home at 11:45am to start with, given that his pre-school had him staying a lot later.