[icepat]

Active listening is something I'm completely incapable of doing in a traditional way. When I have an activity in front of me, for example code or an interesting task, I listen better and am more engaged. When I was younger, I had a specific teacher who'd assume I was not paying attention, and ask me to answer often. Much to his surprise, I was fully engaged and able to respond.

It's just a different learning style. I'm actively listening, but in a more passive way than normal, if that makes any sense.

> Compared with, say, sitting in the library (or indeed at home), working on the same thing, without the potential distraction of what the rest of your class was doing?

In University I'd often skip class specifically to do this. Worked far better for me than sitting in a lecture hall. Let me work at my own pace, take breaks, walk around, ect. Classes with mandatory attendance were the bane of my existence. Intentionally designing courses to require attendance by not providing complete notes, or incomplete textbooks, also caused me issues.

[logifail]

> I had a specific teacher who'd assume I was not paying attention, and ask me to answer often. Much to his surprise, I was fully engaged and able to respond

In school I spent many (un)happy hours gazing out of the windows of the class due to sheer boredom.

Q: Are you able to comment on how the pace of learning is for you? Too slow / just right / too fast?

Once I got to University my learning style quickly evolved into "take notes on everything the lecturer said", with pen and paper. Hard to tune out of a lecture when you are literally writing everything down, at speed.

For me at least it was definitely a most effective way of learning (and then revising). Writing stuff out, over and over and over again.

[icepat]

> Hard to tune out of a lecture when you are literally writing everything down, at speed.

The issue here is what I mentioned above: illegible handwriting. The more pressure I am under, the higher my stress levels, the harder is becomes to take clear notes. In these situations I would end up with incomplete, illegible, useless, scrawl on pages.

> Are you able to comment on how the pace of learning is for you? Too slow / just right / too fast?

All over the map, really. The lack of consistent tempo in most lectures was the issue. If the class was too slow: zoning out, forgetting to take down critical parts. If the class was too quick: overwhelmed, unable to take clear usable notes. The duration of a class was always too long as well, but that's not just a me issue. Empirically, there's a infinite amount of time that someone can stay actively engaged. I don't recall exactly how long, but I do remember all university lectures lasted very generously longer than that.

My highest scores in class were always courses where there was an excellent textbook (or where I had found a supplemental textbook), or where I could effectively teach myself the material. IE: philosophy courses where, instead of attending, I could just read the selected writer's works. One of my highest marks was in a class I never once attended.

[blitzar]

> Hard to tune out of a lecture when you are literally writing everything down, at speed.

Hard to actually consume the contents of a lecture when you are frantically trying to reproduce a powerpoint slide and transcript of what someone is saying in real time.

[logifail]

> Hard to actually consume the contents of a lecture when you are frantically trying to reproduce a powerpoint slide and transcript of what someone is saying in real time

I would postulate that for the majority of people, in the majority of learning situations, writing out notes could (should?) be an integral part of consuming the contents of a lecture.

There's a 2021 paper from the University of Tokyo entitled "Paper Notebooks vs. Mobile Devices: Brain Activation Differences During Memory Retrieval"[0] which is worth reading.

NB: this obviously won't (can't) work for everyone.

[0] https://doi.org/10.3389/fnbeh.2021.634158

[blitzar]

I would postulate that for the majority of people, in the majority of learning situations, listening, consciously should be an integral part of consuming the contents of a lecture.

Making a hand written transcript of every word said - like a court stenographer is not necessarily listening or consuming the things said, especially when they are new or challenging concepts that require the student to apply some critical thinking or form connections with other knowledge.

[icepat]

I think an important addendum here is that the environment of a lab, and the environment of an uncontrolled classroom are different. So it's entirely possible that the actual real-world effects might be even more different than what we see here. While I agree that the effect of writing is well documented, I still find that the external factors around the act of writing get in the way of properly tapping into that added benefit.

[Symbiote]

Your case is very unusual, and should be dealt with separately. It's not at all reasonable to make generalizations to all children from a single neurodivergent child.

(In England your teacher would ask the school's special education teacher for advice. You might end up with a laptop, or something else that helps, essentially on prescription from an educational psychologist. Class teachers would be given guidance on when and how you can or should use it.)

[icepat]

Not saying it is not, but what I am saying is that you should be allowed whatever learning tools work best for you. A blanket ban on computers and insisting on hand written notes, is just no good. Forcing children to manage bureaucracy to get a simple laptop in class is also senseless.

> In England your teacher would ask the school's special education teacher for advice

In Canada, they just said I wasn't trying hard enough. I can't count the number of times people fought me tooth and nail to prevent me learning in the way that suited me best. You would like to assume that teachers and school administrators are looking for the best way to educate people, but sadly that's not always the case. It often breaks down into a bureaucracy of "well, you don't have xyz condition, and we only allow this for xyz condition, so you don't get it." Another one I got was "we won't let you have a laptop because we're liable if it gets broken".

[logifail]

> You would like to assume that teachers and school administrators are looking for the best way to educate people, but sadly that's not always the case

At the latest since become a parent and having school-age kids it's become patently clear to me that this isn't what school administrators or the indeed the vast majority of teachers are looking for at all.

[Symbiote]

I draw your attention to where I wrote the laptop would be on prescription from an expert, with guidance to teachers. That puts it outside any blanket ban that might otherwise exist.

Some process is inevitable when your needs are far outside the norm and have the potential to disrupt the education of the rest of the class.

(I can't comment on the situation in Canada.)

[icepat]

And I did note that, and address it. This is exactly like the line of reasoning that blocked my access to the tools I needed to learn. Like I said, the bureaucratic process of getting an assessment is often prohibitive. Many educational experts are stuck in specific ways, and unwilling to suggest accommodations unless there's obvious disability. Radically different learning styles are not considered a disability, but rather a problem the student must rectify on their own. Now that I'm out of school, I'm completely functional at work, and in other domains of life.

I see it as similar to being left-handed in the 1800's. Eventually we're going to see that the approach we're taking now is just as nonsensical. We're essentially beating the devil out of children now by forcing them to adopt a learning approach that was developed over a hundred years ago when there was no other way.

I think you're error here is in assuming that you will be given what you need if you simply ask for it in school. I assure you, this is not the case. In many cases, I've had teachers (and later profs) explicitly go out of their way to exempt themselves from having to provide any accommodations at all. Even when supplying them was legally mandated by provincial government. One sticks out in my memory as having quite literally saying "then sue me" when I was refused an accommodation specifically required in my student file.

[logifail]

> I am saying is that you should be allowed whatever learning tools work best for you. A blanket ban on computers and insisting on hand written notes, is just no good.

Umm, not sure whether I agree with this.

Don't we expect children to learn basic mathematics without access to a calculator? This despite the fact that there are certainly children who struggle with laborious long multiplication and division. Our eldest was one of them!

[icepat]

I think there's a major difference between using something that removes the need for basic knowledge, as opposed to allows that knowledge to be learned in a different way. I'm not advocating not teaching people to write, I'm suggesting we do that, but then provide them the option to use a computer to assist their learning.

If you provide someone with a calculator, there's no need for them to learn how to do basic math. If you provide someone who can write with a computer, you're just altering how the information is retained, not what information is retained.

[logifail]

> I think there's a major difference between using something that removes the need for basic knowledge, as opposed to allows that knowledge to be learned in a different way.

> I'm not advocating not teaching people to write, I'm suggesting we do that, but then provide them the option to use a computer to assist their learning

Q1a: What would we say is the purpose of young people learning to write unaided, with just pencil and paper?

Q1b: At what point do we say "OK, that's enough basic knowledge", and we let them reach for an electronic device to assist?

and

Q2a: What would we say is the purpose of learning to do mathematics unaided, with just pencil and paper?

Q2b: At what point do we say "OK, that's enough basic knowledge", and we let them reach for an electronic device to assist?

I'm not sure that I see that there's much difference between the two.

In both cases, there will come a time when you don't have your device (or its charger) handy, and you will have a significant advantage if you can manage the task in front of you without electronic assistance.

[icepat]

Again, not advocating teaching people with the machines that abstract, just letting them use the machines to help them collect their knowledge and solidify it. My point is very clear, and there's no real ambiguity in what I'm getting at. You're constructing a slippery slope argument here and asking "well if we let them take notes on laptops, then what? Stop teaching them to add"?