Thank you so much for going to the trouble of writing such long and thoughtful feedback! Especially since it’s obvious that I still have a lot of this unclear for you.
Actually, I should ask while I’m here: why are you being so diligent about pursuing this?
For me, the most obvious direction of thought would seem to be as follows (but I’m not too sure about my judgement on what would be obvious to someone who doesn’t yet understand the theory, hence why I’m checking with you):
The differences between DI and anything else (‘normal’ education and competing models together) as shown on those graphs from Project F-T are really impressive
And it did say in the meta-analysis that “DI’s consistent achievement of such scores is unique in educational research”, so the F-T results aren’t likely to be a random fluke
So there must be some explanation for that, and the possibility that the people who make this DI stuff actually know what they’re talking about—something complex and non-obvious that I don’t yet understand—at least deserves some serious consideration (...despite the fact that this idiot has so far done a terrible job at explaining what that might be :P)
If that does seem to accurately reflect what’s going on in your mind, please do tell me, because that seems like it would be of great use in fixing up my “DI to LW” communication problems.
Anyway, I’m gonna use an analogy to explain to your what this challenge of communication feels like from my perspective, and then I’ll try to give you some meatier replies to your questions.
Analogy: Imagine that you were trying to explain physics to someone who had never even heard of it. Why it’s exciting in and of itself, and the amazing engineering feats it allows you to accomplish. You gave them an introductory module on Newton’s three laws and they came back and said, “Honestly, it seemed pretty vague. And the axiom ‘moving objects stay moving unless they’re made still, and still objects stay still unless they’re made to move’ seems almost like a tautology. And how on Earth does this allow us to create ‘amazingly faster transportation’?” (Note it does not occur to them to ask the last question: “How does this allow us to engineer trains and bridges etc?”)
(Please remember, this isn’t meant as an argument by analogy! I just think it could help you to understand what I say better if you have some idea what it feels like for me trying to find good explanations. On to meatier bits.)
So you asked:
is the claim that each learner responds 10 times per minute correct?
I dunno. Offhand, it sounds plausible as something a good presenter could achieve for many sections of the programs, but it’s not like it’s mandated by the theory or empirically shown to be necessary. Get your hands on the Michel Thomas lessons for a personal experience with how this is actually not too implausible. And I could try to scan a lesson from a kindergarten reading program or something for you some time, too. (I’m from Canada, and I’m staying with a homestay during my internship in Baltimore, so I’d have to ask them if their scanner is working).
Anyway, before I go any further, have you read this short comment yet? (Just because I want you to have that background and I wasn’t able to integrate it below.)
why are you being so diligent about pursuing this?
I am not much diligent, but even if I were, I doubt my ability to state true reasons for my participation in online discussions.
The differences between DI and anything else (‘normal’ education and competing models together) as shown on those graphs from Project F-T are really impressive.
If it wasn’t clear, I didn’t mean differences in results, but differences in method. That’s still what I was complaining about: I have read several times how magnificent DI is, but still haven’t learned what the hell DI consists of. Well, I have a rough idea now, but it isn’t based on unambiguous statements.
Analogy: Imagine that you were trying to explain physics …
This was getting interesting, but was interrupted exactly at the moment when I expected you to write the most important part: how does a DI teacher explain Newton’s laws? Can you show?
From the continuation comment:
“Faultless communication” is the basis of the stimulus-locus analysis branch of the theory. If faultless communication fails with a particular learner, that gives you specific information about how the learner is not using the two-attribute learning mechanism. That tells you to shift to the response-locus analysis branch of the theory to figure out how to modify the learner so that they do use it (and the stimulus-locus analysis is more just an application of normal behavioural analysis to the situations encountered around the context of DI)....
This sound extremely vague (much vaguer than Newton’s laws ever sounded to me). Faultless communication is, as far as I understand, a technical term with some precise meaning. What’s its meaning? How is it defined? What are the basics of the stimulus-locus theory? I assume majority of LW readers aren’t familiar with the theory and if it is a key component of DI, you should give at least a brief explanation of its basics.
You teach algorithms through ‘cognitive routines’ …
Once more, nine paragraphs or so and I am not able to make sense of it (probably because I don’t know the specialised vocabulary). Somewhere in your original post you said that DI is based on algorithms which teachers apply and this doesn’t need the teacher to understand DI on theoretical level. So, consider me such a teacher who wants to teach multiplication and give me an algorithm to follow.
I… find myself quite surprised at the way my understanding of your response to my question (round the first three bullets) doesn’t seem to address what I meant to ask. Was I not clear enough, or were you just skimming around there (not that I don’t understand you skimming occasionally at this point).
Man, I just read the first sentence of this comment back to myself, and...
Well, I’ve been working on less than four hours of sleep a night for the past three days. I’ma try to keep this short by giving only a limited treatment of one point you asked about, go to bed, and give you something more detailed later.
You teach algorithms through ‘cognitive routines’ …
Once more, nine paragraphs or so and I am not able to make sense of it (probably because I don’t know the specialised vocabulary). Somewhere in your original post you said that DI is based on algorithms which teachers apply and this doesn’t need the teacher to understand DI on theoretical level. So, consider me such a teacher who wants to teach multiplication and give me an algorithm to follow.
All right, I’ll ask in the DI community for advice on good examples of places in programs that teach cognitive routines (well, places that review the whole routine at once, since the initial teaching of all the components is distributed over long sections of the script, of course). (I’ll also ask if they can give me the reference to the experimental evidence on the 1-20 vs 1-99 thing, and so on.)
But yeah, the section of Theory of Instruction on “Constructing Cognitive Routines” begins on page 191 of the text, so you being a bit confused after only nine paragraphs written by a student pretty much reciting an outline of their own mental notes is not that odd.
If you could possibly find the time to check the online catalogs of any university libraries near you to see if they have the book… because if you could easily get your hands on a copy, it wouldn’t be too hard to just try skimming the section and chapter summaries.
Thank you so much for going to the trouble of writing such long and thoughtful feedback! Especially since it’s obvious that I still have a lot of this unclear for you.
Actually, I should ask while I’m here: why are you being so diligent about pursuing this?
For me, the most obvious direction of thought would seem to be as follows (but I’m not too sure about my judgement on what would be obvious to someone who doesn’t yet understand the theory, hence why I’m checking with you):
The differences between DI and anything else (‘normal’ education and competing models together) as shown on those graphs from Project F-T are really impressive
And it did say in the meta-analysis that “DI’s consistent achievement of such scores is unique in educational research”, so the F-T results aren’t likely to be a random fluke
So there must be some explanation for that, and the possibility that the people who make this DI stuff actually know what they’re talking about—something complex and non-obvious that I don’t yet understand—at least deserves some serious consideration (...despite the fact that this idiot has so far done a terrible job at explaining what that might be :P)
If that does seem to accurately reflect what’s going on in your mind, please do tell me, because that seems like it would be of great use in fixing up my “DI to LW” communication problems.
Anyway, I’m gonna use an analogy to explain to your what this challenge of communication feels like from my perspective, and then I’ll try to give you some meatier replies to your questions.
Analogy: Imagine that you were trying to explain physics to someone who had never even heard of it. Why it’s exciting in and of itself, and the amazing engineering feats it allows you to accomplish. You gave them an introductory module on Newton’s three laws and they came back and said, “Honestly, it seemed pretty vague. And the axiom ‘moving objects stay moving unless they’re made still, and still objects stay still unless they’re made to move’ seems almost like a tautology. And how on Earth does this allow us to create ‘amazingly faster transportation’?” (Note it does not occur to them to ask the last question: “How does this allow us to engineer trains and bridges etc?”)
(Please remember, this isn’t meant as an argument by analogy! I just think it could help you to understand what I say better if you have some idea what it feels like for me trying to find good explanations. On to meatier bits.)
So you asked:
I dunno. Offhand, it sounds plausible as something a good presenter could achieve for many sections of the programs, but it’s not like it’s mandated by the theory or empirically shown to be necessary. Get your hands on the Michel Thomas lessons for a personal experience with how this is actually not too implausible. And I could try to scan a lesson from a kindergarten reading program or something for you some time, too. (I’m from Canada, and I’m staying with a homestay during my internship in Baltimore, so I’d have to ask them if their scanner is working).
Anyway, before I go any further, have you read this short comment yet? (Just because I want you to have that background and I wasn’t able to integrate it below.)
{goes to next comment because it hit the character limit per comment}
I am not much diligent, but even if I were, I doubt my ability to state true reasons for my participation in online discussions.
If it wasn’t clear, I didn’t mean differences in results, but differences in method. That’s still what I was complaining about: I have read several times how magnificent DI is, but still haven’t learned what the hell DI consists of. Well, I have a rough idea now, but it isn’t based on unambiguous statements.
This was getting interesting, but was interrupted exactly at the moment when I expected you to write the most important part: how does a DI teacher explain Newton’s laws? Can you show?
From the continuation comment:
This sound extremely vague (much vaguer than Newton’s laws ever sounded to me). Faultless communication is, as far as I understand, a technical term with some precise meaning. What’s its meaning? How is it defined? What are the basics of the stimulus-locus theory? I assume majority of LW readers aren’t familiar with the theory and if it is a key component of DI, you should give at least a brief explanation of its basics.
Once more, nine paragraphs or so and I am not able to make sense of it (probably because I don’t know the specialised vocabulary). Somewhere in your original post you said that DI is based on algorithms which teachers apply and this doesn’t need the teacher to understand DI on theoretical level. So, consider me such a teacher who wants to teach multiplication and give me an algorithm to follow.
I… find myself quite surprised at the way my understanding of your response to my question (round the first three bullets) doesn’t seem to address what I meant to ask. Was I not clear enough, or were you just skimming around there (not that I don’t understand you skimming occasionally at this point).
Man, I just read the first sentence of this comment back to myself, and...
Well, I’ve been working on less than four hours of sleep a night for the past three days. I’ma try to keep this short by giving only a limited treatment of one point you asked about, go to bed, and give you something more detailed later.
All right, I’ll ask in the DI community for advice on good examples of places in programs that teach cognitive routines (well, places that review the whole routine at once, since the initial teaching of all the components is distributed over long sections of the script, of course). (I’ll also ask if they can give me the reference to the experimental evidence on the 1-20 vs 1-99 thing, and so on.)
But yeah, the section of Theory of Instruction on “Constructing Cognitive Routines” begins on page 191 of the text, so you being a bit confused after only nine paragraphs written by a student pretty much reciting an outline of their own mental notes is not that odd.
If you could possibly find the time to check the online catalogs of any university libraries near you to see if they have the book… because if you could easily get your hands on a copy, it wouldn’t be too hard to just try skimming the section and chapter summaries.