The Process

By Bobby Neal Winters

I’ve recently read a book entitled The Master and His Emissary which was written by a scholar named Iain McGilchrist.  The writer was making a case that Western Civilization is going awry in a particular way--which is what almost every book is about this day it seems. Along the way he writes about many things that interest me regardless of the merits of his case as a whole.

McGilchrist is a brain scientist.  In simple terms he says that the right half of our brain takes in our experience of the world; the left half of the brain creates a model from the information it gets from the right by putting it into language that can be manipulated.  The model is then sent back to the right brain to be tested against reality.

I’ve read the book and a group I belong to is now discussing it.  All of us in the group are all either teachers or retired teachers, so this sort of thing is of interest to us. It parallels the best way to learn something and the best way to teach something.

Right now, as someone who is going to be 62 in a couple of months, I am learning to program in assembly language. I am doing this because I am preparing to teach a class in low-level programming.  Here “low-level” does not refer to the level of difficulty; the word “low” refers to how far you are above the hardware.

To understand this better, let me talk about high-level programming. I’ve written before about learning to program in the Python programming language. In Python, you put in your numbers and commands and run it.  You don’t worry at all about the particular machine you are using. Regardless of what machine it’s going to be running on, everything is the same. 

In low-level programming, you need to know about particulars. You need to know what CPU you are running your code on. You need to have its data sheet. I’d never even seen a data sheet before I started working on this.

I’ve been googling articles, buying books, and watching videos.  And making notes. I’ve forgotten from time to time. In my youth, I just remembered things. I paused in conversation and they were just there. Now I need to write them down, and sometimes I forget that I’ve written them down.

From time to time, I need to pause and write down in prose at length what I’ve learned. I write from the point of view of explaining to someone else.  I then come back the next day and recopy it, expanding on the points where I was just a bit too terse. Once done, I put a paperclip on it, and put it in a file. 

I then go on to the next thing I want to learn.  Lather, rinse, repeat.

My plan is to come back--after I’ve gotten the whole process done--and type it all up.  In the past, I’ve found that what I’ve done at the end will make me want to change what I’ve done at the beginning.

This is a great way to learn. This isn’t my discovery by the way.  It’s well-known.  Make your student go through an experience and force them to think about it enough to explain it to someone else.  

We do it by writing. Writing is probably the best way to do it, but talking works.  We have kindergarten kids do it in Show-and-Tell. The great story-tellers of old from the ancient oral traditions did it. Do it; think about it; explain it to someone else.

Writing allows us to remember details better.  Writing allows us to revisit, to correct, to amend. Writing allows us to share through time.

As wonderful--and to me, enjoyable--a method this is, students resist it.  Students don’t like to write.  Writing requires time; writing requires thought; writing requires time.

Writing requires rewriting.  Indeed, for you programmers out there, writing is rewriting in the same way programming is debugging.

Writing puts our grammar and spelling on display for all the world to see.  There is a lack of appreciation for creativity in either of these areas.

In any case, once you get over the bump of hating to rewrite, a whole new world of learning opens up.

[As an advertisement, the University has a writing center that helps students and teachers in stuff like this.  The staff there is brilliant. Just sayin’.]

There is a process we go through naturally. It’s the way the brain works: Take it in; think about it; explain it. This process goes in a circle. Good education, education at its best makes use of this process and perfects it.

Welcome back to school!

Bobby Winters, a native of Harden City, Oklahoma, blogs at redneckmath.blogspot.com and okieinexile.blogspot.com. He invites you to “like” the National Association of Lawn Mowers on Facebook. Search for him by name on YouTube.