Open Thread April 8 - April 14 2014

Tenoke

You know the drill - If it's worth saying, but not worth its own post (even in Discussion), then it goes here.

What's your retention like, 1, 6, 12 months after?

The reason I ask is that I've noticed that the things I've "learned" on khanacademy and MOOCS stick far more poorly in my brain than traditional methods do, despite doing the provided exercises. Is this is quirk of my brain, or is it a problem with the exercises/instruction given?

What do you class as "traditional methods"?

A big problem I've found with video lectures is the difficulty of looking things up afterwards. Text is much easier to refer back to, and it's after-the-fact repetition that helps things stick with me (and, by my understanding, with most people). I do find a lot of video lectures much "clickier" than text, though. Explaining something five ways is stylistically and editorially frowned upon in text, but is much more common in lecture format, so it increases the odds of having the subject explain... (read more)

2[anonymous]12y

On average, I would say my retention is slightly less than traditional methods and this is probably due to be the amount of time spent doing exercises. MOOC's are generally completed faster, and the number of required exercises/quizzes you do is overall less than a traditional course. Even with traditional courses, if I want to be able to do the stuff I've learned after it is over (and not just get the piece of paper), I work out a way to apply the learning in real life, such as a small programming project, or spend 10 minutes a day doing practicing maths. It is only after doing that that I considered I have nailed a topic.