Esprit de L’Escalier

The fact that the system of education for children, schoolchildren and students originates in the cave of the troglodyte shaman and has remained the same to this day has been said more than once.
Its principle is simple and dumb as the ass of that “FIRST” shaman in prehistory, who came up with the idea of “TEACHING” young troglodytes the ability to live:
To give some kind of knowledge, skills and abilities without a specific goal.
How does learning take place in any subject?
The teacher gives a certain amount of knowledge new to the students in this subject. Then, “To consolidate and verify the degree of assimilation,” certain tasks, questions, control, dictation, and so on are given.

And the basic law of learning should be exactly the opposite: Do not put the cart IN FRONT of the horse.

Set a task!
And, of course, the students DO NOT KNOW how to solve it or even how to approach it. It is here AND ONLY now that the teacher gives them information, in the form of either reading the relevant chapters in a textbook with a parallel interpretation or explaining a PIECE of KNOWLEDGE himself! Students, faced with a problem, should naturally ask the teacher questions about the topic.

So, THE TASK MUST PRECEDE THE KNOWLEDGE NECESSARY TO SOLVE IT.
This Is The Law Of Necessary Knowledge. The Law of Didactics, 
Because it solves several problems at once:
The personal interest of the students.
Activating their attention and thinking.
“Sports interest”.
It gives from the very beginning the beginnings of self-study and independent search for the necessary knowledge.

This system, unlike the shamanic one, never gives “KNOWLEDGE IN GENERAL”, which the student MUST learn without understanding why and what is the meaning of this knowledge? IT DOESN’T REVEAL ANYTHING TO HIM. Neither mind nor heart.
And if you start with the task, there is already the aforementioned interest and a purposeful search for the NECESSARY knowledge, and not “knowledge in general”. Like, someday it will be necessary. The process of “From task to knowledge”, already at the expense of understanding and emotional connotation in the search for a solution, contributes to MEMORIZATION forever, because this is not some kind of burden, it is unknown what it is necessary for and whether it is necessary at all. And the target information is for targeted use. This process immediately teaches the ability to think logically, develops NOT a dull mechanical, but a flexible associative memory and encourages students to CREATE knowledge themselves.
This also eliminates the implicit or explicit element of violence against students. They say, either know-remember without benefit and to no avail, or get a whip – a negative assessment.

First class.
The teacher comes into the classroom and hands out books with large letters and funny pictures to the children. Then he says: Well, now we’ll read what’s written there?
The children are at a loss: They DON’T KNOW how to decode these spider bugs on the pages. A hubbub is rising: WHAT IS IT LIKE TO READ???We don’t know how! We don’t know! We don’t understand what kind of bugs these are-the spiders were recognized by the leaf of the book!  That’s where the teacher starts EXPLAINING – HOW!
The children already HAVE A TASK: To figure out what kind of bugs they are on the pages, what they should be called, what sounds of the language correspond to them, how to combine them into words already familiar orally.
That’s when children will willingly and enthusiastically begin to learn to read and write.
It’s the same with the letter! Task: Write the word MOM!
AND HOW is it? Write it? – The children ask. And again, the teacher starts showing them HOW to draw these black bugs in their notebooks.
Grammar.
The teacher dictates the text and the students write it down in notebooks, of course completely illiterate. Several students spell out what they have written in front of the class. But no one laughs at them. Everyone has something similar. And only then, the teacher suggests that they either open the textbooks and see HOW these words are written CORRECTLY and according to what rules lowercase are written, and according to which uppercase and so on… Again, the students are facing a problem: How to write down words correctly, combine them into sentences, how to spell words correctly, where to put dots, where colons, commas, etc.Again: The rules (knowledge) answer the question already asked, and does not fall from the sky “just in case”.

Similarly, all items. Give A TASK.
It is not a task that is derived from some general vague and unknown knowledge, but TARGET KNOWLEDGE as a derivative of the task! The answer to it, the way to find a solution to the problem, is already a DERIVATIVE of the problem, this is exactly the knowledge necessary for its solution.
Physics, mathematics, chemistry, biology, history, geography – everywhere every lesson, every lecture at the university begins with a TASK that students must solve!
Even in higher grades, do not give them chewed-up knowledge, but let them look for a little themselves in the form of questions to the teacher and a search in the textbook.
The point of this method is that children, schoolchildren, and students continue to learn not mechanical dumb memorization, but the ABILITY TO THINK FOR THEMSELVES! The ability to formulate a problem and look for the necessary one (ONLY the NECESSARY ONE, and not drag thousands of unnecessary information into memory)   This information sharpens the mind of children and, schoolchildren, students.

It is impossible to fill up the consciousness and memory of students with waste heaps of waste rock (empty, because there is neither a feeling nor an understanding of its USEFULNESS) of unnecessary, PURPOSELESS knowledge.
Knowledge should always be aimed at achieving an existing goal!
For any kind of learning, you need a joint work of logic and emotional interest as a result of your mental work.
Only such a combination of “mind and heart” will give you the real ability to solve problems, store the necessary knowledge in memory, always search for it purposefully and not put it on a shelf in memory for years of falling asleep with the dust of oblivion, and immediately use it!

One, two, ten, one hundred, a thousand such lessons and a person leaves school or university THINKING clearly and soberly as a specialist who knows how to search for the right knowledge and immediately use it to solve problems and create NEW KNOWLEDGE!

Faciant meliora potentes.

13 II 2024