Educating Genius
The limits of what’s possible: will future EdTech turn anyone – including you – into a genius?
Monday 23rd September, 2019
Resources related to the talk
Memory Techniques (mnemonic systems)
A very powerful method to rapidly memorise numbers of any length is called the Major System. I first learned about this system from Tony Buzan's wonderful book "Use your memory".
Successful People with Learning Difficulties
LÁSZLÓ POLGÁR
Wikipedia's article on Laszlo Polgar is a great starting point.
Photo attribution:
The photograph of Laszlo with Susan, Judit and Sofia was taken by Fortepan adományozó URBÁN TAMÁS and is featured on Laszlo's wikipedia page.
The photograph of Judit playing Simultaneous Chess was taken by Ed Yourdon. His flickr stream is fascinating.
I couldn't find any copyright attribution on Metapicz for the photograph of the three girls over the chess board (bottom left) but if anyone knows who took this, please let me know so I can attribute them.
Polgar wrote a book called "Raise a Genius!". Sadly it's out of print but I found a site with a link to a PDF version of an English translation (translated from an Esperanto translation of the original Hungarian - so assume a double loss of fidelity). It makes for fascinaing reading.
Neurobiology of learning
This is a huge topic and our understanding of it changing fast. Most educational information on neurotransmitters you'll see on the web is basically wrong or out-of-date. 293 have been discovered in humans now. As far as we know, they're all involved in learning and play multiple complex roles. Many manifest in our conscious experience as different feelings - but it's complex!
Owens MT, Tanner KD. Teaching as Brain Changing: Exploring Connections between Neuroscience and Innovative Teaching. CBE Life Sci Educ. 2017;16(2):fe2. doi:10.1187/cbe.17-01-0005
Artificial Intelligence
We don't need to fear automation but we do need education to keep up with the new pace of change
McKinsie Report: Five lessons from history on AI, automation, and employment
AI is teaching us lessons in ways that are completely unexpected
Read DeepMind's article on AlphaZero.
Optimising Learning Forces for Accelerated Learning
Sources of friction in your personal biology (things that can affect your cognition):
Lack of exercise
Poor sleep
Food allergies
Poor nutrition
Heavy Metal poisoning
Stress
Gut bacteria (dysbiosis/psychobiosis)I highly recommend reading Dr Mark Hyman's work. His book, "The UltraMind Solution: Fix your broken brain by fixing your body first" changed my life. If you get brain fog/cognition problems it can take a while to figure out what's causing it, as many things can.
If you've ever had a course of antibiotics, your gut biome is very likely out of balance too. Antibiotics kill all the good (and bad) bacteria in your gut but not the yeast which then takes over and can ruin your cognition and mood.
The Candida Diet is an excellent resource to get it back to normal again.
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