Date: Sun, 9 Nov 1997 16:28:41 -0500
From: George Trail <gtrail-AT-UH.EDU>
Subject: Re: PLC: After Irene Hossack



>Descartes would say exactly the same about a child knowing that 2 and 2
>make 4. "Understanding" -- whatever -- is quite a solitary process. So
>it doesn't happen only to poetry or the poets.
>
>Cheers,
>
>pM

I had an experience with algebra the like of which I have not encountered
in the literature of pedagogy. It was, (and ought again to be) a manner of
teaching composition to have people copy Addison and Steele, from _The
Spectator_, and to turn in the copies. It actually works very well, but if
one tried it now one would be lynched. The copier tries to remember larger
and larger chunksof the text being copied to cut down the time of glancing
from your copy text to the orginal, and you pick up, thus, the sense of the
stucture (typing won't do.).

I was going for a test to have to demonstrate that I could "derive" the
quadratic equation in a required college algebra class, and despite a
knowledgable roommate who acted as tutor, was unable to grasp it at all. So
I decided to memorize it, line by line so I could reproduce it from a copy
in my head (cheating, really).

Just about the time I had it all straight except for the last line, how it
worked suddenly flashed upon my understanding. I'm not particularly ashamed
to say that that understanding left me within months, and moreover, that I
have never had occasion to need to derive the quadratic equation.
g






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