Comments on: Learning to learn

By: Jason Hamzy

Jason Hamzy — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 22:52:14 +0000

Great comment. My kids go to a Waldorf school (another name for Steiner school), and that is what I love about it. I’ve always held the ideal learning is self taught. Thanks for your insights.

By: Dan North

Dan North — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 19:55:07 +0000

Thanks for that Katie – so it seems it isn’t just the conventional schools that can leave you with a negative impression of learning. I haven’t had any dealings with any of the Steiner, Montessori or Waldorf styles of school, and to be honest I did have the impression that “the grass is greener”.

I’m glad you managed to see past that experience to still be interested in learning – or was that one of the reasons you chose to find out what really works?

By: Katie

Katie — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 23:44:36 +0000

I went to a Steiner school, and it drove me nuts. They don’t teach you how to learn, they tell you that they teach you how to learn. They teach you to hug trees and dye yarn and make you stay in the same class as everyone else your age because you were reincarnated at the same time. I was a problem child at the Steiner school because I taught myself things before they thought I was ready to learn them. I hated crafts, can’t knit to save my life, and none of their exploring taught us to explore the real world. They seemed afraid of the real world – science doesn’t seem to be spiritual enough.

Many, many of the kids who didn’t teach themselves stuff just swallowed the fluff and were completely lost when the real world hit them and they had to actually learn about the real world and adapt to it.

I love learning about learning – Edward de Bono, memory palaces, agile practices… I am a sucker for books that teach me how to think differently about things – I just didn’t get any of it from the Steiner school.

I’ll be quiet and go back to my programming now.
Sorry about the detour. I don’t want to start a religious discussion.

By: Dan North

Dan North — Mon, 19 May 2008 10:16:49 +0000

Hi Thomas.

It looks like Jeremy has changed his blog slightly. I’ve updated the reference so it should work ok now.

By: Thomas Garrod

Thomas Garrod — Mon, 19 May 2008 03:29:30 +0000

Whooops! I did not realize this post was so old. No wonder the link does not reflect that interesting article.

By: Thomas Garrod

Thomas Garrod — Mon, 19 May 2008 03:28:08 +0000

I was interested in the “excellent article” by Jeramy, but the link does not lead to an excellent article. On the other hand, I was very happy to see your comment about teaching children to learn. I’ll be attempting something very like that soon. I’ve been dreaming of creating a program for underachievers, and I’ll do that, or try this summer. Thanks for the thoughtful comments!

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Richard Griffin's Blog — Wed, 23 Aug 2006 20:48:54 +0000

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By: Aidan

Aidan — Mon, 26 Jun 2006 15:42:23 +0000

Not sure you are aware, but this philosophy of learning to learn is one of the underlying tenets of Steiner education (named after the guy who ‘invented’ it, Rudolph Steiner). Although a lot of Steiner’s writing is absolute fluff, he did have his head screwed on right when it came to understanding learning. This is why kids who attend Steiner schools don’t actually start learning things like the 3 R’s until they’re 7 years old – they’ve spent the in-between time learning how to learn (through craft, stories, dancing, singing, exploring … all that good stuff).