Do we know the meaning of what we are learning?

I had a very interesting conversation with my friend yesterday, and it made me think a lot about this question.

As a kid, we started to learn how to read, write, and calculate numbers. I’m quite sure we did lots of exercises to make sure we could pass all the exams and get the certificates. But have you ever met people who didn’t go through all of those processes, but somehow they play much better than us in daily activities? Have you ever met a restaurant owner or a waiter who said they didn’t complete elementary school but still can play with the numbers to calculate our bills much faster than we can do? Or you may talk with someone who didn’t finish high school but the way they present and share their story is super engaging.

What makes the difference? My friend told me that the difference is when you start doing something with a very clear purpose in your head, and you know exactly how to measure your definition of done. If the kid knows that they’ll have a spring fair at the end of this week and they won’t be able to make it happen if they don’t know how to do the calculation, it will be the busiest week for them to learn it. And I’m sure if it’s their favorite activity, you cannot ask them to go to bed early if they are still in the middle of mastering that skill. Or like the case of my son playing chess. It’s crazy hard to ask him to practice daily but the situation completely changes when he knows that there will be an upcoming tournament.

You may think of gamification as a solution to leave the winning moment during the journey. But how about the motivation to start? Gamification works perfectly with games because we love playing games, so we’re willing to go through the process. But how about the topic that we completely hate?

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How to trigger our brain energy for learning

How to trigger our brain energy for learning

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I don’t have a complete solution yet, but I’m thinking about something similar to the sugar-coated but on the positive side. Can we add some more ingredients to the raw courses, classes, and certifications so that we can make them more interesting and delicious dishes? Especially if we can link the outcome with personal interests. Something like if we can change the boring subject “literature" to “How to deliver your speech when you won a gold medal"?

It's just my thought, how about yours?

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