Find More to Study Less

Find More

"Find More" means "finding more meaning in what you see, hear, or read". When a lesson makes sense to you, you can remember it with less effort, you can apply it with less effort to solve a problem, and thus you can get higher marks with less effort.

Books and teachers will make effort to help you understand. But it is your duty to put in this effort. If you don't understand a thing, don't force it down your brain. Refuse to do so. Einstein refused, Watson(DNA discoverer) refused, many great scientists and almost all great business people refused too.

If a book can't help you understand, change to a different book.

If a teacher can't help you understand, change to a different teacher.

Words are not much help, explanations are not much help. Let your child feel, see, hear, smell, taste what it is really like to understand, to find meaning.

Exercise 1.
1 .Let him/her read this list for 1 minute and then ask him to recall them. There are 12 items in the list.
Feb, p6, Holland, pen, p4, pencil, Spain, paper, Germany, January, p5, March.

2. Show him/her read this list for 1 minute and then ask him to recall them again.
(pen, pencil, paper), (p4, p5,p6), (Spain, Holland, Germany), (January, Feb, March).

3. Show him/her read this list for 1 minute and then ask him to recall them again.
(pen, pencil, paper), (upper primary classes ), (Spain, Holland, Germany), (first 3 months).
Or
(pen, pencil, paper), (upper primary classes ), (this world cup 1st, 2nd, third winners), (first 3 months).

4. Ask: Why does the step 3 become easy?

Exercise 2.
1. Ask them to memorize this table.
100    200
300    600
700    1400

2. Tell them that (1) first column has only 3 digits (2) first column begins with the smallest 3-digit number i.e 100 (3) second column is twice of the first. (4) 200 + 100 => 300 and 600 + 100 => 700.

3. Ask them if it has become easier to remember and if so, why?

Exercise 3.
1 .Let him/her read this dialog for 20 seconds and then ask him to explain it in his/her own words.
A: Do you have children?
B: 2 kids in primary school.
A: That's fine. Do you have any pet?
B: 3 pets. 2 dogs and a snake.
A: Oh, sorry.

2 . Tell him/her that Speaker A is a landlady and B is a potential tennant. Let him/her re-read the dialog
for 20 seconds. Then ask him/her to explain it in his/her own words again.

3. Ask: Why has the task become easier?

Exercise 4.
1. Teach this formula very quickly.
train A going to the right with a km/h
train B going to the right with b km/h
train A and B are d km apart when they start
Then,
the time they will meet/pass each other = d/(a+b)

2. Ask them to solve such a problem under "Speed" topic in P 6 maths. Are they ok?

3. This is what happened in one class where the teacher gave no formula at first.

|--------------------- 200km ------------------|
|--------------------- when? -------------------|
9 a.m. A ------> when? <------B 9.a.m
20 km/h                                        60 km/h

They were given no formula. Most of them got stuck/stumped.
Only then, after 2 or 3 minutes, they were reminded to make/find their own formula.
So, they made a similar but smaller, simpler problem/case of their own, like :

|------------------- 20km -----------------|
|------------------ when? -----------------|
9 a.m. A ------> when? <------B 9.a.m
4 km/h                                    5 km/h

They were reminded again: "Sometimes smaller numbers help. Sometimes they don't. If stuck in the same type of problem, change the type, change the nature of the problem."
One student came up with this problem, like :

|----------------------------- 9.am ------------------------------|
<--- 1hr at 6 km/h      9.am        1hr at 4 km/h  ---->
|------------------ total time = 1 hr    ------------------------|
|----------------   total distance = 10 km    ----------------|

Then, that student again turned the problem into opposite direction, like:

|--------------------------------- 10 km ---------------------------------|
|-------------------------------------------------------------------------|
9 a.m.  ------------------------------------------------------  9 a.m.
|----1hr at 4 km/h ------> met in 1 hr <------ 1hr at 6 km//h---|

10 km, 4 km/h, 6 km/h, 1 hr???
10/(4+6) = 1 ???
distance apart / two speeds = time to meet ???
Because they were a bit tired, the teacher confirmed their formula instead of asking them to verify it with another example.

4. Which class, the first or the second, do you think have a better chance of recalling and applying the formula in different situations? Which have a better chance of solving things future?

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