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+---- Thread: 'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' (/Thread-That-student-is-taught-the-best-who-is-told-the-least)
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'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 24-10-2006
Taken from a referral by Seagarama (My personal thanks to you for many usefull referrals) and to our expert
THIS IS A FINE METHOD OF TEACHING FOR POLISHING UP AN ALREADY WELL TAUGHT STUDENT BUT LITTLE USE WITH A BABY
YES SOCRATES WAS CORRECT UNLESS WE ARE TAUGHT TO THINK WE ARE NOT TAUGHT AT ALL
I BELIEVE IT WAS BLAKE9(No John Locke, founder of British empiricism) THAT SAID THE MIND OF THE NEW-BORN CHILD WAS TO BE COMPARED WITH A BLANK PAPER
MOST OF US ARE BABIES
Robert Lee Moore and the Moore Method
Robert Lee Moore (1882-1974) was a towering figure in twentieth century mathematics, internationally recognised as founder of his own school of topology, which produced some of the most significant mathematicians in that field. The 50 students he guided to their PhDs can today claim 1,678 doctoral descendants. Many of them are still teaching courses in the style of their mentor, known universally as the Moore Method, which he devised. Its principal edicts virtually prohibit students from using textbooks during the learning process, call for only the briefest of lectures in class and demand no collaboration or conferring between classmates. (Exceptions were Moore's calculus and analytic geometry courses in which textbooks were used for setting problems. His doctoral students were allowed to refer to the literature mainly to ensure their theses were original.) It is in essence a Socratic method that encourages students to solve problems using their own skills of critical analysis and creativity. Moore summed it up in just eleven words: 'That student is taught the best who is told the least.'
-- From J. Parker, R. L. Moore: Mathematician and Teacher (Mathematical Association of America, 2005), p. vii.
Moore's long life was mainly devoted to mathematics and to his students but it intersected with many of the principal social issues of 20th-century America. Some of the key events are given in A Chronology of Moore's Life and Times.
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 18-03-2007
ickly: YES EDUCATION
FOR PRIMARY CHILDREN IS SICK
I HAVE SPENT OVER TEN YEARS ON THIS SUBJECT
IF YOU ARE INTRESTED IN MY READING FILE
NOT THE BOOKS OR MY PERSONAL THINKING
BUT REASEARH FROM THE INTERNET
THE VERY LATEST BRAIN RESEARCH :tourist:
I WILL EMAIL THE COLLECTED FILE TO YOU
nchjh@aol.com
:holiday: :adder:
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 24-04-2007
THE IDIOTS GUIDE TO THE ABACUS
Richard Dawkins is a British Ethnologist and an Evolutionary Biologist. He was born in Kenya but his family moved to the UK when he was 8 years old. His father was Clinton Dawkins a farmer and former soldier. Both his parents were very interested in natural science. Richard went to school at Oundel and then went onto study Zoology at Oxford University in 1962.
He is maybe the world’s most famous atheist. He is an avid believer in evolution and follower of Darwin. He interprets Darwin's ideas using current findings from our science research. Darwin who was a naturist and developed the theory of natural selection. (Slight variation in species promote their advantages and disadvantages in survival. Those members who gain an advantage tend to survive and reproduce.) Dawkins argues genes and not population are the basis for species survival and behavior.
Dawkins has written several books outlining his beliefs the first was published in 1976 The Selfish Gene. This book was very successful it was translated into over 25 languages and over 1 million copies were sold. In this book he talks about his gene centered view of evolution. Therefore genes (molecules of DNA) are the fundamental units of natural selection. The genes are what are carried forward He talks about how organisms are merely a survival measure constructed by its genes to maximise its chances of replication. They act as a vehicle for the genes so the success or failure of the gene on their ability to build successful vehicles. So organisms propagate their genes not themselves.
Genes that get passed on are the ones whose consequences serve their own interests. He also discusses altruism in nature which could be used to argue against this gene centered view. Altruism is the selfless concern for the welfare of others. For example the Bees who commit suicide when they sting to protect the hive. This was previously thought to be a part of group selection, Individuals doing what was best for the sake of the group. He says that this indicates that the selfish gene is also subtle.
His second book published in 1982 The Extended Phenotype he feels is his greatest contribution to the Evolution Theory. He writes how phenotypic effects are not limited to an organisms body but can stretch into the environment. Dawkins suggests because of genetic recombination and sexual reproduction from an individual genes viewpoint all other genes are part of the environment to which it is adapted. He also looks at memetics which is an approach to evolutionary models of information transfer based on the concept of meme. Dawkins does introduce the term meme in his first book. Meme is a unit of cultural information as gene is a unit of genetic information. He says memes can go from one mind to another in a manner similar to genes.
He formulated the word to talk about ideas that evolve and survive in the
same way species evolve. Therefore a meme is a self replicating unit of
culture. Just as genes reproduce so as to yield more copies of themselves in
using organisms so do memes reproduce so that they are remembered and
transmitted by more people. Children imitate from a very early age which
makes memes, memes are transmitted by imitation.
The existence of meme has been an aspect of Dawkins work that has been widely criticised. The discovery of mirror neurons in the brain however is a fundamental development in neuroscience to back up Dawkins theories I plan to now look at mirror neurons and then I shall look at how there existence has contributed to the field of memetics.
The discovery of mirror neurons is crucial for our understanding of the human brains evolution. Some say that their discovery is one of the most important findings in neuroscience in the last decade. Mirror Neurons are situated in the vertical premotor area of the frontal lobes. This is part of a pre-motor cortex whose activities are linked to planning and initiating movements.
They were discovered in 1995 by Giaccomo Rizzollati who was a neuroscientist
working at the University of Parma, Italy. The researchers had been studying brain activity in Macaques monkeys. In particular he was looking at the neurons the Macaques monkeys used for hand movements. In order to do this he had used electrodes which he attached to neurons to measure their response to movements. What he found was a crucial discovery.
He found that certain mirror neurons will fire up when the monkey performed a single specific action similar to motor neurons that make muscles do certain things. However he then discovered that these mirror neurons were very different because the same mirror neurons would fire up when the monkey observed another monkey or person doing the same task. Therefore they are active when an action is performed or observed. Since this discovery many experiments on primates and humans have confirmed their existence and their purpose. These experiments have recognised that they both have mirror neurons but they have discovered that humans have more highly evolved and flexible mirror neurons then primates. This is illustrated by an experiment that was documented in The New York Times 13th December 2005. Carl Zimmer writes about a student called Derek Lyons at Yale University. He had wanted to observe how three to four year olds learn. He claimed children learn by monkey see monkey do and chimps don’t. He was trying to confirm other research that suggested that children imitate in greater detail even when this is unnecessary where as monkeys recognise the unnecessary steps and merely go straight to the point. For example when an object was placed in a box and the experimenter underwent a number of steps to retrieve it they would incorporate a number of unnecessary steps such as tapping on the box. The chimps would recognise these and merely open the door and grab the food the children however would not they would still incorporate all the steps they had watched. Even when rushed they would not miss out steps just merely speed up the whole process.
These experiments all proved that humans were hard-wired to learn by imitation even when clearly this was not the best way. It proves that there is a big evolutionary change from Monkeys to Humans. Humans have multiple mirror neuron systems that specialise in carrying out and understanding not just the actions of others but their
intentions, the social meaning of their behavior and their emotions.
Mirror Neurons can explain a number of human features such as imitation, early language development, development of facial cues, empathy, mind reading, cultural rules and social skills. Because they allow us to predict, mimic and understand the actions of others. There is a strong belief that these mirror neurons reveal how children learn. They are the basis by which we understand other people’s intentions. Any time a child watches there parents, siblings, peers or teachers mirror neurons must be active in a similar observation execution matching system, because when we watch others perform a task or start to perform a task our mirror neurons fire up. Jean Piaget said “Play is the serious business of all childhood learning" Child
learn through touch, imitation, exploration, discovery and play.
Parenting and teaching are among some of humans activities most reliant on
functioning mirror neurons because the goal of parenting and teaching is to get the same neuronal systems firing in the student. It is necessary for a more technical explanation of the effect, that learning has on the brain to fully understand mirror neurons role in learning. When we learn something neurons in the cerebral cortex modify their connections to accommodate the new information. A new series of connections is established among the neurons. These same connections experience additional alterations later with newer input. Therefore the more we learn the more we are capable of learning in the future on a similar subject. This is why when a child is exposed to different languages they find it easier to pick up languages in the future
then one that is not.
So what dose this mean for us?
Evidence from mirror neuron research indicates a number of factors we need to
consider to get the most from education and the abacus. Firstly it indicates that between the years of 3 and 6 a human under goes the most extensive re-wiring. Therefore they are the most important years to develop the fundamental skills necessary for successful education from nursery to university. Therefore the abacus needs to be introduced as early as possible so the child is exposed early to it.
The second point is that people respond better to demonstration then instructions. Therefore watching a teacher use an abacus is a more effective teaching tool then reading of a calculator. The child can map the observed movement of a teacher on to an abacus onto their own abacus. New technology driven learning may decrease as the realisation the benefits of the more practical learning experience.
Their also is evidence to suggest that mirror neuron deficiency is what causes autism. A child who suffers autism is physically indistinguishable from those without but they suffer from deficits in social interaction and communication skills. Autistics are shown to have a lack of activity in their mirror neuron region of the brain. This dysfunctional mirror neuron system may contribute to many of their impairments.
The lack of activity in mirror neurons may explain these defects because mirror neurons involvement is not only in the execution and observation of movement but also in cognitive behavior such as our ability in social skills, imitation, empathy
and theory of mind.
EX LUCY NICHOLSON THE AUSTRALIAN
ickly:
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 05-05-2007
onwards and upwards
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Apart from polishing the techniques which is your lots job (teachers) i feel that it is time for me to move on.
Easy Learning with abacus and alphabet is no more then a ruse to hide the vital principals of early education that i believe in.
SATURATION MATHEMATICS ALWAYS VERY EARLY AND CONTINUOUSLY THROUGHOUT THE CHILD'S SCHOOL LIFE
ALONGSIDE SATURATION READING USING SIMPLE LOGICAL STEPS
One international method internationally applied and recognised should bind humanity together more then anything else.
Teacher and parents working together
a constantly reviewed, adopted and adapted, METHODOLOGY to suit all children
we can waste no more time arguing while the
WORLD BURNS
OUR TRIBE MAN IS IN GREAT DANGER FROM ITSELF
WE HAVE TO SIMPLIFY THE WAY WE LIVE
CONSERVE OUR NON RENEWABLE RESOURCES
DEVELOP OUR ABILITY TO HARNESS POWER FROM THE TIDES THE WIND AND THE SUN
GROW AND PRESERVE SUFFICIENT FOOD TO ENSURE OUR PEACEFUL SURVIVAL
BUILD FOR ETERNITY
I am moving on in my educational research to concentrate on
THE STORY OF ME ----------------
Our common human history
the common history of everyone-----------
that means you
every colour every nationality every language every religion every philosophy ever great one, ever good one every bad one every kind one every greedy one, every wise one, every silly one.
yes, my friend that means you.
i only need one of you to help please let it be you.---------------- :
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 27-05-2007
Looking For One Line Truths
-----------:am: ---------------------------------------------------------------------
LOOKING FOR THINKING LINES
FOR EVERY CHILD
-------------Perfect numbers
---------will
-----------Develop a perfect brain
-----------------------------------Saturation mathematics
---and symbol recognition
-------------------------------------Is the gift of
The abacus and the alphabet
-----------------------------WHEN
Used everyday for 15 minutes
---------------------------------between4 and 5 years of age.
---------It guarantees that every child will read normally and develop
natural mental arithmetic ability.
----The human brain is capable of instant understanding
When
-------The cognitive highway is paved with our written language
:autumn: -------------- :autumn: ------------:autumn:
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 30-05-2007
:rainy:
:adder:
:choc:
HOW TO USE AN ABACUS ONE MAP
COPYING AN ABACUS ONE MAP ON PAPER IS FREE TO ANY PARENT OR TEACHER
USING IT AS AN ABACUS
Simply being familiar with it is usefull to any child from three and four years upwards. Simply by using seven counters we can express
ELEVEN MILLION ONE HUNDRED AND ELEVEN THOUSAND ONE HUNDRED AND TEN. Individual Numbers
IT IS A NATURAL STARTING PIONT IN NUMBER AWARENESS
JUST LIKE ANY MAP USED REGULARLY WE BECOME FAMILIAR
WITH IT
Every child using it develops a mental map of how numbers are written.
Start expressing numbers in rows linking the two written symbols.
Familiarity with written numbers develops automatically with use.
Starting simple addition with all counters on zero.
Count any number with the child using the right hand, touch ever number. As a simple demonstration we will add 9 to 5 starting with 5
The child takes the counter indicating the number being counted, in this instance 1 is 1 – 2 is 2 the counter rests on five our starting number. Then let the child indicate the number five with a finger from the left hand, take the counter in the right hand and move it to 9
This is in order to express nine, the child is aware of 9 as an expression a position on the finger column, just as it as become aware of 5 on the finger column by counting on and resting on 9
THIS NEXT STEP IS PURE ABACUS TECHNIQUE
With the left hand finger on 5 the child takes the counter in its right hand and begins the count of 1 to 9.
So 6 is 1 and seven is 2 eight is 3 then 9 is 4 and 5 is 10
The child raises its right arm and asks this question,
PLEASE MR DECIMAL GIVE ME TEN
Then the left hand finger on 5 moves the counter on zero in the ten column to the written word ten on that column.
The child continues its count to nine
1 is 6 then 2 is 7 and 3 is 8 finally 4 is 9 and so a number is born.
This simple physical process is converted by regular use to become a permanent mental understanding of any number, the two hands give us a physical awareness of ten and an abacus a physical awareness of place value, the order of numbers. Thank you Mr Decimal for your
SIMPLICITY
SIMPLY by regular use of Abacus One and the Abacus One Map
Every child can understand any number.
The abacus develops the thinking processes accurately in the case of numbers and generally in the case of logical thinking more effectively then any process on earth.
A child learning to read, sees the written numbers on these abacus one recourses as automatically aware pictures, part of the natural reading process assisted by copying the alphabet on the reverse side
Of the virtually indestructible plastic page, in order to write and think in the words of our English language.
My work is in order to create the possibility of a world where justice is conceivable, where education excellence the natural right of
EVERY CHILD
John Nicholson
:autumn:
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - MarkM - 10-06-2007
"The student is taught the best who is told the least"
The less one knows about something, the more one thinks they know. While the more one know about something, the more one realizes how little one knows.
In the first scenario, the student's mind is stimulated with just the basics. Because the knowledge is left open and not taught as being closed, their imaginations are more free to come up with their own ways to fill in the blanks. Once you begin to define something in exacting terms, there is much less room for open thinking. It becomes more expedient to simply remember the facts.
Both orientations have their advantages and disadvantages. In the first case, free and open thinking allows new angles to appear. But it can also result in new angles that have already been tried. Although this may seem like a waste of time, reinventing the wheel, is a good way to practice ingenuity, since one is able to compare what they came up with with what has been determined to be the case. Open thinking can also result in new angles that have little basis in reality. Irregardless, it gives the students more practicing thinking outside the box, since the walls of the box are made porous for them.
The second case, has the advantage of learning about the state of the art so one is not wasting too much time reinventing the wheel or going down paths that lead to nowhere. The negative side of the second case, is close minded thinking with little tolerance for deviation.
I tend to believe that both personality types exists. Some people are designed to be the social memory capacitance for the state of the art cultural and knowledge tradition. While some are designed to push the boundries so things can evolve. The checks and balances make sure progress is progress instead of change for the sake of change.
When I was a student I could memorize, but I preferred subjects that taught a basic set of skills, i.e., less memory intensive, which could then be used to solve a wide range of problems. This preference is why I decided to became an engineer. Most engineering exams were open book, since memorizing was less important than doing research. Even research benefits by open minded ingenuity, following hunches to speed up this first aspect of problem solving. Cheat sheets were allowed in all exams, usually one piece of paper on all six sides. Good cheat sheets required the student prepare a detailed but condensed outline of the subject. This was is really a good way to review the subject and then organize the data into a compact working set.
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 13-06-2007
:rainy:
:pcprob:
still hammering
DEVELOPING THE BRAIN OF A FOUR YEAR OLD AND
THE FUTURE OF THE WORKING BRAIN
All we shall ever have are words.
WORDS CREATE IDEAS
IMAGERY is my best explanation of the teaching techniques I am proposing.
All we shall ever possess of any value throughout our entire lives is contained within words, so let us look closely at them.
What are words? Every human word is an individual idea, ideas that we combine to create or explain what we know or what we think. Ideas that may be simple or complicated, ordinary or bizarre, useful or harmful. All human knowledge is contained within words, numbers though they may be precise are no more then words, our best explanations are possible with the correct use of words. Our subconscious mind stores and delivers those words at will in order to give explanation or make inquiry throughout our lives.
Only by the use of written words can we store the precise meaning of the ideas we individually consider, every thing that happens to us or others takes place somewhere at sometime, where and when individually whether we recognise it or not, we are all on a personal voyage of discovery, we do not have to repeat history only learn from it, individually we have in a modern world to absorb vast amounts of inconsequential knowledge, we need tools to deal with that knowledge, not only inconsequential knowledge which is peripheral to our existence but vital knowledge that enables individuals and societies to live in peaceful co-existence?
We learn naturally about everything we do from speaking, to the highest achievements that humans are capable of, our personal potential in good health is virtually unlimited, only time and personal experience limit what we can achieve individually. In combination with each other working with modem technology we are capable of building a fair world providing sufficient food and adequate housing.
We need to exploit the natural resources that are available to us utilising the world’s non-renewable resources with respect.
The worlds greatest and most valuable resource is renewable, the human mind, by mans ingenuity every possible idea can be explored and utilized, we are still in the educational Stone Age with the provision and application of universal education.
Symbol recognition is essential the first part of the one percent of vital knowledge we have to be taught early in our lives.
It is as natural for a person to learn as it is to breathe, provided we arrange learning alongside practical demonstration. At an advanced stage something’s may be considered, just as you are considering this statement with reflection, with experience and with intellectual curiosity, obviously there is always a better way of doing everything, but with human behavior standard practice is simple, it requires no intellectual application.
Education in its present manifestation is sadly lacking, it is failing the human race, most of us live in poverty, and many of us waste half
our lives simply through lack of effective primary training, the cost of public education is difficult for countries with little resources to sustain education in a western mode.
Time taken to teach children that have become disenchanted with education not only slows down their potential development in practical experience but it takes up others time and resources that would be better-used else ware.
WORDS CREATE IDEAS
IMAGERY is my best explanation of the teaching techniques I am proposing. Image in action not (imagination). WE COPY by nature.
Imagination is the product of imagery we appear to only use it successfully and subconsciously, when we are asleep, at least that is when we are most aware of it.
Humanity is programmed to instantly utilise imagery in order to convey meaning from words. (Ideas)
Why are human beings teaching and learning, learning and teaching constantly throughout their lives?
Simply because they have no other choice, it is natural for them to use words we all exchange words, words are nothing but ideas.
So let us look closely at ideas. What are ideas?
Visual concepts that we create, using imagery.
Obviously we do not always have to use words to create imagery. Imagery occurs naturally within the mind.
In normal thought, occurring without concentration we rely heavily on imagery it is as of the speed of light, but written spoken or thought words, direct that imagery through the concepts and linked ideas we are regarding.
If we reverse the words of Descartes “I think, therefore I am†Into “I am, therefore I think†“there we have the human state†We simply have no choice.
Even in sleep our mind never rests, constantly it mixes the ideas occurring naturally in our daily lives, it freely mixes real ideas using uncontrolled imagination and produces bizarre results, as we lose control of our active mind, falling asleep is heralded by the first unrecognised imagery that occurs at the onset of sleep, rapid eye movement no more then a dramatic moment within our dreams.
Imagery is the natural manner of thinking, after prolonged periods of either physical or mental activity sleep is our savior.
Words are only our best attempt of conveying the ideas necessary to create the imagery we need to consider those ideas.
Words are all I have to convey the meaning and consideration of IMAGERY.
Imagery is immediate, as fast as the speed of light, as broad as the universe, as encompassing as the world, as precise as a flea, are you bitten by the idea of a flea, thrilled by the idea of a world understood by imagery, or as frightened by the concept of the universe as I.
Formal education needs to concentrate on the precise tools for thinking, symbols sounds and ideas, alongside the multitude of headings those ideas are contained within.
With mathematics and reading we are developing the Childs brain, allowing it to create its own meaning, once the child can speak, ten symbols and thirty words allows it to understand numbers, basic arithmetic truths are readily understood, simply by format and familiarity, basic arithmetic utilises the eye, to brain, to meaning, process which is essential in decoding written words.
Every child posses the ability to recognise some words as pictures, Especially so with familiar words the likes of one to ten, this ability should never be mistaken for true reading, eventually all words become pictures but pictures that need to be decoded at the speed of light, the first letter is the key, the second letter the sound direction, the signpost.
Without the ability to recognise every sound combination created by the different combinations of letters within words no child will ever read fluently.
Seven logical steps in familiarity are vital tools in reading progress...
For a child that has taught itself to speak (every healthy child) reading and math’s are no problem once it has been taught systematically, concentrating on the essential sounds of the thirty six symbols that create meaning in a multitude of combinations that are made possible by building words to express ideas.
Children naturally build a vocabulary associated with whatever they are familiar with, so using numbers creates meaning in those words.
Reading and mathematics both share the same neural pathways.
.
:choc:
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 21-06-2007
:pcprob:
Last night on the BBC (i think)i caught a shot of an evolutionary nature created by computor to illustrate the development of a human through merging visualisation from monky to man
IT WAS FANTASTIC
WE NEED TO TEACH EVOLUTION THEORY INTERNATIONALY AS A SELF AWARNESS EXERCISE
IN ORDER TO REDUCE THE EFFECTIVENESS OF RACIAL AND RELIGOUS INTOLERANCE
LET children think for themselves
just as they have to when they use an abacus
developing self awarness in every thing
here is a piece of brain research i found intresting
it will be to 2 two much for fester the rat
but for all you inteligent teachers it may be usefull Brain processing depends on the interactions between neuronal groups. Those interactions are governed by the pattern of anatomical connections and by yet unknown mechanisms that modulate the effective strength of a given connection. We found that the mutual influence among neuronal groups depends on the phase relation between rhythmic activities within the groups. Phase relations supporting interactions between the groups preceded those interactions by a few milliseconds, consistent with a mechanistic role. These effects were specific in time, frequency, and space, and we therefore propose that the pattern of synchronization flexibly determines the pattern of neuronal interactions.
from the usa Science mag started by Thomas Eddison
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/316/5831/1609?rss=1
:pcprob: ---:pcprob:-----:pcprob:
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 26-06-2007
MY REAL WORK
here i am again back at the same place.
http://www.brainconnection.com/library/?main=genhome/early-reading
for over ten years i have worked on minute problems conserning childrens
ability to read write and count, ninty nine % of it i lernt in ten minutes watching chinese children use an abacus,
my tools are nearly ready to market, they are simple they are cheap, they have universal aplication.
has any so called scientist given my a helping hand? NO
will any scientist set up an experiment that proves that simple number awareness guarantees a child easier progress in reading ability?
or is it me on my own as usual?
just hammering away--- ------- -------
My real work
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 12-07-2007
:adder:
i am sending this to some people i respect.
THREE PEOPLE IN THREE DIFFERENT COUNTRIES
Just what have you got in common, your obvious deep commitment to the human race, and in particular to those people who are most seriously disadvantaged.
My regard for the three of you is such that I cannot perceive my dream coming about without your assistance and blessing, and towards the fulfilment of my dream I must give explanation as to what it is.
In the immortal words of Martin Luther King “I have a dream” a dream of equality.
My dream is the “equality of human opportunity”
We can all be capable of showing kindness when kindness is shown to us, and in some cases when none is shown to us.
“A dream of equality of human opportunity,” ------------my dream starts with the work of Maria Montessori with extremely disadvantaged children, trained first as an engineer choosing then to be trained as one of Italy’s first female doctors specialising in mental health, which led directly to her work with children committed to asylums, Simply by kindness and a deep awareness of human capability which grew throughout her lifetime, she learnt that by careful explanation and demonstration, that she could restore the self worth within those children. She consistently developed her personal understanding of the human mind and how children build understanding and mental capability.
It is exactly one hundred years since she established her first school, her principals of education are ignored in the main part by monolithic state education systems, to the greater disadvantage of the worlds children.
Maria Montessori realised that human beings teach and learn quite naturally.
It is part of our evolutionary history that we are capable of learning to speak our native language quite independently, simply by copying the sound of it and recognising the meaning of words as normal familiarisation takes place.
In the same manner we are able to copy human action, science has identified the human capability of mirror neurons capable of establishing permanent memory of movement just as efficiently and seamlessly as we learn to speak.
Maria Montessori had a deep realisation of this human capability, it was this natural inbuilt ability to copy and retain the memory of the movements she demonstrated, on which she built her educational theory.
It was the realisation that children in particular learn most efficiently by simply doing things (in the same manner as adults combine theory with action in whatever they do however complicated it may be) that her educational philosophy was constructed.
IT WAS THIS PHYSICAL AND MENTAL LINK THAT DROVE HER WORK
Throughout the rest of her life she was driven to create personally physical activities to develop mental awareness.
This is where my own realisation of the capability of the human brain begins.
Twelve years ago I was watching a television program where four and five year old Chinese children were shown doing extremely complicated (for their age) arithmetic,
Answering question instantly, I thought that they had naturally more ability then British children, I was the relived to see them using a Chinese abacus a counting board, I thought that is why they are so quick (to my relief)
Then the children had their abaci removed, but they were just as fast.
At that moment in less then ten minutes, around the time it takes you to read this letter I realised they had built a mental map of the abacus, a three dimensional map where they were able to calculate instantly from a visualisation of physical memory.
There are only two things which are necessary in the first instance to give every child equal opportunity in education, perfect arithmetic and reading ability these two skills go hand in hand they use the same neural pathways to create the visual awareness that I describe as image in action, the very same human ability that you have used to read this letter.
We all have this mental capability of image in action, it is our common link only language and perceived injustice divide us, let Maria Montessori and the abacus
Remove the vast part human misunderstanding.
John Nicholson
:pcprob: --------:pcprob: --------:pcprob: still knocking it into you
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 18-07-2007
:tourist:
DRIFFIELD SHOW POLITICS FARMING FINANCE JUSTICE LIFE TODAY AND THE ABACUS.
Apart from Driffield SHOW , these are my main areas of concern, at almost 67 years of age, and still with the impatient mind of a 16-year-old, what's in store for us today, I awoke early, thinking of the Abacus Gordon Brown how I am going to pay my next bill, what a dreadful summer it has been, and just how wet the land is, considering the burning of wheat, when there are still thousands of children starving, considering turning crops into fuel, so the majority of us can drive aimlessly around, as I start to write this it is six o'clock in the morning, and I have been reading the real story of Chairman Mao for two hours it is no wonder I am introspective at this time, Chairman Mao makes Hitler and Saddam looked like a saint, time after time he sacrificed thousands and millions of people, not for social justice, just for the greater benefit of Chairman Mao.
Being a Blair fan but watching dreary Campbell reading his own diary in the most awful monotone, It is appalling how naive Blair appears, after his experience managing England for 10 years, clearly leaving the rich and poor further apart than ever before, there is no doubt that Blair has learned a great deal, and I still believe that his greatest hour is still to come, there are many situations which have to be settled in the world if we are ever to have any conceivable peace,
Tony Blairs standing in the rest of the world is far higher then in the United Kingdom, he is a young man still, in touch with world leaders of great stature, or are they leaders of great stature, or are they ordinary men, most of them I believe that are quite ordinary men, there by chance and charm to lead their respective countries,
Why is Tony Blair left the United Kingdom in such a financial mess, Great Britain Limited is losing over £1 billion a week in trading terms, every house in the United Kingdom is worth three times more than it was what Blair came to power, we have enjoyed an unprecedented time of financial growth with most of us spending money we do not have, thousands of farmers have been saved from financial collapse by the rising property values, thankfully thousands of farmers will continue to be saved, by the real rise in prices for basic food, dairy farmers may get a living again, watching the Chinese English speaking programme on sky we hear that pig prices have gone up by over one third in china, how close the rest of the world is to us, when the price of pig meat in China can quickly affect the price of pigs in the United Kingdom.
The poor are further away from the Rich then they have ever been, is it any wonder when than when there are still 3 million , not unemployed say the labour government, they are now say getting a little bit more money, while one millions sick under the Conservatives, have changed places with the 3 million unemployed today through sickness, instead of 3 million unemployed we now have one million unemployed, the figures have just been changed around basically there are 4 million people maintaining families without doing any work,
Who is to blame for this situation, millions of people are obviously unemployable, some of them are genuinely sick, most of them are well pissed off with a situation they are in, but they see no way to get out of their growing poverty trap,
They do not own there own houses, they are either in council houses, housing institutions which are just the same, or they are in houses which had been bought on mortgages to let to people who were considered too feckless to lend to, so those individuals, sharp enough to borrow money, to buy houses to let, have reaped the reward for their enterprise.
The cost of British housing, is appalling, it is Tony Blair`s more disastrous legacy to the United Kingdom,
Not only is it that, but he is leaving us with a one eyed individual, previously in control of the finance of the entire contry, now claiming to be the last salvation, he is going to build more houses, on government land, the very man who has brought our economy into a disastrous situation, is now claiming to be our salvation for the future.
We cannot rely on brown field sites, to provide enough houses for our growing community, there must be at least one million East Europeans working very successful in happily within the United Kingdom,
the reports are that there are 400,000 people less in our villages, is there any wonder that there are 400,000 people less in our villages when they are not allowed to build a house in a village any more, virtually every small village in the United Kingdom with less than 500 people in it, could quite easily be doubled in size without doing any harm to the community at all, there are millions of older people who would gladly come to live in villages if they could find a house at reasonable money, there are hundreds of thousands of young people who would be glad to stay in the villages if they could buy their first home There
Where is the justice of the individual, when politicians always fail us.
Okay it's obvious every silly begger knows what we should have done when it's been done
Scientific knowledge has never grown at a faster rate then it is at this time, new knowledge is being created Daily.
Scientific problems are being solved, science is at the servers of all of us.
All knowledge is part and parcel of the rights of every human on the earth.
This is where the Abacus comes in, how can people consider the financial and physical mathematical facts that bombard our minds, when we are considering which idiot we choose to lead us, without perfect maths.
How can we consider the scientific knowledge that will enable us to live in the modern world if we cannot read about it.
What Justice for us will there ever be, unless we use our commonsense.
The one thing we know as farmers is, that Food is very difficult to produce economically,
I could source millions of Abacus at extremely low cost from China.
But they could not produce of one bread loaf for the rest of the world.
At least farmers should be able to grow their own personal food however stupid the rest of the world is.
No more introspection, let's just get well oiled, and tell East Yorkshire just what bastards they really are,
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 31-07-2007
:tourist:
I SHALL MAKE A PROPHESY THAT THIS BOOK WILL BECOME THE MOST IMPORTANT MODERN HISTORY BOOK OF THE TWENTY FIRST CENTURY.
Why because without ten years research it could not have been written.
AND that research was special.
Carried out in two languages by husband and wife, capable researchers one of them with her whole life experience as an added attribute
Jung Chang and Jon Halliday have revealed Mao as one of the 20th century's greatest monsters, says Michael Yahuda
Saturday June 4, 2005
The Guardian
Mao: The Unknown Story
by Jung Chang and Jon Halliday
832pp, Cape, £25
The author of Wild Swans and her historian husband, Jon Halliday, have torn away the many masks and falsehoods with which Mao and the Communist party of China to this day have hidden the true picture of Mao the man and Mao the ruler. Mao now stands revealed as one of the greatest monsters of the 20th century alongside Hitler and Stalin. Indeed, in terms of sheer numbers of deaths for which he responsible, Mao, with some 70 million, exceeded both.
IDIOT FANATICS THAT WERE ALLOWED TO TAKE NATIONAL POWER AND
HOLD INTERNATIONAL INTENTIONS OF PERSONAL WORLD DOMINATION
So let us just keep voting and arguing
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my cunning plan is to ensure every child in the world can read such books and count the cost of failure to educate all children in basic reading and writing and counting in HUMAN TERMS
so every finger number name and an abacus for every child please.
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - segarama - 11-08-2007
August 10, 2007
I travel a great deal in the United States and other countries. I find very interesting empirical evidence that OECD - Organization for Economic and Cooperative Development is highly visible and college graduates are generally knowledgeable and recognize the letters OECD...in most European countries and on the east coast of the United States. However on the west coast of the United States, I have found a dearth of college graduates who have even heard of the Organization for Economic and Cooperative Development. As a matter of fact, recognition is less than 5%. Purely observational.
This is troubling to me since this little survey includes University Professors and professional people at some of the highest levels of their profession.
OECD is conducting important work and is represented by 30 democratic countries. My hope is that OECD will take a hard look and do some research on recognition of its organization. This might produce some hard figures that might convince OECD that a campaign of some magniture would help lend support to this outstanding organization.
Frankly, "the teach the brain forum" is where I heard of OECD for the first time in the 2003.
Be well,
Rob aka segarama
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 17-08-2007
:yes: FOR A NEWSPAPER
SHOWING DOING KNOWING
Just how can you end up doing something well?
You simply start by doing it badly!
How did David Beckham get to the top of his career in football?
He simply started kicking a ball around and practising until it could handle it perfectly. It is not the quality of our finished results which are important in life, but the beginning and the training we need in order do anything, the human child teaches itself to speak simply by listening, copying and association, what is the most important thing your child will ever learn? after 12 years of research vast amounts of reading of research papers trialling various methods of education and thousands of hours off thinking in minute detail an East Riding farmer whose business was severely crippled by what he considers to be an illegal association between a British bank (now taken over) and an international trading company. He Claims that the answers to the human future rests clearly within our own hands, for it is within our hands that the ability to count, is first acquired, simply place your hands flat on a table in front of you, there is a clear basis for numeracy. The beginning of arithmetic knowledge, leading to the whole world of mathematics, physics, science and education in general begins with understanding the number name of every finger, it is his considered opinion, that simply by KNOWING the number name of every finger in whatever language the child has been brought up in, is the most vital piece of education, that the child will ever have to learn.
Just look at your fingers, you are clearly looking at the twin representation of five, touch the tip your fingers together and you have the perfect ten.
Technical education starts simply by knowing the number and name of each finger.
Nicholson's awareness of the value of mathematics, as a starting point in education, was made clear to him by a ten minute television programme. Watching children in Hong Kong shouting the answer to a masters collection of numbers just as quickly as he wrote them on the blackboard, alarmed him to the fact that these children clearly displayed advanced mathematical ability in comparison with European children, the television article, then illustrated the children using the Chinese abacus, a sense of relief in understanding their ability, but when the children were asked to do the arithmetic without the abacus, he clearly recognised that utilisation of the abacus had developed a mental map of mathematics.
Working now for over 12 years on this project. This East Riding farmer is proposing that simple education based on the principles of Maria Montessori should be available to every child in the world, he sees simple education as the right of every child, he claims the most important thing in human existence is without doubt Justice. He believes that only world democracy in the beginning on a country by country basis, will lead to a peaceful world.
His observation is that he has never seen a cat that could speak, a horse that could read, or a dog that could drive a car.
We are clearly the most able animal on the face of the Earth. Capable of teaching ourselves to speak our natural language, our children are capable of teaching each other mathematics, our parents and teachers are capable of together providing every healthy child, with the ability to read reasonably well by they are six years old, if we simply start by teaching our children the number name of each finger just as quickly as possible, moving on to utilise the properties of the abacus, and developing their ability to recognise the 26 letters of the alphabet in low case, utilising simple chanting of the alphabet, overlying the letters of the alphabet, utilising a modern colour pen to trace the letters in lowercase, rubbing out and retracing, utilising simple everyday objects to illustrate the letters of the alphabet, so building up natural ability to effectively understand the manner in which the alphabet is utilised, providing children with a starting point of alphabet sound, and clearly moving on, simply through natural association to understand the alternative sounds of the alphabet, from the natural association of objects associated with the individual letters of the alphabet as a starting point.
Every primary school and every nursery school, in our area, will have the opportunity to be provided with direct lessons, from a highly qualified, and gifted former primary headmistress, who has specialised in special needs education over the last ten years of her career. Sue Harrison working with well-qualified undergraduates freely offers free training and advice to local primary and nursery schools, in order that they may lead British education through the simple steps of showing doing and knowing, education in the manner of Maria Montessori, education has it has existed naturally throughout the development human existence.
unny: ---------------unny: ------------unny:
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 28-08-2007
------:anyone:
THE IMAGEN READING METHOD
There is as significant a reason why I'm writing this on the 28th of August 2007August. The effective proof of a new three dimensional reading system has just been demonstrated to me by my five year and four months old Granddaughter Imogen.
This method of learning to read is due entirely to my granddaughter Imogen. Why is Imogen important to reading, probably because she is the most naturally gifted among my eight grandchildren but with the least inclination to read, she was able to speak at the earliest age, Imogen is one of three children her elder sister was seven years old on the 24th of August this year and the youngest of my grandchildren Charlie was one year old on Sunday the 26th of August.
Observations of my own grandchildren and the children of friends and relations has provided me with the experimental procedures and opportunities to process the necessary changes that I needed to evaluate my mathematical and reading developments and the ongoing design development necessary to produce, effective international low-cost resources, which will inevitably lead to the most effective and standardised procedure in establishing basic skills quickly and effectively in any healthy child.
It is now 12 years since I first discovered the effect the abacus can have on early education. [A TEN MINUTE REALISATION]
The Imagen Reading Method is something I have only just perfected. I describe it as three-dimensional reading, simply because it is activated by three dimensional objects, which of course every three and four-year-old child are simply aware of.
[A TEN YEAR REALISATION
Her grasp of the spatial layout of the six line alphabet came quickly
together, fixing the individual letters with the correct sound association after only six days doing it only once a day.
Imogens language ability became very clear between fourteen and fifteen months of age, she was quickly able to imitate language, which of course she did not fully understand at such an extremely early age, quite naturally her mother rejected everything that her own father had to say about education, refusing to utilise the abacus correctly at the right age on any of her three children. Limited utilisation of the abacus and a very good primary school have effectively brought Imogen's sister Phoebe to a good average standard, for a six-year-old by the time of her seventh birthday.
Imogen however, has steadfastly refused to learn to read her alphabet, in either alphabet sound, or the alternative phonetic sounds of the alphabet, as used in many schools.
Grosse irritation with my own daughters failure to follow fathers recommendations, in establishing the six line rhythmic sound of the alphabet as a starting point for Imogen, resulted in an extremely intelligent child, refusing to make any attempt to learn the alphabet whatsoever at five years of age.
My first three-dimensional object, was an oxo cube, clearly marked illustrating a cube and the word oxo which we used as a phonetic example of x, this demonstration worked so well, it was a simple matter to build twenty six physical demonstrations of practical objects and toys to place on the 26 letters of the alphabet, creating the instant ability to use a well recognised object, in order to associate the sound with the symbol of the sound, and so it has become a for an apple, and b for a ball, c for a model cat, d for a model dog, and e for a real egg with the word written on it.
So we have an immediately acceptable three-dimensional reading system created quite naturally by Imogen and her mother's inability to follow standard procedure.
I consider that this latest development has brought together everything necessary to initiate a massive demonstration on the joint ability of a child to develop both mathematical and reading ability at the earliest possible age, provided of course that they have the correct resources and the knowledge and will to utilise those resources correctly.
CONT
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 28-08-2007
-------:tongue: MORE
Effectively my research into Reading came about through the request of a concerned mother, who had quickly establish perfect arithmetic awareness in her own child through utilising the abacus correctly, asked if I had developed anything which would assist the child to learn to read as effectively.
After producing the original abacus one model I felt it would be necessary to develop something as simple and as usefull for teaching children to read.
I had in fact spent thousands of hours building a word wheel utilising three discs, this provided the beginning, the middle, and the ending of all the commonly used words and of course all the letters of the alphabet.
I had worked on this system, for years, it was only when I had developed a prototype, that I realised, I had not started at the beginning, and so it was that I then developed my system of steps within reading, first of all the realisation that rhythmic chanting quickly develops the ability to remember the sounds of the letters, then to fix the sounds with the lower case symbol of the letter as a permanent memory, then the realisation that the child must only be taught the simplest layout of the alphabet, and that they must only learn the lowercase letters in the appropriate alphabet sounds.
Repeating this until perfection is achieved.
By using a standard layout of the alphabet gradual realisation of letter layout builds understanding and the permanent memory of every symbol and sound combination.
Children mix up letters easily, the same visual format associated with sound fixes letter permanently in the childs mind, playing card size letters are used at first to overly a map of the rhythmic alphabet in standard layout.
A secondary similar layout is utilised for children to practise overwriting, in a format already familiar to the child which reinforces the symbol sound association.
Using three dimensional objects is a perfectly viable manner of introducing the alternative phonetic sounds of letter combinations,
in which the childs brain automatically develops subconscious awareness especially when differing objects are used, for example the combinations of the first two letters in salt as opposed to sugar.
Moving on in reading can be helpful, but until all lowercase letters are full understood in low case symbol/sound combination fluent reading will be impossible.
My personal study of reading apart from observation and practical demonstration and trial and error links the early works of Doctor Orton and his disciples through modern American research to the synthetic Phonics programs used in schools today but without a near perfect understanding of the alphabet any child will struggle, perfection in understanding twenty six letters are as important in reading as ten letters and place value are in mathematics.
Perfecting both these two essential non automatically acquired
key links are the vital foundation to educational progress in any form.
My appreciation of the natural abilities that all humans possess to learn vast amounts of information quite naturally, has been enhanced to the point when I only consider that less than 1% of individual knowledge is vital within anyone's education, provided that those essential 36 symbols utilised with the English language is taught correctly, efficiently and at the right time within a child's life.
From a philosophical point of view, and the realisation that we are effectively tribal, which has in the past protected us, I now realise that only a unilateral effort within primary education, and the recognition that we are all of one species, quickly outgrowing our ability to sustain an adequate lifestyle, which we human beings with our superior communications systems require for individual fulfilment, of what we would consider to be, a worthwhile existence, there can be no alternative to a simplified and universal primary education.
Individual brain development, from four years of age, through the next four years of the child's life, requires perfect teaching, any child failing to read adequately by the eighth birthday, is in great danger of dropping behind the natural level of achievement which the majority of children will obtain.
My list of essential lessons during those first four years of every child's education, whether it be carried out within school, within the home, or given freely on a child to child basis, starts with mathematics and the abacus, a perfect understanding of the sounds of every letter and every letter combination, in order that the child can read quickly, allowing it the natural period of enchantment which those of us who were taught in this manner have all benefited from.
My research leads me to believe, that our individual brain development, is inadequate without certain physical abilities being developed during our early years, every child will benefit from learning a second language, every child benefits from playing chess, during those early years of education the game of chess needs to be included under the heading of mental development, as also would be playing the piano, learning to type formerly, the utilisation of art in all its many forms, all games and sports, starting quickly with table tennis which is effectively the most convenient form of brain and body ability that can be carried out within the home.
Concentration on rapid easily assimilated mathematics and reading ability is the combined responsibility of both the primary school and the parents, universal reading and mathematical ability will only be achieved when schools and parents are convinced that they must work together in order to enable our children to receive the start in life that comes from developing early ability to read and understand.
The investment in schools and universities which the Western world has developed is impossible for the greater part of the Third World at the present time, but with a universal system of reading and mathematics combining naturally with the advent of cheap computers and the Internet system, we are obviously in a position where ever child on earth can achieve its own individual intellectual capability at will.
Our world communities, need to recognise and develop the possibility that education brings in the manner of peaceful coexistence.
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 30-08-2007
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THREE DIMENSIONAL TEACHING
Why am I using the term Three Dimensional Teaching?
Why am I writing this, three days after I conceived the term
Three Dimensional Reading?
The answer to these two questions starts with an explanation.
My youngest child a girl called Hattie Elizabeth Nicholson, was four years old, when I discovered the power the abacus had to build a mental map of mathematics.
This mental map builds a spatial understanding of numbers, simply by regular use, even one days work with a five strand abacus, built an ability for my four year old daughter to read the setting of an unmarked abacus, which allowed her to set the number.
Five thousand five hundred and fifty five. 5,555
At four years of age, she could set any number on the abacus, that I either wrote for her, or verbally asked her to set, obviously she did not fully understand the meaning of the numbers but was easily able to understand the three dimensional aspect of the abacus, and manipulate it simply by counting from one to ten and grasping the verbal value name of each column.
TWELVE YEARS have passed by, how clear the memory of that day is still in my own mind, I had to write the value of each column on the frame for myself to grasp the principals of it, Hattie still as this abacus in her bedroom with my writing on the frame.
Hattie is now sixteen, her GSE results are excellent, she has rarely been out of the top maths set in her years in school, and achieved eleven good grades failing only French. Apart from abacus testing and trialling she has had no special training, or appeared extraordinarily diligent.
Thee dimensional reading, is pure Maria Montessori, my most highly regarded human being. Her work on education never ceased throughout her lifetime, understanding the Human Mind came naturally to Maria Montessori, through working with children in mental hospitals. She was able to repair years of mental abuse by practical three dimensional teaching, educational research needs to start where she stopped. There is no Montessori school anywhere without an abacus.
My own fascination with the human mind began with the Abacus, my redesigned Abacus One is suitable for a child of any age in any language, and also suitable for establishing verbal understanding as it is written in any other language.
The speed of the human mind is as of the speed of light, slowed to conceptual level for practical purposes, millions of years of evolution,
In mammalian terms (fifty thousand years for modern man at least) has finally resulted in our near perfect brains, we have no evolutionary help in reading or counting, but we have instant ability to understand instantly virtually anything we can see and do, many lessons (small vital pieces of an intellectual nature) can be learnt instantly.
Reading is a perfect example of human ability, our brain working at the speed of light converts words into images instantly, but it can only do this when we are perfectly able to understand the combinations of symbols we use to represent the sounds we use mentally, to create the images we need to communicate with.
Three dimensional reading uses knowledge we already have, to create the subconscious knowledge we need to assimilate before we are able to read.
Three dimensional reading from a common spatial pattern will ensure early reading in virtually every child on earth.
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'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 06-09-2007
CONSIDER 15 9 1940
THE HUMAN VALUE
THE INTERNATIONAL VALUE
THE NATIONAL VALUE
THE SCHOOL VALUE
THE FAMILY VALUE
YOUR CHILDS VALUE
YOUR VALUE
OF A COMMON METHOD OF TEACHING. FOR YOUR AND ANY CHILD TO READ AND COUNT and think..
What part of the human body is the same in any man woman and child.
Yes it is already in your head, the human brain.
Just how do we think image in action
Image in action
What as an old farmer t to offer the world other then one word and a little common sense.
What is the word? ABACUS
What is the common sense? Let every child have one.
why WHY
because of the natural way we think, we can easily remember everything we see and do when we do it often and sometimes when we do it only once.
I will prove it to you. Draw the low case letter eon an egg, put it on a tin plate and hit it with a hammer in front of one child or thirty. Something so dramatic will become a lifetime memory.
THE VERY FIRST THING WE NEED TO TEACH ANY CHILD
IS THE NUMBER AND NAME OF EVERY FINGER LEFT TO RIGHT ACROSS THE TWO HANDS.
TEACH IT YOUR WAY OR MY WAY BUT JUST DO IT FIRST.
YYES another lesson and another letter. In the childs memory for life.
So yR u reading this..when u could put your bran back on thick mode at any time you wish. Do not we all do that every day. But please not today, I am teaching u about image in action with my abacus, imagine teaching your own child or yourself with mans oldest computer the abacus. Here I am using mans latest computer, using a brain just like yours to prove the concept of natural thinking. “image in actionâ€
4 u &and every child still to be born, for a peaceful future let us work together on thinking naturally, and establishing clear counting reading and thinking.
So simply consider to assist in the development in human thinking we acknowledge a common thread that starts with the abacus alongside perfection in recognising the 36 essential symbols that create the millions of different sounds that hold meaning to us in the English language we learn naturally.
HOW?WE JUST START EVERY DAY WITH OUR NATURAL THINKING HOUR.
WHATis our natural thinking hour 4. simply 4 thinking, in every class at every age every day, in every country, for every body.
WHENnow, u have started already by reading this.
WHEREON every national television say 7 two 8 am.
Y Simply because we are human, of 1 species in one world with only i life.
What is the significance of 15 9 1940 the day we recognise the fact that we the many owe so much to so few.
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 13-09-2007
:tourist:
building IQ
THE DEVELOPMENT OF INTELLIGENCE
There is an acceptance of Howard Gardners seven separate concepts in intelligence, but I want to explore the links within these seven intelligence's, considering the effects of natural development on those seven concepts on each other, and of course the possibilities
of critical enhancement, when we intervene by teaching, especially when we create that education, to best enhance these natural human concepts.
“Once this broader and more pragmatic perspective was taken, the concept of intelligence began to lose its mystique and became a functional concept that could be seen working in people's lives in a variety of ways. Gardner grouped these capabilities into seven comprehensive categories or "intelligences":
• Linguistic Intelligence: The capacity to use words effectively, whether orally (e.g., as a storyteller, orator, or politician) or in writing (e.g., as a poet, playwright, editor, or journalist).
• Logical-Mathematical Intelligence: The capacity to use numbers effectively (e.g., as a mathematician, tax accountant, or statistician) and to reason well (e.g., as a scientist, computer programmer, or logician).
• Spatial Intelligence: The ability to perceive the visual-spatial world accurately (e.g., as a hunter, scout, or guide) and to perform transformations upon those perceptions (e.g., as an interior decorator, architect, artist, or inventor).
• Bodily-Kinesthetic Intelligence: Expertise in using one's whole body to express ideas and feelings (e.g., as an actor, a mime, an athlete, or a dancer) and facility in using one's hands to produce or transform things (e.g., as a craftsperson, sculptor, mechanic, or surgeon).
• Musical Intelligence: The capacity to perceive (e.g., as a music aficionado), discriminate (e.g., as a music critic), transform (e.g., as a composer), and express (e.g., as a performer) musical forms.
• Interpersonal Intelligence: The ability to perceive and make distinctions in the moods, intentions, motivations, and feelings of other people.
• Intrapersonal Intelligence: Self-knowledge and the ability to act adaptively on the basis of that knowledge.
When Howard Gardner wrote Frames of Mind in 1983, he deliberately limited his examination of human capacities to seven intelligences. Are there more? Yes. In fact, after this book was published Gardner added an eighth intelligence to the list. The Naturalist Intelligence is the ability to recognize plant or animal species in one's environment.
I HAVE STOLEN THIS EXPLANATION TO CONSIDER OUR NATURAL INTELLIGENCE IN ORDER TO ENHANCE IT
SO LET US EXAMINE NATURAL INTELLIGENCE
• Linguistic Intelligence: The capacity to use words effectively, whether orally (e.g., as a storyteller, orator, or politician) or in writing (e.g., as a poet, playwright, editor, or journalist).
Looking at each intelligence on an individual basis, exploring the natural effect on other intelligence's and what can be our most effective human intervention (teaching) to enhance the concept itself, and even more important the effect of that enhancement on the six other concepts.
First of all we look at how language develops naturally, we adopt the language of those around us, proven easily by our individual language and the local accent we use, individual family and schools may enhance our childhood language, the type of job we take will have a natural effect on our language development.
These are the natural effects on language, what can education provide to enhance language ability, first of all effective reading ability at an early age will develop our contact with words expanding our vocabulary our ability to read widely, understanding every thing we read easily.
“I consider fast logical teaching of reading our first education priorityâ€
• Logical-Mathematical Intelligence: The capacity to use numbers effectively (e.g., as a mathematician, tax accountant, or statistician) and to reason well (e.g., as a scientist, computer programmer, or logician).
What part has our linguistic intelligence to play in mathematics, obviously without the ability to use and understand words understanding the processes in mathematics is impossible.
Conversely what part as mathematics to play on linguistics, my personal view is that early mathematics is the most essential intervention (teaching) we humans can involve our selves in, within teaching. NOTHING IS AS ESSENTIAL or as quickly achieved as early mathematical awareness a child as simply to understand every aspect of ten, in spatial terms (natural spatial memory) ten single marks have thirty three separate patterns.
Natural spatial awareness combined with the knowledge of the columns we use in numeric symbol arrangements provide us with the easily understood concepts in describing numbers in words.
The simple arrangement of numeric patterns are easily converted into meaning by use of only thirty words, the brain can understand the meaning of any number by language, it is therefore inherent that language development is interrelated with logical numeric awareness.
Where Asian and abacus educated Europeans are using language to describe and think numerically, spatial control areas of the brain are fired up, clearly visible in research on brain activity experiments, as opposed to Europeans with none spatial understand of numbers who consider numbers within the normal brain activity areas utilised for the usual word decoding, in normal reading thinking and conversation.
AT THIS POINT IN CONSIDERING THE BRAIN LET US CONCENTRATE ON JUST HOW WE TEACH THE BRAIN
Howard Gardener has identified seven natural concepts in human intelligence, I am typing this with one finger in order to ensure my best verbal explanation of the natural combinations of these differing aspects in human intelligence, that we as individuals combine naturally in considering anything.
Firstly we have to be aware of these natural human intelligence's, then we have to understand how they interlink in natural thought.
We human beings, are empowered with the most incredible working tool the human brain, millions of years of evolution have perfected our human potential.
My personal belief is that the concept of measuring that potential is impossible, I believe that the normal human mind is very rarely stretched but without a basic concept of numbers being established perfectly at the earliest possible time in any child's life, we are inhibiting that child's potential, it is so easily achieved and so vital in building neural pathways in reading development.
Visual understanding is our greatest gift it allows us to keep ourselves safe in the most part quite naturally.
Reading however, gives us the most potential to develop the human mind in total or overall understanding of any human activity we can consider.
Why? Simply because it mimics human communication, LANGUAGE
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 17-09-2007
---------------:anyone:
[SIZE="4"]ROSE COTTAGE
THE GREEN
BISHOP BURTON
BEVERLEY
EAST YORKSHIRE
HU17 8QF
MRS Sara Brown
No10 Downing St
London
Dear Mrs Brown
I am writing to you seeking help, I believe that you and your husband but you especially are in a position to help bring a positive result to twelve years of thought and research. Your son John will be three years old on the 17th of October, exactly the right age to become acquainted with my simple low cost teaching developments. I have already introduced a costless arithmetic method for Indian Charities based on one of the items that I am enclosing as presents for your son.
Indian children are already being introduced to arithmetic from a virtual costless print of my abacus one map in their own and the English language. Only seven stones and the ability to teach using it are required to instruct any child in early arithmetic awareness.
Children vary in their ability with language a great deal, but by now your son John will no doubt be counting, this is a vital learning time for any child. Please try a small experiment with him, try to keep a log on the number of times you have to chant the numbers one to ten, before he can clearly count to ten, but not only count to ten but visually identify each finger with its name and number left to right across the two Hands. Perfection in naming the name and number of each finger instantly, prepares any child for my next exercise.
A SUM A SECOND simply use the two hands palms towards the child to develop the childs instantaneous counting ability, get the child to mirror and count each representation in order to develop its mental pathways, only stop these exercises when your child can achieve the speed of a visual sum a second in a verbal count and mirror image combined. ( they establish a pattern left to left or visa versa) let them use which ever way is easier for themselves. Just work at high speed
Introducing my redesigned three strand abacus, is straightforward but it will be harder for you then your child. Once you have grasped the principles teach the child to count at high speed in every number one to ten to one hundred. Start with ten it is easy.
By learning to count first, the times tables are easy but vital to instantaneous answers for life, both methods should be perfected.
On the back of the abacus one map there is the simple starting point for alphabet recognition. A spatial starting point to help the child confirm letters against verbal and visual memory locking in the alphabet sound awareness that is so vital as a starting point in rapid reading. After establishing awareness of the rhythmic chant link the childs mind to the letters and alternative sounds of letters by small familiar objects this is a fun way to rapid reading.(Fruit and animal models)
My methods are simple the abacus principle as old as the concepts of numbers themselves, I believe be achieving perfection in counting we will guarantee rapid reading.
Only one day of your life will be sufficient to train yourself in a methodology which will effect every day of your childs life.
The efficiency of the proof in my developments, will eventually affect the lives of millions of children.
Please help me
Yours truly
John Nicholson
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'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 18-09-2007
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IT IS MOST FITTING THAT MY TESTEMENT TO THE ABACUS
IS BUILT AROUND SPATIAL INTELIGENCE
I regard spatial intelligence as our greatest gift, it is always part of both our natural thinking and our specific technical thinking.
Let us start to consider it from another’s view Howard Gardners
Spatial intelligence.
• Spatial Intelligence: The ability to perceive the visual-spatial world accurately (e.g., as a hunter, scout, or guide) and to perform transformations upon those perceptions (e.g., as an interior decorator, architect, artist, or inventor).
When spatial intelligence is combined with bodily kinaesthetic intelligence, its combined effects are instantaneous, the brains recently discovered ability to follow physical movement when simply watching any physical activity (Mirror Neurons) explains Maria Montessori’s perception of human intelligence, it was to this concept within natural human understanding she devoted her educational energy.
Maria Montessori brought severely mentally damaged children back to normality with her teaching systems, although I have read a great deal about her work I have not personally scratched the surface of her work. She worked on perfecting education for over fifty years.
I discovered the value of the abacus in importing spatial mathematic ability in ten minutes and have taken twelve more years to develop a system of teaching any child to read in a simple easy manner, a system I describe as “Three Dimensional Reading,â€
it starts with rhythmic intelligence, learning to chant the alphabet, overlying printed numbers with only low case letters, overwriting printed letters and finally using easily recognised three dimensional objects, fruit or small toys models easily recognised by any child to cement the lowercase printed/written letter in every childs mind.
Perfecting the instant recognition and name of every letter and number in the mind of every child, in the simplest and most memorable manner has been my major interest and pleasure over the last twelve years, most probably writing this, three days after my
Sixty Seventh birthday, it will have to fall to others to develop these simple human procedures essential in building common human intelligence, the natural right of every child.
Let my work be examined by so called educationalists alongside a revisited examination of the whole of the life’s work of Maria Montessori.
Over four hundred teachers have been sent a free abacus in the last week as the Autumn Term started, I am preparing my research material to send to the UK Prime Ministers Wife for use by herself in teaching her son John to count and read easily ,starting on his third birthday. Our Prime Minister will have no closer advisor on a primary education system suited for all the worlds children then his own wife, or a better example of the childs natural assimilation then his own son.
Let us move on in this study on the possibilities of building human intelligence by specifically looking at kinaesthetic bodily intelligence.
• Bodily-Kinesthetic Intelligence: Expertise in using one's whole body to express ideas and feelings (e.g., as an actor, a mime, an athlete, or a dancer) and facility in using one's hands to produce or transform things (e.g., as a craftsperson, sculptor, mechanic, or surgeon).
Obviously here is another natural gift in human intelligence, our body takes instructions from our mind, some of those instructions we are aware of, but the majority of those instructions are perfectly natural, they are instructions given by our mind in the pursuit of a particular purpose that the mind is pursuing, for instance if we want to kick a ball and score a goal, the central purpose is considered by the mind, and the actual process is carried out automatically.
When a child learns to use an abacus, every physical movement is considered, exchanging a symbol of 10 for the reality of ten counters is the first thing any child learns on the abacus, the process of exchanging ten in addition or subtraction quickly becomes automatic in the child using an abacus to count forwards on making subtraction is
The combination of visual and kinaesthetic movement establishes within the mind and automatic map where the process of addition or subtraction is carried out visually.
The Japanese nation still educate some children for over five years in manipulation of the Japanese abacus, long beond the application necessary to turn abacus manipulation into efficient arithmetic noteation Japanese children may be required to develop a mental abacus where they are able to perform outstanding feats of multiplication and division that themselves would be difficult in pure noteation.
Early use of the abacus endows every child, with the mental picture of the mathematical processes, used in counting. By ensuring your own child can utalise the three Strand abacus, teaching it to count in every number from one to ten, chanting the number as for counting in tens ten twenty thirty, you are locking in an awareness, once the child can count to 100 in any number, the same process can be applied to chanting the times tables, of course one ten is ten and two tens are twenty, it is exactly the same process counting, except that when we understand the times tables properly, established as a permanent life memory, it is easier to recall instantly that seven times in nine is sixty three. The times tables presents an instant answer, counting in sevens or simply knocks seven from 70 to achieve the answer of nine times seven.
Every automatic answer in UK education is valuable, especially when you have been taught clearly to understand the process involved in achieving the answer by simply using an abacus in arithmetic terms.
Human movement becomes automatic process, neural pathways develop to assist those processes, the neural pathways of learning associated with understanding simple arithmetic, are of immense value when teaching a child to read. The latest neural research identifies the benefits within memory assimilation of the utilisation of every technique associated with the teaching of reading.
We need reading to be efficient, when a child reads the abacus clearly it is looking at the picture of a word, which originally it may not be able to decode letter by letter, but the sense of achievement for the individual child in being able to read and understand the words on the abacus provide every child with sufficient encouragement to undertake this simple steps necessary within the process of efficient reading acquisition.
When we present the child with a map of the rhythmic alphabet is the child has no problem whatsoever in memorising the lowercase numbers when we utilised the three-dimensional process, of establishing any letter with the physical reality.
Placing an apple on the letter a secures a lifetime memory of the physical link between the letter a hand the Apple.
Placing an egg on the letter e even writing egg on the egg is an efficient manner to retain the e in both the alphabet sound and the phonetic sound in the combination of e g g
O n e These three letters have no relationship with 1until we place them together.
'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 22-09-2007
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In a world were the average Third World person is becoming part of the world's economy at an alarming rate every grain of rice, every
Ear of corn will be needed.
If the world is to have a future, it must prepare for it, man is the thinking and doing animal, let us think about the future.
Attending a seminar in Cambridge on accelerated learning. We were lectured by Tony Buzan. The most important thing he told us, was that we should all buy the new scientist, it is a well written magazine with all the latest research being featured by very good scientific writers, i turned to thinking about one of the products that I have designed, on one side of it there is a flat projection of numbers which I describe as my abacus one map.
Two years ago in India I used this flat projection to illustrate how we could produce an abacus just by copying it on to a piece of waste paper and picking up seven stones to use on it to represent the number, all it is, is seven columns of written numbers and a column of digits 1 to 10 at either side of these written in words columns.
One simply places seven stones on the seven zeroes, count with a stone, to eight, when you want to add nine, you simply hold the stone in your right hand Count one by simply touching the nine, two by simply touching the 10, then the Indian children held up their right hand, and I got them to say please Mr Decimal give me 10, they simply took their left hand and moved that column stone from Zero to ten, on the tens column next to the right hand column on this map, then continued counting on the right hand column with their right hand, one becomes three, counting on for the nine they ended up on seven.
Show yourself how to do this by writing two columns zero to ten with numbers, then use both forefingers so you rest the left hand on one right hand on Seven, imagine it with stones, and you can the see the simplicity of the abacus.
The principle of revolving columns of ten is easily understood, by a three year old child.
Of course most of this I am writing with a speech recognition system. It would take hours of my own time to begin to write this in either pencil of type it into a computer, human speech is rapid and ability to understand it just as rapid,
So I have given you a lesson in mathematics using two columns of numbers on a piece of paper this is a new idea for me, from this quickly established demonstration you can now see why I never want to lose the simplest of ideas and therefore use this system to record ideas. It also helps to develop ideas, simply because I am able to write something the moment I think about it.
On the back of my Abacus One map which is no more than a plastic page, I have written the alphabet in a rhythmic chant order, I have now decided to call it the Alphabet Map. I can also see the value for a four year old of writing without ink. The child simply traces the letter with it forefinger the letters contain a guide for writing which can be used effectively by a forefinger.
The Alphabet Map is a good demonstration of the value of spatial intelligence, by using the same layout, a child can overly a simple copy of this layout with instructions to parents written around it, the child simply has to drop playing card sized cards on the appropriate letter.
So visually the child starts naturally with abc then use the physical demonstrations on Apple on the a and ping-pong ball on the b
The child needs to work constantly in lowercase only, they naturally pick up capitals as they proceed.
I want to lock in another piece of thinking here, I always utilise the fact that speech is quite natural, it is our best demonstration of the brain working on its own, expressing the mental concept we are thinking of.
Children teach themselves to speak by simply listening and associating the words with something practical.
I constantly endeavour to understand the reading process. I believe that it is very much like the process of speech.
Once the child has learned the alphabet name and sound of the letter, by concentrating only on twenty six essential symbols, the alternative sounds follow.
My recommendations on reading are based on observation and logic, most of us will only teach our own children to read but it is a basic truth that only effective individual letter recognition must be the starting point.
Three Dimensional Reading is based on the assumption that children automatically understood the alternative sounds of letters from using words naming objects that they are familiar with, the child naturally uses words with these to describe the objects as pictures of words.
My system of reading depends entirely upon the logical process of learning, we all need to think of the alphabet, virtually every day, if we open a telephone directory we need it, if we need to correct spelling we need it to open the dictionary properly.
Because I am so near to the crux of reading, to the crux of education in general I am sharing my every thought with you.
I am now comparing automatically learning to speak, when we listen to and copy sounds, with automatically learning to read, where we have to learn what the sound of each letter is first, it is essential knowledge in different circumstances sounds created by symbols before we can automatically proceed to read with the least outside interference.
It is my belief that my version of three-dimensional reading, gets over most of the problems in establishing the permanent memory of the sounds we use when the letters are used in association with the differing vowels and constantans’ as they arranged within words.
I am particularly trying to keep the sounds and mental awareness of those sounds in my own mind, and I believe that if we teach a child that a and t when used together sound like at, it becomes simple to add an h for hat and then a t for that.
Simple natural world building, every child can do, when it has been taught the appropriate sounds correctly.
My demonstration of simple teaching, using two columns of numbers, and your index fingers to work with, helping you to explain to your own brain the formation of written numerals which are so important to us.
There is no mental progress, without some understanding of numerals, therefore we should teach it first, and simply regard it as the first part of teaching a child to read, it is so simple, a natural precursor to learning the letters.
What can be simpler than the international sign for one. 1
My son is endeavouring to teach his children the name and number of every finger, simple symbol awareness utilises the same mental pathways that are needed to teach numbers, they are also required to establish automatic recognition of letters when they are used in words more complicated than the words one to ten.
Here is a little piece for Blake “only the exact words of explanation will doâ€
Well we're nearly there, when we read something, we convert the word to a mental sound, ping fart or one, Blake told me that each word was an idea, and therefore each sentence a collection of ideas.
The final crux of my thinking in regards to reading, is that if we simply teach a child approximately 100 essential words, which would of course contain most of the alternative sounds of the letters naturally.
Virtually every healthy child will learn to read quite naturally, almost automatically simply with the brains automatic abilities as in speech taking over as in reading.
Reading the new scientist quite regularly and thinking about what I read within it, I have come to the conclusion that electricity is our best resource, I'm sure that if Thomas Edison had lived into our time he would have already perfected the battery.
Running mass transportation in cities with electrically driven buses, if batteries have limited use, it is a simple matter to design those busses with the facility to change the battery simply, reversing into a battery charging facility, sliding the battery out of one side of the bus in order to recharge it, and simply slide into place a newly charged battery.
Looking at a situation where humans can survive and prosper for the next thousand years at least, fossil fuel will run out, turning crops into fuel is not possible when we have so many mouths to feed.
It is vital that we use our remaining fossil fuels to establish natural means of electrical production, whether it be in the form of wind mills, of capturing the value of tidal forces, or simply in the manner of production within photoelectric cells. We have to solve those problems now.
Only scientific research will save the planet, that essential research will never be done properly, without raising the ability of the individual human on an internationally inclusive basis. Basic arithmetic and early proficient reading are at the hart of individual understanding.
We need to be taught very little to teach ourselves.
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'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 26-09-2007
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SOME THING I HAVE COPIED
'The Absorbent Mind', Dr. Montessori wrote,"The most important period of life is not the age of university studies, but rather the first one, the period of birth to the age of six. For that is the time when man's intelligence itself, his greatest implement is being formed. Not only his intelligence, but the full body of his psychic powers. At no other age has the child greater need of an intelligent help, and any obstacle that restricts his creative work will lessen the chance he has of achieving perfection." Recent psychological studies based on controlled research have confirmed these theories of Dr. Montessori's. After analizing thousands of such studies, Dr. Benjamin S. Bloom of the University of Chicago, wrote in 'Stability and Change in Human Characteristics, "From conception to age four, the individual develops 50% of his mature intelligence; from ages four to eight he develops another 30%..." This suggests the very rapid growth of intelligence in the early years and the great influence of the environment in early development.Through Montessori's experience, she found that the young child's absorbent mind usually lasts about six years, a period she observed to be split into two three-year phases.
SOMETHING I HAVE NOT COPIED
TEACH ANY CHILD TO READ IN A DAY
of course by using an abacus with words on it
ABACUS ONE
one thousand one hundred and ten answers on one page
how many questions can you develop for it?
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'That student is taught the best who is told the least.' - John Nicholson - 09-10-2007
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Last Updated: Thursday, 30 October, 2003, 13:27 GMT
E-mail this to a friend Printable version
Almost half of adults 'lack basic maths'
One in five adults were below the numeracy standard set for 11 year olds
Almost half of adults have maths skills below those needed for the lowest possible GCSE pass grade, a government survey suggests.
The Department for Education and Skills blamed "decades of neglect" for figures showing millions of people lacking basic literacy and numeracy skills.
The survey found 47% of the adults in England - or 15 million people - had a lower level of mathematical knowledge than was needed to gain a grade G at GCSE.
Some 21% - or 6.8 million - were less numerate than the standard set for 11 year olds in national tests.
'Stark'
Meanwhile, 16% of adults had sub-GCSE literacy, with 5% failing to achieve the expertise required of 11 year olds.
Skills minister Ivan Lewis said: "I am determined to ensure that today's young people will no longer endure the decades of neglect in literacy and numeracy education which is reflected so starkly in this survey.
"Our recruitment of 50% more maths teachers in just four years and dedicated literacy and numeracy strategies in primary schools are already delivering significant improvements in maths attainment at secondary level."
The DfES said the number of adults with sub-GCSE literacy skills had fallen from 7 million to 5.2 million since 1997.
However, the earlier figure was based on an estimate.
'Shocking'
Those adults lacking an 11 year old's accepted standard of numeracy had fallen just by just 200,000.
The DfES findings, based on a survey of 8,730 16 to 65 year olds in England, found a strong link between numeracy and literacy and higher wages.
Some 68% of full-time workers earning more than £20,000 a year had gained at least one GCSE at grade C or above.
Parents with poorer numeracy and literacy were also less confident when helping their children with school work, the DfES found.
The CBI estimates that poor skills cost the British economy £10bn a year.
Liberal Democrat education spokesman Phil Willis said: "Decades of neglect in British education are continuing under Labour.
"After six years in office, the government can no longer blame its discredited predecessor for the shocking lack in the nation's skills.
"The Government's obsession with misguided targets has resulted in minimum improvement at GCSE level."
this has to be super news for abacus
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