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I suggest that they go get a copy of "Windows for Dummies" or the "Idiots guide to Window." (This really extends to almost any subject and not just computers.) "Read the book, and if there is anything you don't understand call me and I will explain it to you."
I'm glad you brought up this problem. On my job, this is exactly the way I'm asked to learn things. I'm given a project with a few resources and asked to dig into the materials and come up with specific questions. No hand-holding happens on the job. I find this hard to do sometimes, especially when I'm totally clueless about a certain topic, but it actually forces me to use my brain power and helps me learn and retain much better.
Come to think of it, this is probably why I get paid as much as I do. People too often go for instant gratification and don't bother to invest in anything, the result of which is the inability to develop their mental and physical capacity further.
Be glad that you are able to invest in delayed gratification. This quality will take you far in life.
This is partially a rant, but also an honest question. How do you get people to learn to help themselves?
There are many discussions here on CD about what makes people smart or dumb; successful or failures. Usually people try to relate this question to the all encompassing CD catch alls of "liberal or conservative", the equally condescending "rich or poor", and who can forget the other CD favorite "Black or White." I think it crosses all these classes and comes down to one thing. Those who read vs. those who do not.
As a person in the community who is known to be a computer professional, I get calls from friends (and friends of friends) who ask for help solving some problem on their computer. Most of the time it should be a simple 5 minute Q&A and they should be on their way. For Example, trying to get someone to do a print screen, paste it to paint, and send it to me. More and more, I find that it takes hours for me to explain these simple things because they don't know what "print screen means", they don't know how to paste into a document, and they don't know how to save to another folder - or find the saved file from the mail attachment dialog. I usually have to give in and go fix the problem for them, or send them to the local geek squad if they are located too far away.
I tell most of these folks that the problems they are having are happening because they do not know how to use their computer and that they need to take time to learn them better. I suggest that they go get a copy of "Windows for Dummies" or the "Idiots guide to Window." (This really extends to almost any subject and not just computers.) "Read the book, and if there is anything you don't understand call me and I will explain it to you."
I tell them that they would be able to solve their problems on their own - or that it would just take a few minutes on the phone for me to explain things if they would just learn the basics -- if they just get and read these books. But A few months later, they will call again with the same or a similar problem. When I ask them if they got a copy of the book I suggested, "what book" is usually the answer. This will repeat over and over until either they get frustrated with me telling them to read, or I tell them "Sorry, I can't help you with that."
I find this to be the same for many of my friends and it does not really matter what their background is. And it really doesn't matter if we are talking about computers, cars, home repair, woodworking, or gardening.
What is it that makes it so difficult or undesirable for people to get a book and read. I know that many people would rather just ask someone else to fix their problems for them, but how do we get more Americans to just read?
Do we need a PSA, that says "Most of the solutions to your problems are in a book?"
Instead of just teaching reading and math, should we have kids spend a lot of time in a class devoted simply to RESEARCH?
How do you get people to read?
What kind of friends do you have that they think they can bother you with all of their minor computer problems again and again??
Good thing you aren't a pediatrician or any type of MD and your friends had children as opposed to computers.
I have an above average IQ and a graduate degree and i detest reading. I'm guessing it's some sort of visual processing problem.
It is so MUCH easier for me to HEAR directions and process the info that way. I think it's one less step in the brain or something.
I've gone so far as to avoid reading the lyrics on TV on "Guitar Hero" and sing "LA LA LA" to the tune instead. Prompting frustrating from many people and them yelling, "THE LYRICS ARE RIGHT ON THE SCREEN! "
But that's just me.
In general, reading requires 1. Sustained attention which I think is getting less and less daily (myself included.) and 2. Retaining info which we don't really need to do as much nowadays with smartphones and such.
Yes there is such a thing as a auditory learner compared to a visual learner.
That was identified on my kid's IEP in grade school through testing.
Didn't help him much with the school accommodating him but it helped him and US figure out how to facilitate different things. If I wanted to, I could have PUSHED it with the school but didn't do so constantly unless I saw they were being unreasonable.
For example how to write down directions and referencing them for a long road trip. Pre GPS days.
Or in grade school, how to drill different things. '
So you can research those strategies if you like.
Like so many other people with some learning differences, or ADD or whatever...you don't have a road blocking problem IF YOU'RE INTERESTED in the material. You just take the long way around to get to the same goal.
My ex husband was the same way as my son inherited. High IQ but challenged in strategies. I used to say "If I asked you to go across the street you're going to go all the way around the block and down the road and back to get there". That was before I had a kid and learned WHY. He ALSO has two masters and a phD and it was a LONG ROAD but he LOVED reading luckily so could learn to the extent of his strong interests even if it took longer. Like spending the entire day in his home office or library studying for YEARS.
Schools ruin reading for kids. Make them do boring and stressful graded stuff. The hate continues in life from age 12 until age 65.
12 - 65? At some point you have to take ownership for yourself. I used to blame my Mom for not instilling good housework skills in me but one day I realized that if I wanted to learn something all I had to do was look for information. Just because I wasn't taught something in the first 18 years of my life doesn't mean I got a free pass to be ignorant for the next 70 years.
While research shows that the best time to instill a love of reading is when kids are very young, that doesn't mean that you can't develop a reading habit at any age. I didn't like many of the books I had to read in school either, but still I'm a reader. How do you explain all the people that love to read - were they all home schooled?
The school curriculum manages to choose the most tedious works possible. As a result, people associate reading with boredom.
I'm not kidding. I was a voracious reader by the time I was in second grade and still am today. But I'm amazed at how many 'classics' I read that were simply uninteresting.
The school curriculum manages to choose the most tedious works possible. As a result, people associate reading with boredom.
I'm not kidding. I was a voracious reader by the time I was in second grade and still am today. But I'm amazed at how many 'classics' I read that were simply uninteresting.
Yeah, like The Catcher in the Rye, dumb White boy keeps getting kicked out of prep school. So exciting.
Heinlein's Citizen of the Galaxy totally blows it away.
The school curriculum manages to choose the most tedious works possible. As a result, people associate reading with boredom.
I'm not kidding. I was a voracious reader by the time I was in second grade and still am today. But I'm amazed at how many 'classics' I read that were simply uninteresting.
I think it's got to be a combination of the books and the teacher. I remember really disliking some classics because of a particular teacher in HS and how we had to laboriously pick them all apart. My kids OTOH, had some excellent English teachers and would come to the dinner table full of interesting facts about what they were reading and didn't seem bothered about analyzing the books. They have also had a wider range of books than I did.
Something that I think is pretty common on this forum is the assumption that the education we were given is the same one given today. Or that the education that's given in one state is the same that's given in another. Education strategies can change pretty quickly depending on mandates from the State, from the feds, from the school boards and the individual school administration. My kids got a much better education than I did, but I don't know why. We live in a different state than where I grew up ad there was thirty years in between. Even my oldest and my youngest got a slightly different education because their HS offered more AP and Community College classes in the eight years between them and graduation requirements changed.
In my case, because of laziness. I wish I was a better reader. It usually takes me months to finish a book, not because I read slowly, just that I'd put the those that I bought/borrowed on my table for a whole month or two before I open it, and that has to change.
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