Q&A: Why focus on filling in prerequisite knowledge? Why not focus on improving generalization ability directly?

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Students have different levels of generalization ability.

The higher a student’s generalization ability, the more learning they’ll infer beyond what they’re explicitly held accountable for learning. The better they can “fill in the gaps” in the face of instructional shortcomings.

Discussed at length here. (See the section “Counterexamples” in particular, which contains several case studies.)

If some students can “fill in the gaps” better than others, then why try to solve educational problems by directly remediating gaps in student knowledge and providing finely scaffolded instruction? Isn’t that just treating the symptom? Why not focus on increasing generalization ability directly?

Because unlike prerequisite knowledge, generalization ability is not really malleable. Same with working memory capacity (which is unsurprisingly correlated with generalization ability).

Trying to make a student better at math by increasing generalization ability / working memory capacity is like trying to make an athlete better at basketball by increasing their height.

But the good news is that when you directly remediate knowledge gaps and provide finely scaffolded instruction, everyone benefits. It’s a multiplier on everyone’s learning efficiency.

Related reading:

• How Do You Increase a Student’s Ability to Make Mental Leaps?
• Q&A: Is there really no evidence of a method to increase working memory?
• People Differ in Learning Speed, Not Learning Style - see section "Lack of Evidence for WMC Training," which includes plenty of specific references to the literature.
• You Can Effectively Turn Long-Term Memory Into an Extension of Working Memory
• A White Pill on Cognitive Differences

And some tweets: here, here, here.

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