The Iron Ring

In this month’s Scientific American is an article about the expert mind. While most us go on believing that experts have innate abilities, this article completely debunks that idea, claiming, via the model of chess masters, that experts are trained, not born.

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?chanID=sa006&colID=1&articleID=00010347-101C-14C1-8F9E83414B7F4945

The article claims that the difference between those of us who become concert cellists, and those of us who spend six years in the Penn Orchestra sitting no higher than fourth chair (ahem) is something they call ‘effortful’ learning. In other words, those of us destined to become experts are adept at challenging themselves, always pushing to perform the hardest sonata, solve the most difficult problem, and beat the greatest chess master whereas most of us settle for baseline ability. The example given is learning how to drive. Most of us learn well enough to pass our road tests and not kill ourselves on the road and so we’re happy. An ‘expert’ would continue challenging themselves.

Here is my question; isn’t it possible that even if the ability to be an ‘expert’ is not innate, the ability to be an effortful learner is? Perhaps it is not the case that anyone could become an expert, but that anyone is who an expert in something could just as easily have been an expert in something else. It’s certainly a case of nature vs. nurture, since we cannot go back in time and hand Tiger Woods a violin instead of a golf club.

But as the article points out, the real issue raised is that of teaching. If this theory is true, we can no longer go on sorting students by abilities, but rather we need to change the way we challenge each student to help every student become ‘effortful’ learner.