Learnlets

Secondary

Clark Quinn’s Learnings about Learning

The case for learning science

by 1 Comment

In a perfect world, we’d spend all the time we want on learning. However, we don’t live in that world, we live in the real world. Which means our decisions are about tradeoffs. Which means we have to evaluate the case for paying attention to research. So here’s a stab at the case for learning science.

Learning is a probabilistic game. That is, there’s a probability that anything we’ve invested in learning will arise at the appropriate time. I’ll suggest that our brains have some randomness built into them, so there’s always a chance we’ll do things differently. Thus, in a sense, learning design is about increasing the probability that the right thing will occur.

And there are consequences. Say, for instance, that we want people to wash hands sufficiently. Then we might rightly work to increase awareness (along with making sure there’s soap, water, sinks, towels, etc) and the proper procedure. To do that sufficiently, say, takes X minutes of instruction.

Yet we may not have X minutes. Given the drain on resources, allocating that much time means the cost of the washing may be more than the cost of not. People not on the job for that time are an expensive resource. What’s a manager to do?

What we do all the time is make a probabilistic decision. We provide the rules in places where people might get their hands dirty, and we provide support materials (e.g. signs on the walls) in the places you wash your hands.

Most importantly, however, we make a determination of what’s a level of time that is going to likely do ‘good enough’. We’ll spend X-Y minutes, and make essentially a gamble that we’ll get 80% there, and the support materials will do the rest.

What this means is that since we’re not allocating sufficient time, we should be optimizing the quality of the learning design we apply. If they’re only getting X-Y minutes, that time should be as effective as possible. Which means we practice serious learning design, reflecting the best practices.

Quite simply, if you do less than use the best learning design principles derived from research, you’re decreasing the value of your investment in design time and learner time. And there are lots of ways we go wrong, whether it’s myths or just underinformed design. It’s a matter of professionalism as well. So let’s be smart and design smart. That’s the case for learning science. We owe it to our learners and our organizations.

Top 10 Tools for Learning 2020

by Leave a Comment

It’s time, once again, for Jane Hart’s excellent Top 10 Tools for Learning survey. And, so, it’s time once again for my reflections. Here are my take on the top 10 tools that support my learning.

The first way I learn is to process what I’ve seen. That, toolwise, is largely about representing and communicating.

Processing Tools

1-2. Writing is arguably the top way I reflect. And, so that’d put Microsoft Word at the top of my list. That’s where I write books and articles first. And, of course WordPress is how I write my blog (e.g. here!).   Writing is a way to sort out how I think about things. As I say, things that end up in presentations and books tend to show up on blog first. Well, one of the main ways.

3-4. Besides writing, two ways I sort out my understandings are to diagram and to outline. I use OmniGraffle as a general purpose diagramming tool because, well, it largely works the way I want to think about it. Diagrams, mind maps, even recently as sort of posterboard. And I use OmniOutliner to do, well, outlines. Another way to map out structures. I’d use a less costly tool, but…the columns feature is really helpful for annotation. Both, unfortunately, are Mac only (and sadly quite dear).

5. Keynote is how I create presentations, another way I do, and then share, my thinking. Diagrams are a big part of my talks, punctuated with stock photos to represent concepts (from Pixabay and occasionally Unsplash). I believe (and don’t have evidence for) that using an image that relates to the concept but doesn’t exactly communicate it leaves open some curiosity that then gets connected. And that this leads to better comprehension (I avoid bullet points in live presos, and save them for handouts). Anyone got that data?

The second thing I do is see what other people are pointing to and have to say, and ask them questions   as well. So the second category is about interacting with others.

Social tools

6. Twitter is a regular feature of how I see what people are pointing to, as well as pointing to things I’ve found as well. Chats there are fun, too. Like Jane, Tweetdeck is my tool of course on my Mac. I have to use the Twitter client on iPad/iOS, since they’ve taken away Tweetdeck on the iPad (grr).

7. I like FeedBlitz as a way to sign up for blogs, as it brings them into my inbox, instead of me needing a separate app. Reading a select list of blogs is one of my tactics. That’s how people can sign up to get my blog in email, too.

8. Slack has also been a major component of getting things done, mostly with IBSTPI. It’s a handy way to get things done with others.

9-10. Social networks are a big part of my learning, which means that Facebook and LinkedIn also play big roles. Facebook’s more personal, ie less about work, but I learn about   many societal things there. And LinkedIn is a place for learning as well, professionally as opposed to personally.

And…

Honorable Mention: to round out the picture (10 is such an arbitrary number ;), sharing collaborative documents, e.g. Google Docs, is a major way to collaboratively process and learn together. Also socially, Zoom and BlueJeans (the latter’s almost the same, and what ISBTPI uses) are used a lot to discuss and negotiate understandings. And email, of course (using the Mac Mail client) is a major way I learn, e.g. blogs appear there, and it’s a major way I interact.

DuckDuckGo has become my goto search engine (and Brave as my browser,  at least on my Mac, awaiting cross-device sync), because I don’t need to spread my data any further than necessary. And searching is a big part of my learning.

As an aside, owing to the pandemic, like everyone else I’ve been doing much more with Zoom to interact with colleagues than I had in the past. And I find, interestingly, that the ways I reach out are more opportunistic: I’ll use FB Messenger, or a Twitter DM, or a LinkedIn message, or an email depending on who, why, and what tool I’m in at the time. There may be some method to the madness, but I’m not confident on that point ;).

So, there’re my Top 10 Tools for Learning. I hope you’ll post or send your list to Jane too, so we can continue to see what emerges.

 

Tips to Avoid Millennials Marketing Hype

by Leave a Comment

I received, in my email, a solicitation for a webinar titled 5 Tips to Engage Gen Z and Millennial eLearners in 2020 and Beyond.  And, as you might imagine, it tweaked my sensibilities for the worse. My initial reaction is to provide, as a palliative, tips to avoid millennials marketing hype.

The content starts off with this scintillating line: “if you‘re searching for current, new ways to engage people online and keep your business thriving, look to your youngest learners.” What? Why do you want current and new ways to engage people? How about the evidence-based ways instead? Tested and validated ones. And why your youngest learners? Organizations need to be continually learning across all employees. Why not just your  newest employees (regardless of age)?

So, your first tip is to look for phrases like ‘new’ as warnings, and look for “research-based” or “evidence-based” instead. “Science-based” is likely okay, as long as it’s not neuroscience-based (wrong level) or brain-based (which is like saying ‘leg-based walking’ as someone aptly put it.)

Second tip: don’t be ageist. Why focus on their age at all? Deal with people by their knowledge and background. It’s discriminatory, really.

The ad goes on: “To future-proof your learning program, make sure your content is designed with these young professional learners in mind.”   What’s different for these learners? Their cognitive architecture isn’t fundamentally different; evolution doesn’t work that fast. So why would you do something just for them (and discriminate against others) instead of doing what’s right for the topic?

Next tip: avoid any easy and inappropriate categorizations. Don’t try to divide content or experiences in trendy ways instead of meaningful ways.

You should already be leery. But wait, there’s more! “On one hand, they can be distracted, overwhelmed, and impatient. On the other, they are highly collaborative, technically-savvy, and driven by fairness and storytelling.”This is like a horoscope; it fits most everyone, not just young people. We all have distractions and increasingly feel overwhelmed. And our brains are wired for storytelling.   These describe human nature! And that ‘tech savvy’ bit is a clear pointer to the digital native myth. Doh!

They then go on. “With this in mind, how can you effectively engage this digitally dependent group to attract, train, and retain them?” Um, with what attracts, trains, and retains humans in general?  That would be helpful!

Thus, another tip: let’s not make facile attributions that falsely try to portray a meaningful difference. Let’s focus on design that addresses capturing and maintaining attention and motivation, and communicating in clear and compelling ways. And skip mashing up myths, ok?

We’re not  quite done with the pitch: “how to level up your existing learning strategy to meaningfully engage your Millennial and Gen Z learners.” This is just a rehash of the tips above. Meaningfully engage  all your learners!

There’s also this bullet list of attractions:

  • What motivates Millennials and Gen Z and how to tailor your learning strategy to keep them engaged
  • Ways in which traditional learning programs fail younger learners and how you can prevent these common mistakes
  • A step-by-step process for evaluating your instructional content, providing you with an actionable blueprint on transforming your content

This could easily be rewritten as:

  • What motivates Millennials and Gen Z learners and how to tailor your learning strategy to keep them engaged
  • Ways in which traditional learning programs fail younger learners and how you can prevent these common mistakes
  • A step-by-step process for evaluating your instructional content, providing you with an actionable blueprint on transforming your content

And, for all I know, that’s what they’re really doing. That would be actually useful, if they avoid perpetuating the myths about generational differences. But, as you can tell, they’re certainly trying to hit buzzword bingo in drawing you in with trendy and empty concepts. Whether they actually deliver is another issue.

Please, avoid the marketing maelstrom. Follow these tips to avoid millennials marketing hype, and focus on real outcomes. Thanks!

Thinking Transformation

by Leave a Comment

This pandemic has led to everyone scrambling to work digitally. And it‘s not really a transformation (which shouldn‘t be ‘digital first‘), but rather just ‘move what we do online‘. And that‘s understandable. Over time, however, I think we want to shift our mindset. And, I think a previous exercise in thinking transformation is valuable here. I‘m talking mobile.

When I originally was talking about mobile, I was doing so from a perspective of augmenting our brains. The 4C‘s framework was a way to think about core mobile affordance from a point of view of what mobile offers. Then I moved on to the role the devices play in our (working) life. It‘s about not just courses on a phone, but:

  • Augmenting formal learning: extending it
  • Performance support: cognitive augmentation
  • Social: tapping into the power of social and informal learning
  • Contextual: mobile‘s unique opportunity

And, I suggest, these are valuable ways to think about using technology in general to support us. On principle, I like to think about how technology supports our thinking (not the other way around ;). To future-proof what I propose is one driver, so tech changes don’t undermine relevance. Further, since mobile is a platform – a strategy not just a tactic – focusing on fundamentals makes sense.

For instance, elearning shouldn‘t look like just a classroom online. That can and arguably should be part of it, but there‘s more. It‘s about extending formal learning, not just delivering it. And aligning with how we really learn, because it really does have to be effective.

Similarly, with folks working from wherever, thinking about the support they need is important. What tools, aids, guides, etc., will help them work more effectively without their prior context? Let’s change workflows to align better with what‘s known about how we work.

And making people available in useful ways for communication and collaboration is important. The demands of online meetings are becoming more prevalent and onerous. Zoom fatigue is a thing!   How can we optimize the experience?

Contextual is more uniquely mobile, taking advantage of where and when you are (and other contextual factors), but we probably do need to account for them more astutely. If your kids are in the other room, what does that do to your ability to work? Here, of course, is the greatest difference from mobile, but the mindset is still relevant.

So, for instance, when I ran a mobile course for the Allen Academy, we had a week dedicated to each of these elements (as well as kicking off a mobile mindset and closing on strategy). Given that it was still early in this new world, I didn‘t really push the thought of how this is a more general tactic. Of course, I now would.

And, given that I‘ll be running the course again, I definitely will! Look, mobile hasn‘t gone away, and we‘re possibly using mobile tools more now even though we‘re not on the road! So mobile‘s still relevant, and the mindset behind ‘thinking mobile‘ is even more relevant. I’ll be talking with Christopher Allen of Allen Interactions about it tomorrow (12 Aug) at 11AM PT, 2 Eastern (see below). And, if you‘re interested in the course, check it out!

Curious about Curiosity

by 3 Comments

Looking into motivation, particularly for learning, certain elements appear again and again.   So I’ve heard ‘relevance’, ‘meaningfulness‘, consequences, and more. Friston suggests that we learn to minimize surprise. One I’ve heard, and wrestled with, is curiosity. It’s certainly aligned with surprise. So I’ve been curious about curiosity.

Tom Malone, in his Ph.D. thesis, talked about intrinsically motivating instruction, and had curiosity along with fantasy and challenge. Here he was talking about helping learners see that their understanding is incomplete. This is in line with the Free Energy Principle suggesting that we learn to do better at matching our expectations to real outcomes.

Yet, to me, curiosity doesn’t seem enough. Ok, for education, particularly young kids, I see it. You may want to set up some mismatch of expectations to drive them to want to learn something. But I believe we need more.

Matt Richter, in his well-done L&D conference presentation on motivation, discussed self-determination theory. He had a nice diagram (my revision here) that distinguished various forms of motivation. From amotivated, that is, not, there were levels of external motivation and then internal motivation. The ultimate is what he termed intrinsic motivation, but that’s someone wanting it of their own interest. Short of that, of course, you have incentive-driven behavior (gamification), and then what you’re guilted into (technically termed Introjection), to where you see value in it for yourself (e.g. WIIFM).

While intrinsic motivation, passion, sounds good, I think having someone be passionate about something is a goal too far. Instead, I see our goal as helping people realize that they need it, even if not ‘want’ it. That, to me, is where consequences kick in. If we can show them the consequence of having, or not, the skills, and do this for the right audience and skills, we can at least ensure that they’re in the ‘value’ dimension.

So, my take is that while we should value curiosity, we may not be able to ensure it. And we can ensure that, with good analysis and design, we can at least get them to see the value. That’s my current take after being curious about curiosity. I’d like to hear yours!

Mythless Learning Design

by 1 Comment

If I’m going to rail against myths in learning, it makes sense to be clear about what learning design without  myths looks like. Let me lay out a little of what mythless learning design is, or should be.

Myths book coverLearning with myths manifests in many ways. Redundant development to accommodate learning styles, or generations. Shortened to be appropriate for millennials or the attention span of a goldfish. Using video and images for everything because we process images 60K faster. Quiz show templates for knowledge test questions because they’re more engaging. And all of these would be wrong.

Instead, mythless design starts with focusing on  performance. That is, there’re clear learning outcomes that will change what people do that will affect the success of the organization. It’s not about knowledge itself, but only in service of achieving better ability to make decisions.

Then, it’s about designing meaningful practice in making those decisions. It’s not about testing knowledge, but ability to apply that knowledge to choose between alternative courses of action. It can be mini-scenarios (better multiple choice), branching, or sims, but it’s about ‘do’, not  know.

We reinforce practice with content that guides performance and provides feedback. It does use multiple media, because we use the right media for the message. Yes, we look to engage multiple senses, but for comprehending and encoding information. And variety. We use visuals to tap into our powerful visual processing system, not because they have any particular metric improvement. We also use audio when appropriate. And while text is visual, we use it as appropriate too. To address learning outcomes, not learner preferences.

Mythless learning design may use small amounts of content, but because minimalism keeps cognitive load in check, not because our attention span has changed. We need appropriate chunking, as our working memory is limited, so we want to make things as small as possible, but no smaller!

We design meaningful active practice not because any generation needs it, but because it’s better aligned with how our brains learn at pretty much any age. There are developmental differences in working memory capacity and experience base, but  everyone benefits from doing things, not passively consuming content.

There are good bases for design. Ones that lead to real outcomes. Starting from a performance focus, and reflecting what’s been demonstrated in learning science research, and tested and refined. Evidence guiding design, not myths.

There are also bad bases for design. Dale’s Cone, shiny object syndrome, the list goes on. Gilded bad design is still bad design. Get the core right. Let’s practice good, mythless learning design. Please.

 

Practicing the Preach

by 4 Comments

I’m working on my next plan for global domination. And as I do, I’ve been developing my thinking, and there are some interesting outcomes. Including a realization that I wasn’t doing what I usually recommend. And I also believe that you should ‘show your work‘. So here I’m practicing the preach.

First, I’m developing my understanding, getting concrete about it. I usually use Omnigraffle as a diagramming tool, to represent my conceptual understandings. And I started doing that as part of the ‘developing thinking’ part. But I started with a diagram, and took the elements out and mindmapped them, and threw in other bits. In short, the ‘diagram’ has become a visual place to store bits and pieces of different diagrams, representations, mindmap, prose, or more. As well as outlining elsewhere. But it’s working out for me, so I thought I’d share.

The overall visualization gives me a place, like a business canvas, to drop stuff on and rearrange. It’s a ‘thinking tool’. I’m also copying part of the the activity map and linking things together to capture the actual flow between content and activities. Etc. A virtual whiteboard, I guess.

Second, one of the things to represent was how this would be communicated. Whether a course, or interactive ebook, or whatever, I want to create a flow. And I realized an activity map might make sense. I haven’t done this before (I’ve used storyboards and diagrams), but I find it interesting. Here’s the current status.

Across the top are the various stages (Introduction, the Principles, the resulting learning Elements, the associated Process, and the Closing). Your stages may vary.  Along the side are the different components (the Content topics, the associated practice Activities, the Emotions I to be evoked, the Stories to tell, and the Tools). I think putting in ’emotion’ is an important step! And then I can drop text bits into the intersections.

Finally, as I started developing the associated content, I realized one thing I advocate is backwards design. That is, envision the performance and how it’s distributed across tools and brains. Then, I realized I hadn’t designed the tools first! I’m going back and doing that. So it’s now in the activity map as well ;).

Just thought I’d share this, practicing the preach, and hope that you find it interesting, if not useful. Feedback welcome!

 

A little silliness

by Leave a Comment

So, this was a little silliness I did in the 99 second presos at the Learning & Development Conference. It was the second one (the other was more aspirational). I’d put it together and then wasn’t sure, but there was time and space. It’s just for fun, nothing serious, along the lines of others I’ve done. FYA (allegro):

Hi, I‘m Dr. Quinn, Meaningful Man, and have I got solutions for you! We‘ve got learning experiences that are certain to be new. And, they‘re based on the latest neuroscience, so we‘re using visuals along with text, and asking questions that require answers!

We‘ve developed in multiple media to make sure that we‘re matching learners‘ learning styles. And we‘re using all the latest interaction types to make sure that your digital natives feel right at home. You can view the presentations in virtual reality!

Don‘t worry, we‘re also catering to all the other generations by ensuring that the presentations are the same whether on screen or ‘in world‘; not a bullet point differs. And the quizzes are still multiple guess with trivial and silly alternatives so no one is bored and everyone‘s self-esteem is maintained.

We‘ve taken a microlearning approach, with each chunk shorter than the attention span of a goldfish. Your learners won‘t be overwhelmed with content at any one time.

And with the visuals, we‘re communicating 60000 times more content, giving you more value for money.

We‘re also Dale‘s Cone compliant, because you‘ll spend 10 percent of the time reading, 20 percent of the time listening, and 30 percent of the time viewing. Which means we‘re 40% shorter than anyone else!

We‘ve used gamification to keep it lively. No more boring drill-and-kill, it‘s all packaged up in themes like racing, circuses and more, so you are earning points that aren‘t confounded by any relation to the material.

Look, you have to justify your decisions. So we‘re buzzword compliant, because we know our business depends on your business, and you depend on matching the latest marketing to justify the expenditure.

So come, get the latest and greatest. Call now, operators are standing by. Thank you.

So there you have it, a little silliness. Please, all in fun. (Ok, maybe with a wee bit of ‘caveat emptor’. :)

Thinking about reframing

by 2 Comments

I found something interesting, and wanted to share, but…I realize this is supposed to be about my learnings about  learning. So, I’m framing it as thinking about reframing ;). Seriously, it’s about extant models and opportunities to rethink.

So, to begin with, I’ve been somewhat frustrated with the traditional model of capitalism. No, not as a plea for communism or something, but because it doesn’t align with our brains. When I champion that we should align with how we think, work, and learn, that’s true at the individual, team, organizational, and societal levels.

The problem is, capitalism assumes that we’re optimizing buyers. That is, we will search out and buy the best products, so there’ll be consistent pressure for quality, and this drives improvement. A lovely theory. With only one small flaw…

We’re not optimizing buyers. Herb Simon was part winner of a Nobel prize (kinda before he went on to be a leader in the cognitive science field) on the fact that we’re satisficing buyers, not optimizing. That is, we’ll buy ‘good enough’. I’ve used the fish shop story to document this. We know how to make light, crispy, non-greasy fish’n’chips. So, the capitalist model would posit that every shop should have beautiful fish. Er, no. You’re just as (more?) likely to find greasy sodden fish. Because we’re not likely to drive one borough/neighborhood/town over to get perfect when what’s close is ‘good enough’.

You can get backup from behavioral economics or the work of Daniel Kahneman about how we aren’t logical beings. The point being, we don’t behave in rational ways. For instance, we’re vulnerable to marketing that affects our perceptions. And economics is linked to politics about whether all the real costs are included. Thus, the fundamental foundation of capitalism is flawed.

As an aside, it’s also predicated on unlimited growth. That is, we’ll continually advance in our ability to meet needs. Yet we live on a finite planet…and yes, I know that there are also technological advances. It’s just that I reckon there are limits to growth.

A serious problem is that the alternatives are also flawed. Capitalism proposes that it passes back by the creator of the superior end product purchasing the components and that cascades backwards. However, to change it, e.g. to track based upon the value of a person’s contribution to the greater good, we’d need bookkeeping to track it.

What I hit a wall against was working within the assumptions. And yet, maybe there’s another way, that is thinking about reframing the problem. Just as I previously talked about replacing happiness with contentment, maybe we can rethink economics. If we think about it differently, can we come up with a different model.

Something pointed me to doughnut economics. And it’s not a full solution, but it does have some interesting properties. The reason it’s called the doughnut model is that there’s a hole in the center, then the body, and then the external limits. The hole consists of the basic capabilities humans need: clean water, reliable and healthy food, etc. This, to me, is kind of the ‘aligning with us’. Then the outside are the practical limits: finite planet, limits on water, energy, air, etc. Between these two are where humans can (and should) live.

It’s a different way of looking at things. I’m not an economist by any means (I find it aversive ;), but I do like looking at society in ways that might make it better. And this model, as far as I know, doesn’t have a clear path to replace our current economic system (e.g. prices on goods). But it’s way of rethinking what matters that’s somehow closer to how we really exist.

The take-home for learning, of course, is being willing to step back and reframe what we think we know. Different perspectives enable different insights. It’s part of the creative process to diverge before you converge. So here’s hoping we can find ways to be thinking about reframing. What ways do you use to think afresh?

Collective mind losing redux

by Leave a Comment

I reported about a conversation on LinkedIn badly defending learning styles. And, the subsequent post came out. Sad to say, it doesn‘t do anything better, and instead is yet another bad example of reasoning. It‘s a ‘collective mind losing‘ redux!

So it starts out saying that those of us who decry learning styles maintain that they don‘t exist. That‘s not exactly what I said, at any rate. Here‘s what I said (and recited in yesterday‘s post):

Sure, learners differ, no one who’s taught can say otherwise. But, identifying how they differ, reliably? Er, no. And that we should adapt to learning styles? Again, not what research says.

Most frustrating, the arguments goes back to the claim that it‘s about different opinions. That‘s a complete mischaracterization. That‘s just not helpful in having a debate.

And there are claims to have research that says otherwise. But then they don’t materialize. He has opinions. They’re not the same ;).

Then, he goes on to claim that the response won‘t be a literature review, a theory discussion, or written as a journal post. OK, so instead an incoherent screed that tilts between blaming the attackers and then citing anecdotal stories? Um, again, that‘s an odd choice to defend against scientific studies.

There are two data points. One is a learning styles advocate who basically recanted. Yet this seems to be taken as support for learning styles??!? The other is a quote by Coffield et al that misconstrues the overall study. In short, no evidence at all.

Oddly, midway through the post, the article starts saying those of us who expect a good rebuttal won‘t like the argument. So the argument is  now going to start? And again the claim that this is about opinion. Again, opinion is fine about things that are aesthetic choices with no consequences. Here, it‘s about orgs trying to spend money sensibly and assist their employees in a scrutable way. I wouldn‘t want my doctor or plumber using bad science, nor do I want my L&D team doing the same.

Finally, what is cited, are two people (one named, one unnamed but purportedly a learning company exec). Who, apparently, believe learners have preferences. Yet we‘re not claiming otherwise. What is demonstrable is that preferences have essentially no benefit in learning. That point isn’t addressed.

And then there‘s this claim, which is fundamentally wrong: “If you can identify the learner‘s style, you can tailor content to meet that need.” First, you can‘t reliably identify a learner‘s style, there isn‘t a viable instrument. Second, there‘s no benefit to tailoring content to that need. Coffield, et al, and Pashler, et all, and now further studies have reliably, repeatedly, documented this. Check out the Guild’s research report, for instance.

And again a mischaracterization of the opposing viewpoint. It‘s certainly possible that we will, one day, reliably identify learning styles, and even find ways to adapt to it. But right now we don‘t, and claiming to the contrary is equivalent to selling ‘snake oil‘ (see Will Thalheimer‘s brilliant introduction to my myths book). You‘ll waste money and possibly damage learning and learner. Most importantly, we have a viable alternative: design for the learning outcome! There are good reasons to include multiple media, but they have nothing to do with learning style.

The final ‘nail in the coffin‘ against learning styles? Argument by analogy: SATs, gorillas, Einstein, and inventions that were doubted before proven true. With support like this, learning styles shouldn’t be so hard to kill…

What’s important is to see through this sort of argument. On one side, you have claims that it’s about opinions, and there’re several cited to support it. On the other hand, there’re clear pointers to research that’s looked deeply into and across this issue. We  must be better than this!

And if my complaints seem disorganized, that‘s because they follow the ‘flow‘ of the original article. The whole argument is specious!   There‘re mischaracterizations of the alternate argument, a lack of supporting evidence despite claims to the contrary, and sloppy thinking. It‘s on a par with flat earth, anti-vax, and other non-scientific beliefs. For goodness sake, please pay attention to the science, not illogical deniers.