The brain processes meaning before detail. Providing the gist, the core concept, first was like giving a thirsty person a tall glass of water. And the brain likes hierarchy. Starting with general concepts naturally leads to explaining information in a hierarchical fashion. You have to do the general idea first. And then you will see that 40 percent improvement in understanding.
John MedinaDon't start with the details. Start with the key ideas, and in a hierarchical fashion, form the details around these larger notions.
John MedinaThe ability to double our biomass - not by waiting several million years and growing to be the size of an elephant - but waiting a few hundred thousand years for neurons to sprout into our brains - ones capable of having us create emotional relationships with other members of our species. We thereby double our biomass not by getting bigger, but by creating an ally.
John MedinaA factory worker at an assembly line, who can learn their job in 5 minutes, can get bored fairly easily, and disengage completely.
John MedinaThe distance between a gene and a behavior is of greatest interest to me. The relative contributions of nature and nurture, of nucleotide and nuclear family, are perpetually fascinating to me.
John MedinaHistorically, very few discoveries were made out of thin air. Most of the greatest insights depended upon the intellectual ecology in which the scientists lived. A certain critical mass of "new findings" occurred, and bright people all over the world found out about it, and several read the tea leaves the same way.
John Medina