Learning and Teaching-Cognitive Load Theory: Part 2. Minimizing Extrinsic Load by Honing the Presentation.

In Part 1 on Cognitive Load Theory (https://polymathtobe.blogspot.com/2023/02/learning-and-teaching-cognitive-load.html), the framework of WHAT Cognitive Load Theory is was laid out in principle, following  Oliver Lovell’s book on the subject (Lovell 2020).

Part 3 is on how teachers can minimize the extrinsic load on the learner through structuring their practices and lessons. (https://polymathtobe.blogspot.com/2023/05/learning-and-teaching-cognitive-load.html) 

Part 4 is on how teachers can optimize intrinsic loads on the student. (https://polymathtobe.blogspot.com/2023/08/learning-and-teaching-cognitive-load.html)

This article follows the book in examining how the teacher or  coach can apply  cognitive load theory to minimize the extrinsic loading on the working memory by honing their presentation. What follows is my interpretation of what was laid out in Lovell’s book, any misrepresentation is entirely my fault.

The definitions of intrinsic and extrinsic loads are reiterated below.

The extrinsic cognitive loads are:

·       A part of  the manner and structure of how the information is conveyed to the learners.

·       Disruptive to the learning task because it distracts the learner from learning by occupying valuable working memory space.

Whereas the intrinsic cognitive loads are those that are critical to learning whatever it is that we need to learn. They are:

·       Part of the nature of the information that we are learning.

·       Core learning.

·       Information that we WANT the learner to have in their working memory.

The critical limitation is that the working memory has a finite capacity; that is, the intrinsic and the extrinsic loads are vying for the same finite resource. One emphasis should be  placed on minimizing the extrinsic load; that is, to offload unnecessary extrinsic cognitive load, to make space in the working memory before optimizing the intrinsic loads.

Note that even though Lovell’s book is relatively short, he presents quite a bit of results, and information, and examples from many different subjects, so it is worthwhile to read through the book.

Since I come from two different but related points of view: teaching at a university level and coaching, I will apply the rules for honing the presentation within both contexts whenever they are applicable.

Minimize Extraneous Load

My experience in both teaching and coaching showed me that de-cluttering the learning experience and eliminating the non-essential components is critical to helping my students/players learn. The actions of the teacher/coach in teaching/coaching often distract the student/player, which dilutes their attention. Minimizing the extrinsic load on the student/player is a large job for the teacher/coach. It was a hard lesson to learn.

Lovell split the task of minimizing the extraneous load into two parts: Honing the presentation and structuring the practice. This part is about honing the presentation.

Honing the Presentation

How the information is presented is critical as they need to focus all of their working memory on the learning task rather than any unintended extrinsic loads added by the presentation modes of the teacher/coaches which distracts the learning experience.

Here are the key points presented in Lovell’s book.

·       Redundancy Effect: Eliminate unnecessary information and avoid replicating necessary information.

Most teachers/coaches feel that anything they present is critical to learning; that is, they don’t recognize that the way they present the information can be redundant. An example from the author is: When information is presented simultaneously in written and spoken forms, both forms of presentation are competing for the same working memory resources, which results in interference with each other.

o   In the case of coaching, it isn’t the mixed medium for presentation which is redundant, it is that coaches often get into the habit of repeating themselves because coaches think that they need to fill in the silence with chatter to make sure that the players get the point.  In my experience, the incessant repetition of information and instruction has just the opposite effect: it pulls the player’s attention away from processing the information to actively thinking about the things that the coach is saying.

o   The definition given in the book does apply in the classroom teaching context. We tend to present written information and we also have a tendency to read that information to the students. This goes back to the cardinal rule of making presentations: do not read the slides verbatim during a presentation.

·       Bullet-Proof definitions: Clearly and simply define each concept introduced. The book recommends a “bullet proof definition”, which is a one sentence summary of the key concept. Detailed definitions and long well-thought-out explanations, while complete, will overload the student’s working memory because they are overcome with the amount of  information being presented and will try to process the all the detailed information in real time, an impossible proposition. It is critical to keep it simple but to the point, at least while introducing new concepts.

o   In the coaching context, the coach needs to avoid giving all the instructions at once. Coaches will sometimes give the players instructions for the complete skill or tactics rather than feeding the instructions to the players in pieces.  While presenting whole and complete pictures are important, they are more important to the experienced players who are refining their  understanding of the skills after having achieved a level of competency. The nuances and holistic understanding come later in the player’s skill evolution, not while they are first exposed to the task.

o   The idea is identical in the teaching context, the teacher needs to learn to construct a basic scaffolding for the student, who needs to establish their fundamental understanding. Each piece of bullet-proof definition serves to serve as the foundation for their future development. These bullet-proof definitions  also need to be placed in relation to the other bullet-proof definitions to show students the linkages between the parts to facilitate the synthesis of the coherent structure. This is especially critical in teaching the student the problem-solving process, because it is never obvious how one problem-solving step leads to the next step.

·       Expertise Level Reverse Effect: What may appear to be vital to the expert is not vital to the neophyte.

Successful learning must be based on the level of the learner.  Details matter to the learning process of the expert, they don’t matter to the neophyte, yet.

Guadagnoli and Lee’s  explains in their paper (Guadagnoli 2004) that those learners who  are learning new skills and concept without any previous experience are more likely to be lost and confused while learning the basics because their long-term memory is do not contain any tangible memory to retrieve and extend into new knowledge.  The presentation must be honed to meet the level of the student and not that of the teacher.

In both the coaching and teaching context, it is incumbent on the teacher/coach to understand that they need to anticipate the difficult concepts which may confuse a beginner and steer them through the complexities. It is better to underestimate the amount of knowledge that the beginner may have rather than to over-estimate.

·       Split Attention: “Information should be placed together in space and time, if and only IF the information cannot be understood in isolation and is essential rather than redundant.” In other words, when presenting complex information to students, the information needs to be  presented together if presenting them separately would lead to confusion. This is more applicable in the classroom teaching context.

Rather than presenting complex information separated by space and time, putting them close together in space and time is more effective in helping the student to learn.

o   Split Attention in Space: This is more applicable in the classroom context. The recommended practice is to put all the information in close proximity to one another so that the student’s visual field contains all the necessary information so that the complete set of  information can be seen and absorbed together. The key is to keep the information within the visual field of the student so that they don’t have to search for pertinent information, while also making sure that the information presented together is not redundant.

o   Split Attention in Time: Refers to the timing of the information presentation. Rather than presenting in a manner which makes logical sense to the presenter; for example, presenting in an orderly bullet list form first and then going returning to the list after the initial presentation to define each item, it is better to present each term and follow up with the definition immediately. Oftentimes, orderly presentation writing practices can cause the student’s working memory to be overloaded.

·       Transient Information Effect: When information disappears, and students must hold it in working memory, this will also cause extraneous cognitive load. This effect occurs almost exclusively in a classroom setting when the teacher improvises and passes on information verbally without presenting that information in a tangible way. This is where improvisation needs to be regulated and digressions avoided unless the students have significant experience and background to process the digressions in parallel.

In the coaching context, the coach should suppress the urge to extemporaneously progress beyond the specific instruction on the fly.

·       Modality Effect: Modality effect is defined as presenting information via the auditory and visual channels in tandem via to eliminate visual split attention and expand working memory capacity. The idea is that the visual and auditory channels work separately, so that both channels can be deployed together to make more effective learning. The auditory and visual channels can be used to enhance the student’s learning process; they are greater than the sum of their parts.

The deployment of the modality effect may seem to be contradictory to the redundancy effect, it is a nuanced difference between being redundant and advantageous. They are only contradictory if the teacher/coach falls into two distinct redundancy traps.

1.     Simultaneous presentation of written and spoken words. They both involve the use of the language processing center of the brain, which overloads the working memory.

2.     Simultaneous presentation of redundant information.

To successfully deploy the dual modality presentation the information presented with the auditory and visual channels are essentially complementary, i.e. if they can be understood separately, then they need to be presented separately.

An example of dual modality presentation in coaching is the time-honored tradition of skills or tactics demo as the coach explains what the coach wants the player to see. The players should be absorbing the visual demo while also getting essential reminders of what they are seeing. The information from the visual and the auditory  channels should complement one another rather than contradict or repeat one another.

·       Keep the number of independent subjects limited. This does not come from Lovell, this comes from Doug Lemov’s The Coaches Guide to Coaching (Lemov 2020).

o   Anecdotally, the working memory can handle up to seven separate pieces of information at a time. Lemov recommends, especially with beginners, no more than three instructions. It is better to have free space in the working memory so that the student/player can apply more working memory resources to those three  instructions.

Note that while these points are seemingly basic, it is difficult to execute because they are often contradictory to what the teacher/coach are accustomed to in practice. I have come to practice understated presentation or explanation to avoid overloading the student/player’s working memory. But just to be sure, I also check for understanding more often and change presentation modes rapidly at the first sign of confusion.

Summary

·       Redundant information is the main reason for an unnecessarily overloaded working memory.

·       Redundancy comes in many forms

o   Presenting the same information using the same means at the same time, e.g. using the written word and oral instructions at the same time because both involve the language processing part of the brain.

o   Presenting too many pieces of information together.

·       Keep it simple. Have bullet-proof definitions for the student/player to hang on to. Something that is simple and to the point.

o   Keep the experience and skill level of the student/player in mind when formulating the definitions. It is easier to initially underestimate their experience and skill level and ratchet up your expectations as they show more aptitude and higher experience and skill levels.

·       To avoid splitting the student/player’s attention,

o   Combine information in the presentation Only If the information is so closely related that it would cause more confusion if they were presented separately.

o   Define the information at the same time as when you present the topic, not returning to the list after the list is presented for the first time .

·       Use the language processing and visual processing channels together.

o   Visual processing meaning picture and videos.

o   Reading slides uses language processing part of the brain, same as listening.

·       Present up to three main points at a time and no more. Avoid improvisations and digressions.

The Rest of the Story

Cognitive Load Theory- Part 3: Reducing Extrinsic Load by Structuring Practice

Cognitive Load Theory-Part 4: Optimizing Intrinsic Load

Works Cited

Guadagnoli, Mark and Timothy D. Lee. "Challenge Point: a Framework for Conceptualizing the Effects of Various Practice Conditions in Motor Learning." Journal of Motor Behavior, June 2004: 212-224.

Lemov, Doug. The Coaches Guide to Teaching. Clearwater, FL: John Catt Educational Ltd., 2020.

Lovell, Oliver. Sweller's Cognitive Load Theory in Action. Melton: John Catt Educational Ltd, 2020.

The Creative Act-Self Doubt

I have been reading The Creative Act: A Way of Being by the music producer Rick Rubin (Rick Rubin 2023). His book is garnering a lot of attention amongst artists as Rick Rubin is very well regarded in the music world. Rubin writes about what he knows: how to be creative. He wrote 78 short but memorable essays which makes up the book. I have just started reading and already I am putting certain essays through my mental filter and interpreting them as lessons, broadened their scope, and applying them to my experiences as an engineer, educator, and coach. Here is a reflection on Self Doubt and How to Deal with Self-doubt.(pages 73 and 77 in the book.)

When humans do human things: create art, practice to better ourselves, be passionate about what we do; we always put our inner most intimate selves into those efforts.  If we did not put all of ourselves into our doings, the results just wouldn't resonate. If we did anything dispassionately and in procedural way, the saliency of what we produce, whether it is tangible or ephemeral would not excite us, nor anyone else. Each artist is different, and each artist has their experiences, backgrounds and viewpoints to draw upon, which is what makes their creations unique. Art reflects who we are as people. The act of the artists putting their innermost intimate selves into their act of creativity is what defines their art as unique.

Rubin also states that making art is not a competitive sport, which is why art is a representative of the self. When someone has self-doubt or precedes the art making with the caveat that  they are not up to the challenge of creating their vision; the effort is defeated before it began, for no one else could be up to the challenge of creating the artist’s vision. We can only be ourselves. We cannot be someone else. We are the only one with our voice. This is also a part of what makes the creative artist’s temperament so delicate. It is also because of this delicacy that many who attempt to do art have great difficulties exposing their inner selves to the world. The sensitivity which allows them to make art is the same reason that makes them more vulnerable to being judged. Those who can overcome those fears and self-doubt, those who are able and willing to  expose their fears and overcome their self-doubts to the world are the ones that the world recognizes. As Rubin states in his essay: the one thing that the artist needs to recognize is that adversity is a part of the creative process. Adversity is a necessary part of what makes their art unique and memorable.

Rubin also points out that most successful artists are often deeply insecure and self-sabotaging. He asserts that this is because artists see tremendous beauty or tremendous pain where others see little or nothing at all, they're confronted with big feelings all the time. These emotions can be confusing and overwhelming. When those around us don't see what we see and feel what we feel, it can lead to a sense of isolation and not belonging, of otherness.

I made the connection with what Rubin is saying about artists and with what I experienced with my students and players: feelings of self-doubt, insecurity, self-sabotaging, isolation, not belonging, and otherness. While most of the college students I teach are better at hiding behind the adult veil, the younger players are more transparent. Their age and level of maturity can boost or undermine their self-confidence, but their self-doubt can be devastating to them in theor formative ages. This is not to say that young players are creative artists at heart, but they behave the same way as the artists in Rubin’s reckoning.

I was interested in seeing how Rubin advises artists in dealing with their self-doubts, especially in seeing how his ideas align with my thoughts and more importantly, how his ideas can be applied to those students and players that I am trying to reach.

The insidious and intimate relationship between self-doubt and creativity makes working with those with self-doubt perilous. Self-doubt prevents artists from taking chances and playing, creatively and fearlessly, as they need to do; while being creative emboldens artists, stoking their belief in themselves and their abilities. The two are inseparable.

One strategy that Rubin proposes is to deliberately lower the stakes in their minds. Rubin’s idea is to create a more nuanced relationship with the artist’s expectations. The idea is to divide the expectations into smaller pieces, to think about the impact of the creative work as a small part of the whole, that the most immediate challenge is a piece of the chain that will lead to bigger things; the lowered expectations lead to diminished levels of fear, and  by implication, lowers the weight of the perceived consequences of failure and lessens the self-doubt. The focus is on the immediate mission to complete the work which leads to progress towards the next mission, and the next. The purpose is to continue forward in a productive rhythm. Lowering the stakes also means that the artist can give themselves room to play, as lowered expectation gives the artist a reason to not playing to win, they are playing to play, and playing is fun and should not create more self-doubt.

Self-doubt will often encourage, if not outright light the fire for an unquenchable perfectionism streak which ultimately gets in the way of having fun, satiating curiosities, and experimenting. Perfectionism fills the void created by self-doubt: if I am not good enough then I will make up for my inadequacies with my efforts to be perfect. Oscar Wilde once said that some things are just too important to be taken seriously. The antidote, setting the bar low, frees the artist to play, explore, and test their creative urges without attachment to the results. This is not just a path to more supportive thoughts, active play, and experimentation; it is the path to being creative and original.

Even though Rubin’s assertion that art is not a competitive sport help lower the stakes for the artists, it becomes an obstacle for the analogy that I am drawing: students who are studying at a university with an eye focused squarely on potential employment or a player learning to play a sport which has the competitive ethos deeply ingrained.

University students are indoctrinated to view their future employment opportunities as a win-loss scenario, that their future employment and earning powers all revolve around their ability to compete in the classroom. This is a mythology perpetuated by employers and universities to motivate the students, but more importantly, it places burden on and preys on the student through their irrational fears of the unknown.

I acknowledge that any college graduate hoping to enter into the work force should demonstrate excellence in their knowledge; but it isn’t dependent strictly on their cumulative grades, the artificial metric which they focus on as the basis of their competitiveness that will determine their future; rather, it is on their ability to think, solve problems, and make intelligent decisions that determines their future employment. It was not that long ago that the tech companies touted a more equitable employment market, where credentials like college degrees no longer matter. Their focus is on the worker’s ability to think, solve problems, make intelligent decisions, and their ability to learn essential new skillsets on the fly that will determine the desirability of the candidates to the employers. There are many salient examples in the tech world which illustrates that not having the credentials does not hinder their ability to be creative.

My approach for my students is to counter their ingrained belief in the win-loss with the win-win, that their academic efforts should be on learning, that having the knowledge should be primary purpose and the grades will result naturally. My class assessments are geared towards assessing learning, not grading on a strict scale. I am not sure about how successful I am, but that is my goal with my students.

In the case of the junior athlete, not only are they surrounded by the ethos of the competitive sports environment, but they also live in the very real adolescent world of sturm und drang with a healthy dose of angst and drama added liberally atop of it all. They believe that whatever it is that they do is the most important thing in existence at that moment, which will also define them for all eternity,

Our sporting culture dictates to them that they must compete for their spot in the lineup, as they are involved in an activity, sports, which is defined by competition. Everyone, family, coaches, teammates, next door neighbors, strangers on the street are constantly hectoring them to compete. So how do I, as the coach, lower the stakes and dilute the expectations? One thing I can do to reward improvement, comparing their present performance with their immediate previous performance rather than anchoring the comparison on some pre-conceived norm. For one thing, I am not that good at determining whether that pre-conceived norm is realizable; for another, if it is not realizable with a specific group of athletes, that comparison will serve to deflate their motivation.

Another thing I do is to allow them space to experiment to retrieve their newly gained knowledge for as often as it takes each individual, which entails patience. The “space” I refer to comes in many forms: some may need “space” in the form of time, or gaps in time to process; some may need “space” in the form of silence from the teacher, to make connections by working through their neuronal processing themselves without feedback; some may need “space” in the form of a reprieve from external pressure and judgement. The true challenge for the coach is to balance the needs of the individual against the needs of the team. How do we keep the faster learners challenged while also helping those who are behind to catch up? I can’t say I have any magic, each case is different; I experiment and play with the context and parameters. Sometimes I am successful, sometimes I am not. When I am not, I need to practice what I preach, to not doubt myself.

In the context of a situation where competition is at the core of the activity, there is space to lower the expectations without falsely devaluating the integrity of the activity. The way I have chosen to operate most often is to refocus the competitiveness to that of strengthening the core of the practice rather than focusing on the obvious scoring metrics. It gives those who have self-doubt to improve and alleviate self-doubt while also taking the focus off the customary points of measurements. This emphasis on the practice of their art improves those parts of their practice that gives them self-doubt while also alleviating the self-doubt. Win-win.

Another way Rubin proposes to overcome self-doubt and insecurity is to give the cause of self-doubt and insecurity a name. Rubin talks about the Buddhist concept of Papantla, which translates to preponderance of thoughts. This refers to the very human reaction to stressful experiences by allowing an avalanche of mental chatter. Whatever our own symptoms of self-doubt, once we have identified them, and have given it a name, it becomes easier to recognize while acknowledging its existence, which makes it easier for us to move beyond the symptoms of self-doubt.

Self-doubt is a manifestation of fear. It is fear of not being good enough, a fear of seeming foolish or inadequate. One way that Rubin proposes to face fear is to just mentally imagine stopping doing what we fear; whether it is to do art, to go to university, or to play a sport. Tell ourselves that we don't ever have to do this again. Just stop. If it's not making us happy, it's our choice. Once that load is off, once that pressure of expectation is relieved, we now have permission to try something new and to look at our circumstances with fresh eyes. Realize our new perspective and be thankful about how fortunate we are to be in a position to make that choice on our own. This realization that we chose of our own preference, rather than not being allowed to choose, might tip the balance on whether we are willing to face the fears and how weighty those fears are. If we thought that what we are doing as a privilege rather than a mundane routine, maybe those fears may not be so daunting. Ultimately, our desire must be greater than our fear.

Once the decision is made to accept self-doubt rather than to eliminate or endure it, the meaning of self-doubt is lessened, and our own reaction to it is also lessened because realizing that self-doubt is not as important as our reaction to it.

Rubin also brings up a finer point, which has to do with the kind of doubt that we are experiencing. We must differentiate between doubting our work or doubting ourselves because that nuanced difference is critical. Doubting the work is expressed by the statements: I don't know if what I did was good enough, the quality of what I do is not as good as I want or as I can do. Doubting ourselves is expressed by: I am terrible, I can't do this, or I am hopelessly out of my depth. They are worlds apart in truth but in close proximity in our thoughts and emotions. Doubting ourselves can lead to a sense of hopelessness, of believing that we are not fit to do what we are doing. It is all or nothing. Doubting ourselves should be a nonstarter but doubting the quality of what we are doing is a constructive path. It is a part of that process, it is a means to an end, it is a quality check on our practice, our execution, our learned skill. We are allowed to doubt our work; we are using the failure of our attempts to improve how we do what we do. The work is not about perfection. The imperfections that we attempt to fix might prove to be what makes the work great. Sometimes it doesn't work that way, but we rarely know what makes it great and what makes it not so great, we can only do it by playing, experimenting, and defying our fears. Sometimes pondering why, which is a central question that we ask ourselves while mired in self-doubt, is beyond our comprehension. We need to embrace our imperfections. Whatever insecurities we have can be reframed as a guiding force in our creativity. Self-doubt only becomes a hindrance when they buttress the resistance to our ability to share what's closest to our heart. Yet we can and should make that same self-doubt the basis of our being creative and making ourselves better.

As we all know, it is difficult mentally to overcome self-doubt, Rubin gives us some mental twists in turning our reaction to the adversity of self-doubt from negative to positive. There is nothing guaranteed, there is just a desire to apply the lessons.      

Reference

Rick Rubin, Neil Strauss. The Creative Act: A Way if Being. New York City: Penguin Press, 2023.