Coaching practices for Prior Knowledge Learning
Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Prior Knowledge Learning, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.
Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?
- I open a new topic and dive straight into reading, and the new material just slides off because there’s nothing already in my head for it to hook onto
- I keep launching into explanations assuming people are starting from where I picture them, and I’m forever either talking over their heads or boring them with stuff they already know
- I dive straight into new material cold and it washes over me without anything to grab onto
- I walk into the same situation already knowing exactly how it goes, so I stop actually looking
- Whenever I hit something new I reach straight for the tutorial before I’ve even tried it myself, and I’m starting to wonder if grabbing the answer that fast is exactly why none of it ever sticks
Practices that may help
- Write what you already know before reading a topic
Before reading anything new, write down everything you already believe about the topic.
The Generation Effect: Why Making It Yourself Makes It Stick - Ask what the audience already knows before explaining
Probe prior knowledge explicitly rather than assuming it.
The Curse of Knowledge: Why Experts Struggle to Teach - Attempt to recall before studying new material
Try to answer questions about material before you’ve studied it — the attempt, even when wrong, enhances retention of the correct answer when it comes.
The Testing Effect: Why Retrieval Practice Beats Restudying - Fresh-eyes inquiry: "What if I knew nothing about this?"
Before engaging a familiar situation, ask what you would notice if you were seeing it for the first time.
Beginner's Mind (Shoshin), Made Practical - Attempt before instruction
Try to solve a new type of problem with your current knowledge before any formal teaching.
Productive Failure: How Struggling First Makes Instruction More Effective - Prepare for the questions a learner would ask
Predict what would confuse a beginner and make sure you can answer it.
The Protege Effect: Learn It Better by Teaching It - Source monitoring
When you feel you know something, also ask yourself where you learned it and how recently.
Feeling of Knowing: Why Your Confidence Misleads You - Work backwards from what the learner needs to do
Start with the decision or action the learner must take, then trace back only to the knowledge that serves it.
The Curse of Knowledge: Why Experts Struggle to Teach - Retrieval: test yourself instead of reviewing
Recall the material from memory rather than re-reading it.
Ultralearning: Aggressive, Self-Directed Learning - Attempt problems before seeing the solution
Try to solve or answer a question before you are shown how — even if you fail.
The Generation Effect: Why Making It Yourself Makes It Stick
Related concerns
- Prior Knowledge Probe
Probe prior knowledge explicitly rather than assuming it.
Ask what the audience already knows before explaining
- Explore Before Instruct
Give the learner latitude to experiment independently while keeping consequences bounded.
Exploration with guardrails
- How To Prime Learning
Try to answer questions about material before you’ve studied it — the attempt, even when wrong, enhances retention of the correct answer when it comes.
Attempt to recall before studying new material
- Prior Knowledge Assessment
Before reading anything new, write down everything you already believe about the topic.
Write what you already know before reading a topic
- Difficulty And Prior Knowledge
A difficulty is only desirable if you have the prior knowledge to overcome it.
Tune the difficulty to your current level
- Expecting To Teach
Tell yourself you will have to teach this — and watch how differently you read it.
Study with the expectation of teaching
Describe your situation in your own words to search the complete practice library.