User:LaviJShachar/sandbox

One way of effective learning, is the plastic platypus learning or platypus learning technique. The basic idea, is that by letting students explain what they have learned, even to an inanimate object, improves their understanding and knowledge retention of the subject .

This technique is based on the learning by teaching (German: Lernen durch Lehren, short LdL) field in pedagogy, in which teaching has been shown to affect learning in a significant way.

The name 'plastic platypus learning' is a paraphrase on the known software engineering technique rubber duck debugging, in which a programmer can find bugs in his or her code without the help of others, simply by explaining what the code does, line by line, to an inanimate object - namely, a rubber duck.

Plastic platypus learning in action

To increase the effectiveness of plastic platypus learning, students are advised to do the following:

1. Prepare notes while learning the subject.

2. Prepare the lesson on the subject (as opposed to just teaching it unprepared; this section demands the most time and energy, and may be omitted in some situations).

3. Teach the subject without using the notes at all (the student knows this beforehand) .

Obviously, this technique may work with any inanimate object, and not just plastic platypuses.

See also

• The Aha! effect
• Think aloud protocol

References

Category:Learning