SCJP 5
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We believe humor (even our lame attempts at humor), is an effective way to help make learning books work better for the learner.
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Spot false dilemmas now, ask me how!
(If you're not on the edge, you're taking up too much room.)
Originally posted by Bert Bates:
but I AM tied to creating emotional charges.
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Spot false dilemmas now, ask me how!
(If you're not on the edge, you're taking up too much room.)
Originally posted by Bert Bates:
Hi Akhilesh,
Thanks for your feedback, I've never heard of this problem before! I'd like to know more about why you feel you can't write in the HF book? We've been fortunate to see student copies of books and the ones that we've seen have writing all over them, which is what we always intended. That said, it's scary to me to think that for some reason you don't feel comfortable writing in your book!![]()
Thanks,
Bert
Originally posted by Bert Bates:
Hi Akhilesh,
Thanks for your feedback, I've never heard of this problem before! I'd like to know more about why you feel you can't write in the HF book? We've been fortunate to see student copies of books and the ones that we've seen have writing all over them, which is what we always intended. That said, it's scary to me to think that for some reason you don't feel comfortable writing in your book!![]()
Thanks,
Bert
Keep Smiling Always — My life is smoother when running silent. -paul
[FAQs] [Certification Guides] [The Linux Documentation Project]
Keep Smiling Always — My life is smoother when running silent. -paul
[FAQs] [Certification Guides] [The Linux Documentation Project]
Bert Bates wrote:We're always researching this topic, and so everything I say below represents what I believe at this moment, and I'm ALWAYS interested in new and better information!
While I believe that everyone has a unique learning style, I think that the differences are relatively minor. For a while the idea of customized learning to meet a learner's "Style" got a lot of attention, I think that, in the end, it was overblown. For instance to say that someone is a "kinesthetic learner" might be true to some degree, but in general that type of learner will still be primarily a "visual learner" who happens to have a slightly more than average leaning towards the kinesthetic. In other words, for the vast majority of the population, differences in learning styles are actually fairly small.
When we first created HF we thought it might appeal to a small subset of readers, and it's been far more universally accepted than we ever imagined. Over the last couple of years we reverse-engineered our own stuff. A lot of that work revolved around analysis of reader feedback. Of course it's always possible that we analyzed the data to meet our own preconceived notions, but we tried not to fall into that trap. Here's what I believe now:
- Your mind is usually battling your brain - your brain doesn't care about Java.
- To trick the brain into caring, you have to get emotions going.
- Humor, however lame, is one way to get emotions going - there are TONS of other ways.
So, I'm not all that tied to humor, but I AM tied to creating emotional charges. I'm really open to hearing other theories, but the question remains - why is HF Java a bestseller? We're not great writers, and we didn't cover anything unusual. What our readers tell us is that they actually learned. I honestly believe that making a distinction between the mind and the brain, and attempting to address the differences between those two is why HF books succeed.
I'd welcome your thoughts!
Bert
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