Who: My nephew
When: September 9, 2016
I’ve tested two methods with my nephew who is eleven years old. I was teaching him Chinese, I noticed he wasn’t paying attention. So I made a deal with him, if he does all the work I say and pay attention then I’ll bring him to the park. That worked for a good couple of hours.
The next day, I was testing him on what we learned the day before, he remembered some but forgot others. I gave him another chance, I said if he remembers the rest within the next five minutes I won’t make him copy each character 50 times. In the end, he couldn’t remember, he got scared and started crying.
What I realize is that a positive motivation can help a person no matter what age to have a better learning experience than a punishment method.
An interesting set of observations and I like the fact that you deliberately tried different methods. Your nephew learned some things and not others, but what did you learn? You note that you learned something about how rewards and punishments work, but I wonder what else you may also have learned? For instance, how much should you ask him to learn at any one time, and how long should you spend teaching him? How much is ‘enough’ for him to learn at any given session?