Learning Cycles

In Juggling and Bicycles, an episode of the Akimbo podcast, Seth Godin talks about learning. In particular, he makes a point about training wheels and learning to ride a bike.

If the goal is to ride a bike then, while training wheels do permit anyone to pedal themselves around, superficially feeling like they are riding a bike, they don't actually teach a fundamental skill: balance.

Sure, training wheels immediately give a sense of accomplishment and perhaps a confidence boost, but they don't teach balance. Worse, they actively inhibit learning that skill because they compensate for any lack of balance that the rider has without penalty or encouragement to improve at balancing.

This is not to say that no-one using training wheels can ever learn to ride a bike. Godin's point is that there are ways to learn to balance and with balance riding comes easier. He points to balance bikes as one approach.

In my role I support people in work they have not done before. I think very carefully about how to do that, but now I have a new dimension to consider: is my support training wheels or a balance bike? How do I feel about that? How do they feel about it?
Image: https://flic.kr/p/4vmPr

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