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What are some advantages of being a slow learner? šŸ¢ (lemmy.today)
submitted 4 hours ago by to c/asklemmy@lemmy.world
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Hi Lemmy! It is obvious that being a fast learner is advantageous. People like people that can get up to speed quickly and contribute to a project or team. Heck, I could put 'fast learner' on a resume and no one would think that's weird. But what about slow learners?

Is there ever a time where it would have been better to learn a skill or get acquainted with something more slowly?

Are there any general benefits across all circumstances where being a slower learner can be advantageous?

And if there are any positives to taking more time to learning, is it something you could ever bring up on a resume or job interview? Would you ever find yourself saying to a hiring manager "I'm a slow learner, and here's why that's a good thing for your organization." Or is it some abstract, unquantifiable positive thing like "I struggle to get good at things and that has built character," or something like that?

TL;DR: In Avatar the Last Airbender terms, if you could have a choice between being a slow learner and struggling with everything (child Zuko) or learning fast and dominating at everything (child Azula), why would anyone ever choose the former?

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[ā€“] 5 points 3 hours ago (1 child)

I run with the ā€œformerly gifted childā€ crowd. Thereā€™s a few things that I think can come from the pressures of being seen as a ā€œfast learnerā€. The main is that the first part of learning is often the easiest and the place where most progress is seen. However if you want to truly master a topic the rate slows way way down. Former gifted children often have an internalized pressure that everything should proceed at the same speed forever. Itā€™s neither possible or sustainable and mostly leads to burn out.

Additionally there is a tendency of people to stick with the stuff that seems easier or comes more naturally. You see this a lot with academically talented kids dropping out of sports or music quickly because itā€™s hard for them. This builds an avoidance of persevering through difficult work. Again to master a given topic, even if itā€™s in their typical skill set they are going to have to slog through parts that are hard and uncomfortable.

I personally seek out teachers or tutors who struggle for B level grades because theyā€™ve had to put work into understanding material rather than just being like of course this thing works this way.

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  • [ā€“] 1 point 10 minutes ago

    There's an S-curve to technology; I wonder if the same applies for learning.

    Yes, I find music teachers who just naturally absorbed the material are the worst.

    Similarly, native language teachers who haven't studied how to teach the language are exceptionally bad teachers.

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