I’ve begun reposting the best posts from the first half of this year. Here you can find all of my best posts over the last fifteen years.
Even though there are quotes supposedly from Richard Feynman and Albert Einstein all around the Internet about the idea that we don’t truly understand something unless we can teach it to a child, neither of them really said anything like that.
Nevertheless, I think there’s still a lot of value to that idea, and the hugely popular subReddit “Explain Like I’m Five” seems to indicate that a lot of other people agree.
I have my students present complicated topics in a way that even a five-year-old can understand. This is a great way to test the idea, and also to provide a different pace to my IB Theory of Knowledge class.
I ask them to search online to get an idea of a five-year-old’s vocabulary (I generally tell them they can stretch it to a seven-year-old), and that they have to use accessible words in both their slides and in their oral presentation. They must also create slides they believe would be interesting for a child.
Then, in small groups, their listeners are encouraged to ask questions that they think a child would ask (but they can’t Actors Children)
The following activities…
