420: Productive Failure with Dr. Manu Kapur
The Hardcore Self Help Podcast with Duff the Psych
Robert Duff, Ph.D.
4.6 • 1K Ratings
🗓️ 8 November 2024
⏱️ 47 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In today’s episode, I sit down with Dr. Manu Kapur, a professor of learning sciences, to delve into his unique approach to education: productive failure. Dr. Kapur explains how intentionally designing failure within the learning process can lead to deeper understanding and greater knowledge retention. We discuss the science behind productive failure and how it differs from traditional methods, which often focus on direct instruction followed by application. Dr. Kapur shares his experiences from childhood dreams of soccer to academic life at ETH Zurich, showing how personal failures have shaped his life and work.
Together, we explore key concepts like the “four A’s” of productive failure: Activation, Awareness, Affect, and Assembly. This method encourages learners to first explore problems in a safe space, where failure is expected, to prepare them for deeper learning through expert guidance afterward. Dr. Kapur’s insights reveal how frustration and negative emotions, when managed safely, can enhance memory and motivation, making failure a powerful tool in the learning process.
In this episode, Dr. Kapur provides real-world examples, from learning statistical concepts in the classroom to developing retrieval paths in social interactions. We also discuss how productive failure can be applied beyond the classroom to daily life and parenting, helping adults model and reinforce the benefits of persistence and exploration for children.
Chapters:
00:15 — Introduction: Meet Dr. Manu Kapur and the Concept of Productive Failure
05:30 — The Science Behind Learning Through Failure
12:00 — The “Four A’s” of Productive Failure: Activation, Awareness, Affect, and Assembly
18:30 — Real-Life Examples: Productive Failure in the Classroom
24:00 — The Role of Emotions in Memory and Learning
30:05 — Applying Productive Failure in Daily Life
36:25 — Parenting and Productive Failure: Teaching Kids Resilience
41:50 — Productive Failure’s Global Applications and Cultural Reflections
47:05 — Key Takeaways and Where to Find More from Dr. Kapur
About the Podcast I’m Dr. Robert Duff, and on this podcast, we dive deep into mental health and personal growth, bringing expert insights and practical advice to help you navigate life’s challenges. Join us for conversations that break down complex concepts into actionable steps.
Guest Links:
- Dr. Kapur’s Book: Productive Failure: Unlocking the Science of Failure for Deep Learning and Growth
- Website: ProductiveFailure.com
- Follow Dr. Kapur on LinkedIn,
Connect With Me:
- Website: http://duffthepsych.com
- Instagram: http://instagram.com/duffthepsych
- YouTube: http://youtube.com/duffthepsych
#ProductiveFailure #Learning #Education #GrowthMindset #MentalHealth
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | So productive failure is the idea that if failure is good for learning, then we shouldn't wait for it to happen. |
| 0:07.0 | We should deliberately design for it, understand how, when and why it works, and bootstrap that for deep learning. |
| 0:14.0 | If you're about to learn X and I've had you think about all the knowledge that's relevant to X in different ways, and especially in ways that it doesn't work, right? |
| 0:23.5 | It activates the cognitive system, and then you're ready to just process new information. |
| 0:29.8 | And here we've found something very interesting that, you know, |
| 0:33.1 | it's okay to feel a little bit of these negative emotions |
| 0:37.3 | because the idea that only positive |
| 0:39.6 | emotions correlate with positive learning outcomes is not true. |
| 0:44.2 | Failure prepares the ground for you to then start making these contrast, what does not |
| 0:48.7 | work with what works in what ways. |
| 0:51.2 | And that leads to deep learning. |
| 0:53.3 | Negative emotion is a potent memory tool, right? |
| 0:56.0 | That's why trauma happens. |
| 0:58.0 | We are very good at remembering traumas or embarrassing things that we've done, etc. |
| 1:02.0 | But it's in that the context is different. |
| 1:05.0 | We looked at more than 160-odd experimental effects across 50- studies in different contexts and we found that the |
| 1:12.4 | average effect of productive failure over direct instruction is quite robust. It's equivalent |
| 1:18.6 | to twice the amount that you might learn with a good teacher in a year. If that is true, if failure |
| 1:26.6 | can be powerful, then how do we actually design for it and use it in a way, in a safe way for deep life? |
| 1:37.3 | All right, everybody, I'm excited to have today's guest. I have Dr. Manu Kapoor. Dr. Kapoor, how would you like to introduce yourself to the audience? |
| 1:48.8 | Well, I'm a reluctant or an accidental academic. But yes, I'm a professor of learning sciences and higher education at ETH Zurich in Switzerland. |
| 1:59.2 | What is that? So what is that, ETH, what is that school? |
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