Saturday, October 11, 2008

Summary: Having a clue and active attention























Ok, time to summarize.

Clue.
First you must have a clue. You must understand what a position is about.
Second you must have the skills to perform the tasks that arise from the clue.

Active attention.
From our debates about skill-building the picture emerges that active attention is paramount. I dare to say that active attention cuts back the necessity for repetition dramatically. Active attention supplies the feedback for your efforts. No active attention, no feedback. No feedback, no adjustment. No adjustment, no learning.

Putting the body to the equation.
The comparison with physical tasks like swimming or Tae Kwon Do is always a bit tricky. The human body adds a factor of its own. It has its own impediments which one must overcome.

Precision.
From experience with singing I can add that active attention translates to precision. There are always new aspects to discover when singing tone ladders. When you add these aspects as seperate details to your exercise it makes every repetition count. When repeating mechanically you don't learn anything. With no precision you might even ingrain the wrong habits.

Umbrella's everywhere.
In my youth I have never used an umbrella. I never saw somebody use one either. When I was 24 or so I went for the first time outside with an umbrella. During rain, that was. Much to my surprise I saw people with umbrella's everywhere. Have I overlooked them before? Did I simply stay inside during rainshowers due to lack of an umbrella? It seemed as if those people had materialized due to my attention and focus on umbrella's.
It's the same with chess. If you have a theme you are looking for you will find it everywhere. With no theme, you see only what is already familiar. You can overlook important themes for years.

Referential framework.
If you are renovating a house where every wall is askew you have to decide which wall you will call straight. No matter how lopsided that wall is. Once you have chosen a wall as referential framework, you can measure everything back to that wall. If you don't decide which wall will be your reference, you will find your self measuring then from this wall and then from that wall. In that way you can never come to a definite conclusion. From one point of view that sink looks straight, from another point of view it looks askew. I tell you this since it clarifies why I always react on comments in a somewhat insisting way. I always want to make clear the referential framework from which I'm talking. Even if I have chosen a very lopsided wall as base. Don't let it scare you. I'm not attached to my choices. Allthough I never let go my wall of choice.

Merlons and crenels.
My metaphor of merlons and crenels has provided me with a theme. An umbrella. Now I see it in every game and I'm learning from it. I'll be back.

8 comments:

  1. I'm trying to grasp what you mean by active attention. Taking the two words active (engaged in action), and attention (the act or faculty of attending, esp. by directing the mind to an object) I would interpret the phrase to mean being purposely engaged in directing the mind to a specific object in what ever it it we're trying to learn.

    Applying this to chess aquiring chess knowledge or recognizing certain things in various positions requires going beyond simply doing the same thing over and over again.

    As I was looking at definitions of active this was #12 on the list.
    "requiring personal effort or attention; not automatic" Perhaps this ties into what you're talking about.

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  2. "It's the same with chess. If you have a theme you are looking for you will find it everywhere. With no theme, you see only what is already familiar. You can overlook important themes for years."

    Aye! I even found R vs. N in the very next game after learning it. The real question is, will I see R vs N. a year from now? If yes, and I've also learned new things, I reckon I'll be in good shape. :)

    And doubly so for the referential framework. Reading just a bit of My System has made a much greater percentage of master games make sense to me. Before this, I don't think I could have learned much by playing over them. Now I can.

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  3. Polly,
    with the term active attention I mean:

    Conscious
    Precise
    Focussed
    Not automatic
    Not mechanicly
    Not parroting
    Not copying
    Not anticipating

    The word active mainly concerns your attitude.

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  4. LF,
    The real question is, will I see R vs N. a year from now?

    If it really made it into procedural memory, you will see it over a year. But you will not notice it consciously. These skills are supportive and guide your conscious attention without you being aware of it. Just as you are not aware what your legs are doing while driving a car. (kind of scary if you think about it, who is governing your legs?:)

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  5. "If it really made it into procedural memory, you will see it over a year. But you will not notice it consciously."

    I've gotten significantly better at seeing the knight's mobility on different squares, and how to use a rook to dominate a knight. And that's helped me in real games.

    I'm not sure yet whether I'll make the extra push to learn it at the procedural level. I am close. But it's alot of extra work. Hmm. :)

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  6. LF,
    it is important to see the difference what should be in your procedural memory and what should be in your semantic memory. Maybe the comparison with driving a car should be worked out further. You shift gears, steer, push the throttle or the breaks unconsciously with the aid of procedural memory. But if you let it guide your direction then you will end up at your work while you intended to visit your aunt.

    It is the same with chess. You keep the conscious leading of the work. But your skills can do all kinds of unconscious little tasks for you. The tasks are humble, like with Troyis, but there are a lot of them and if all of them work well then the overall work to be performed will be done well and quick.

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  7. I believe the terminology "deliberate practice" is also used for what you call active attention.

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  8. Thanks for the explanation. That makes sense especially in light of the comment you left on my blog.

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