<i>"The pace was intense, and I loved it. Finally, someone was challenging me - keeping me in over my head - encouraging and expecting me to pull myself up, quickly. I was learning so fast, it had the adrenaline of sports or a video game. A two-way game of catch, he tossed every fact back at me and made me prove I got it."</i><p>That's precisely the fundamentals of France <i>classes préparatoires</i> (or casually <i>prépa</i>): iterate swiftly and efficiently on knowledge by challenging yourself to the upper limit... and above: there are quite a bunch of things I never ever thought I would be able to grasp, let alone master, yet I did, and more.<p><i>In our three-hour lesson that morning, he taught me a full semester of Berklee's harmony courses.</i><p>The first year's Mathematics course started with a single day during which we re-learned everything we though we knew about Mathematics that we learnt during the last three years. Yes, we covered three years worth in one day. It was an eye opener about the field of Mathematics as a whole. Physics course took another yet similar in goal approach.<p>The second year began with a full week Math course during which we re-learned everything we learned during that first year. This gave us a perspective of how far we've come but also at how challenging the coming year would be. I actually failed that second year the first time, although barely so I retried, with success.<p>It's extremely sad that this system is unpopular because it's perceived as elitist and inegalitarian, as well as an archaic Napoleonian process. People want education to cater for the poor folk that has a hard time keeping up with the basics (which is a worthwhile goal) but are dismissive to those that can easily keep up and more. In hindsight I could have actually failed before reaching <i>la prépa</i> out of boredom.
"Kimo's high expectations set a new pace for me. He taught me <i>the standard pace is for chumps</i> - that the system is designed so anyone can keep up. If you're more driven than <i>just anyone</i> - you can do so much more than anyone expects. And this applies to ALL of life - not just school".<p>I wish someone had told me this while I was in school.
That's definitely true. I started studying CS two years ago on one of the best Maths/CS departments in eastern Europe, last year I started Maths and I expect to get both Bachelor's next year. It was pretty hard, especially the exam sessions, but it was also a lot of fun -- definitely worth it. Now I'm an intern in Santa Clara and it feels like holiday.<p>My advice is, if you're not sure whether you'll be able to do something, don't hesitate -- most of the time nothing bad happens if you fail, and if your case is different, the greater your motivation will be.
Best detail about the site: You can change the language. But at least for German, it is no automatic translation. He translated his whole site to multiple languages. wow!
Good article, but the title is a bit too sensational for me.<p>I agree that a good teacher and motivation can help you reach your potential very fast.<p>I would say there are two range of domains:<p>- 1. almost only synthetic, axiom system has small 'Kolmogorov complexity': mathematics, algorithmization (on non-research level)<p>- 2. more pattern matching, processing of huge amount of information: history, politics, industrial software development, business and everything on research-level.<p>In the first range, if you find a good teacher and you are motivated then you can go to your potential extremely fast. Miracles happen within weeks. After a point you reach the 2. range, where you are already playing in a league with similarly skilled people, and you progress only extremely slowly.<p>That's why some geeks are much better in math at the age 12 than the average adult, but they have to learn and practice for long years to become a professional mathematician or to create a successful software business.
Some good takeaways here, and an inspirational message, but the human brain still has a reasonably fixed (over the long term) bits per second acquisition/retention rate for pure information and a fixed degree of neural plasticity.<p>In reality, there is a speed limit. At least until Kurzweil gets his way.