I think observing-abstract-objects and observing-self are both connected, though in different ways.
My overall goal with the Thinking Physics workshop was to teach metacognition, with the physics questions grounding out “are you learning metacognition in a way that is demonstrably helpful?”. I think being able to notice whats-going-on-inside-you in high granularity is useful to for noticing what cognitive habits are worth reinforcing.
I think it might have actually been good to start with the abstract-objects version, after doing a physics problem that notably had an abstract-object in it, and have people specifically be trying to generate lots of properties about that abstract object, to give them more handles for how to brainstorm solutions.
I think observing-abstract-objects and observing-self are both connected, though in different ways.
My overall goal with the Thinking Physics workshop was to teach metacognition, with the physics questions grounding out “are you learning metacognition in a way that is demonstrably helpful?”. I think being able to notice whats-going-on-inside-you in high granularity is useful to for noticing what cognitive habits are worth reinforcing.
I think it might have actually been good to start with the abstract-objects version, after doing a physics problem that notably had an abstract-object in it, and have people specifically be trying to generate lots of properties about that abstract object, to give them more handles for how to brainstorm solutions.