Bertrand Russell, the eminent mathematician and philosopher, wrote that in order to be capable of discovering anything new one must be able to live with an unfinished world view. In general, the best way to learn how to do something is to do it, with guidance from someone who already knows how. In many cases it is the only way. The way to help people learn to communicate effectively, solve problems together, plan an activity, evaluate a process, learn more about some topic, is to help them do it , in an atmosphere that encourages taking risks that sometimes lead to mistakes. This is true at the day-care center, and it is still true in and after graduate school.
Participants make videos of themselves interacting with someone else.
Guided by the trainers, they learn to analyze the videos, noting the frequency of certain kinds of behaviors that are known to enhance or degrade the quality of the interaction. Over the years I heard many stories of how students had benefitted from working with adults who had been given this training. The frontiers that remained were the effort to continue to improve the quality and cost effectiveness of the training and the implementation of the new learning in actual educational practice. However, with all the heartwarming successes came some bitter disappointments. A few trainees simply could not stand the idea of watching themselves on videotape.