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The confidence to speak up in class - A podcast experiment

2018-09-01 · Podcast or interview · Ali, Parth G · recording, 8:11 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Mindset, motivation and happiness (also: YouTube, writing online and creators) · mode: Conversation and interview · tags: His own products discussed, Aimed at students, His medical past

Starting an experimental podcast called Intercourse, Ali shares a clip of his talk with Cambridge physics YouTuber Parth G on the growth mindset: being wrong in class is how you learn, a teacher would not think less of you and no one else cares; Ali calls the growth mindset probably the biggest influence on his life.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Ali starts an experimental podcast and introduces his conversation with Parth G

  • ★★★ Ali is starting a podcast in which he interviews friends, other doctors and people from other professions about how they got where they are and about productivity, happiness, health and success. — 00:00:00
  • ★★ Ali says he has wanted to start a podcast for quite a while and will try it for a few episodes, continuing if it goes well and reassessing if not. — 00:00:29
  • ★★ A few months before, Ali recorded two podcast episodes with his friend Parth G, a YouTuber who studied physics at Cambridge: one on study tips and one on what they learned at university. — 00:00:29 · University of Cambridge

  • ★★★ Ali calls cultivating a growth mindset probably the single biggest tip he would give anyone going into university. (hedged) — 00:01:27

    “the single biggest tip I would give to anyone going into university”

00:01:57 — Ali and Parth on the fixed and growth mindset and answering questions in class

  • ★★ Parth G describes a fixed mindset as struggling to answer questions in class for fear of looking like an idiot, and a growth mindset as not caring about that because the point is to learn. — 00:01:57
  • ★★ Parth G advises students who avoid answering questions in class for fear of looking stupid that they are doing themselves a disservice. — 00:01:57
  • ★ Parth G recalls teachers who told his class they did not care if an answer was wrong or a question stupid, so students asked and no one laughed at them. — 00:01:57
  • ★★ Parth G says he is wrong about 80% of the time in physics while doing a physics degree, so students should get used to the idea of being wrong. — 00:02:34
  • ★★ Parth G says being wrong does not make you less smart but makes you learn more and grow, which is what the growth mindset comes back to. — 00:03:09
  • ★ Ali recalls a medical-school friend who did not want to ask questions in dissection-room sessions, where about eight students stand around a body with a demonstrator, because she would look like an idiot if wrong. — 00:03:09
  • ★ Ali says his friend later told him his advice helped, and she started answering questions in the dissection-room sessions. — 00:03:53
  • ★★★ To get over the fear of answering wrongly in class, Ali advises imagining yourself as the teacher: you would not think less of a student for a wrong answer and would almost welcome the chance to teach. — 00:04:22
  • ★★★ Ali's second point: when someone else in your group gets a question wrong you do not think less of them, so no one cares when you get one wrong; it is all in your own head. — 00:04:22
  • ★★ Ali says that when he started YouTube he was very worried about what people would think, until he realised that no one cares because everyone is busy with their own lives. — 00:04:22
  • ★★ Ali says getting a question wrong in class is good for his own learning, and someone else was probably thinking the same wrong thing, so it helps their learning too. (hedged) — 00:05:10
  • ★★ Ali says that if you would think less of someone for a wrong answer, that is your own problem to fix, because people are wrong all the time; even Einstein was wrong about something. — 00:05:10
  • ★★ Ali says learning the name growth mindset blew his mind: once an idea has a label, it becomes much easier to internalise and apply to your own life. — 00:05:39
  • ★★★ Ali says the growth mindset is probably the single biggest influence on his life, letting him do the various things he does. (hedged) — 00:05:39

00:05:47 — What the growth mindset has done for Ali, from criticism to his first YouTube videos

  • ★★ With a growth mindset, Ali says, he almost never takes criticism personally or as reflecting badly on him, but sees it as part of learning and growing. — 00:06:08
  • ★★ When Ali started his YouTube channel just over a year before, he knew the first 50 videos would be terrible but made them anyway, knowing his skills would improve; he sees his new podcast the same way. — 00:06:08

00:06:37 — How the podcast will work, the name Intercourse, Parth's channel and sign-off

  • ★★ Ali plans to publish the full conversations of his podcast in podcast format and to turn particularly interesting two-minute segments into YouTube videos. — 00:06:37
  • ★★★ Ali's podcast is called Intercourse and hosted at intercourse.fm, named for the meaning of intercourse as an exchange of ideas or conversation. — 00:07:05
  • ★ For study tips Ali recommends Parth G's channel, which has their collaboration on how to study for exams effectively. — 00:07:05
  • ★ Ali says Parth G also makes vlogs about physics and produces all the music on his videos himself, and Ali would like music-production lessons from him. — 00:07:34

In the description and comments

  • ★ Ali's podcast Intercourse is to have a subtitle along the lines of "Conversations about everyday life". (hedged) — video description

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

Central: growth mindset · Intercourse · Parth G

Also: University of Cambridge

Also centred on growth mindset: Live Stream - Tuesday Evening Hangout · What Makes People Successful?

Also centred on Intercourse: My new podcast - Microphone setup + reflections

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