When I need to decide where to stop, it is not ever at the end of a row. I finish the row I am on, then turn and do several inches of the next row. This part was not surprising; I knew I did that. What was new to me as the reason. I had always told myself that I did this to prevent stitches from pulling out at the end of the row, but it is just as likely they will pull out in the middle.
What I realized about myself this morning is that the reason I like to end on a partial row is that it is less daunting when I pick it back up the next time. I've already started this row; no all I have to do is finish it. It's a little psychological motivation game I play with myself, but I think it reveals something larger
Finishing is less scary than starting.
Maybe it's the power of inertia. Maybe it is easier because you have a visual representation of what is left. Maybe it has to do with procrastination. I don 't know. But I do know that starting something is more challenging than picking up where you left off.
This makes intuitive sense. Starting a race is difficult, but once you are running, you can usually keep running (unless it is something crazy - like an ultramarathon, requiring a different kind of endurance). Writers know the white page problem; it's daring you to create something from nothing. But once something is there, you can ride the flow of your thoughts. The heaviest weight in any workout is the front door of your house.
What could this mean for classrooms? Perhaps, we can employ this psychology for projects, homework, and writing assignments. If math allow enough time at the end of a class period to do one of the problems they have assigned for homework and then say, "Okay, finish this tonight," perhaps it will be easier for the student to motivate themselves after dinner. After all, they only have to finish what they've already started. Perhaps an English teacher can walk students through the first sentence of a paragraph and then say, "You're off to a good start. Keep going."
For long term projects, we can teach students to use this trick as well. We are pretty good at helping them break work into chunks, but what if we said, "Don't finish at the end of the chunk. Either stop a little early or keep going into the next chunk a little ways"? Might it be easier for them to start the next session.
At a session of Learning and the Brain a few years ago, Dr. Jessica Minahan recommended putting a bar of squares at the top of a homework page (ten problems = ten squares) and then telling students to fill in a box each time they finished a problem. It provided a visual representation of how much they had already done and how much there was left to do. She compared it to the loading bar on a computer; it's nice to see that there is only 20% left.
Psychological tricks may sound goofy, but they do often help. I play a similar game with myself every Thursday morning at work. After scanning in the first wave of exercisers who are in line when the Y opens, my next job is to fold a cart heaped with towels. There are two sizes of towels, and I always start with the big ones first. It allows the volume remaining in the cart to drop quickly. After I reach the rim of the cart, I switch to small ones for a little while because the incoming class needs more of them. Then, I switch back to large ones for a little while, eventually just taking them in whatever order they come.
Does any of this make towel folding quicker? Nope. It takes the same amount of time no matter what order I fold them in, but it does change how long it feels. Seeing that volume drop quickly at the beginning make it feel like finishing this won't be so bad.
And sometimes, that's all it takes to get a job done.
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