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# Giving Hints

I think that giving hint is not good for students.This will give them the half of the solution.Whats ur opinion.?

Note by Friend Karl
4 years, 6 months ago

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Although a hint could possibly give the secret trick away to solving a problem, this could not harm the person who could not even get it in the first place.

The hints cost points as to discourage buying them. I would much rather try all I could on the problem before accessing the hint. For those students who can't solve the problem without the hint, that extra little bump in the right direction might actually be beneficial to understanding why and how certain methods work on certain problems. Ask yourself which is better: some who gets it after a hint, or someone who doesn't get it at all? The only sad part is that the hints could be misused by people who could actually get the answer on their own, but are lazy and use the hint instead. It's only hurting them though.

I think the hints are a nice addition to the Brilliant website.

- 4 years, 6 months ago

Indeed, this echoes the philosophy of why I introduced hints. I've often seen students stuck just before a breakthrough point in problem solving, and not know how close they are to understanding and overcoming it, before giving up in despair.

We are aware of possible abuses of the hint system, and will reduce such instances so in further versions. For example, we could limit the number of hints to 3 per week, and the scarcity will greatly increase their perceived value, but not restrict their usage. Hints will then be reserved for the problems which the students find challenging, but still within their reach.

Staff - 4 years, 6 months ago

nicely said!

- 4 years, 6 months ago

I think that hints should only given when the student has used two of their attempts (i.e. only one attempt left).

- 4 years, 6 months ago

Thanks, this is something that we are considering too. Most of the time, the feedback that we get is that students do not know how to proceed with the problem, and hence are unwilling to give a try because they do not like to be wrong. This is very typical human behavior, which is why in this trial period we want to see if providing hints will encourage students to push themselves further.

Our decisions as to how hints ultimately work, will depend on if an how students use it. Please keep your feedback coming, so that we can improve Brilliant for everyone.

Staff - 4 years, 6 months ago

How do you get a hint? I don't see it anywhere.

- 4 years, 6 months ago

Howdy,

To avoid confusion for people like Harrison, I will clarify what is happening. Only half of all users are seeing hints this week. We are running an A/B test to gauge interest in having hints on problems, and to see if it affects the problem solving behavior and academic distributions in bad ways.

Harrison, the way that the hints feature that is being tested works, is that you can exchange points to receive a hint on how to start solving a problem. For half of all users this week, right next to the "reveal solution" button on Number Theory and Algebra problems, is a button that say's "Get Hint." It costs points to get a hint. We think that getting a hint is probably more useful and less depressing than revealing the solution and are experimenting with it this week to find out.

Staff - 4 years, 6 months ago