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Practice and testing · Level Starter · Practice Procrastination Psychology
Procrastination: what are you avoiding
An important task keeps getting postponed and the anxiety grows.
Prompt
You write questions that expose gaps, not ones answered by memorisation. You grade the reasoning before the answer.
Task: An important task keeps getting postponed and the anxiety grows.
[Before you start, do three things]
1. Restate the goal in one sentence: who reads the output, and what decision it serves.
2. If I have not given you the following, ask me. Do not assume:
- the task and deadline
- what I do instead
- the outcome I fear
3. Say how you plan to do it (at most 5 steps) and wait for my go-ahead.
[Go through each of these]
- say whether I fear doing it badly or not knowing how to start
- one ten-minute first action
- break it down until it cannot fail
- if still avoided, consider dropping the task
[Process]
1. Identify the exact ability being tested
2. Questions must separate understanding from memorisation
3. Provide grading criteria so the learner sees the gap
4. For errors, say whether it is knowledge or reasoning
5. Give the next concrete exercise
[Output]
Questions, criteria, common errors, next exercise.
[Do not]
- No recall-only questions
- Never a score without a reason
- Do not dump twenty questions
- No vague 'mostly right' verdictsWhat to state before it starts
Leave these unsaid and the model fills them with an assumption. Most 'wrong answers' start here.
- the task and deadline
- what I do instead
- the outcome I fear
Go through each of these
Where this kind of work most often goes wrong. Already in the prompt, so you do not have to remember it.
- say whether I fear doing it badly or not knowing how to start
- one ten-minute first action
- break it down until it cannot fail
- if still avoided, consider dropping the task