IIRC, the Latin word "ludus" means both "game" and "school". I do not think that is a coincidence.
The observation that one learns more easily in playful manner is probably well-known in (but hardly exclusive to) hacker circles. In a way, it is baffling that people would forget this, especially as it is not excactly a brand-new discovery.
I think you're interpreting that backwards. "Ludus" originally referred to educational training sessions to build skills for later performing activities of direct practical benefit, mainly combat and political oratory. This is how "ludus" means both "play" and "school." It's originally "play" in the sense of "play-fighting," not in the sense of "having fun without a particular goal." Unlike Greek academies, Roman schools were entirely focused on building practical skills.
The idea of "play" as "having fun without any particular goal orientation" is a thoroughly modern idea. The idea that school should be a form of "play" in the modern sense is an even more recent one. It has no basis in ancient Rome.
So our Latin teacher lied to us! I should have known...
Thank you very much for the explation!
EDIT: In Latin class, our textbook was called "Ludus Latinus", and our teacher made a big point of explaining how that meant learning was supposed to be a kind of game. It made me groan at the time, but in later years, I always thought it made perfect sense.
I'd translate "Ludus Latinus" as something like "Latin Practice," in the same sense you'd say "soccer practice" or "piano practice" or something like that.
It is a game, in the sense that it's not the real thing, it's practice for later doing the real thing -- it's a structured, goal-directed game with a particular practical outcome in mind (building Latin skills), not a "let's go have fun in the park without any particular motive other than having fun" kind of a thing.
What most people don't seem to know is that fun and play simply is learning.
Kids play act scenarios all day that they're learning about. It's a way of internalizing what they've learned. Take away time for unstructured play, and you'll find a lot of kids have less ability to learn, simply because their brains need the play time to absorb the relevant facts.
We're using a curriculum-free homeschooling approach, and while my kids aren't on the exact same learning timetable, they're close enough to the normal education track -- and well beyond it in the areas that most interest them -- that I'm not worried. And they play all the time.
The observation that one learns more easily in playful manner is probably well-known in (but hardly exclusive to) hacker circles. In a way, it is baffling that people would forget this, especially as it is not excactly a brand-new discovery.