a deep dive into the strategies that actually work
There has been a surprising amount of research into how we learn. We know what works and what doesn’t, and we also know that most students waste way too much time trying to learn new things badly!
These popular learning strategies really DON’T work …
- Re-reading and highlighting text
- Cramming
- Mindless repetition of material
As the content becomes more familiar we fool ourselves into thinking we truly understand when actually it’s an illusion. We simply forget everything in a day or two and revising the material at a later date is like starting from scratch 🥺.
Learning is an acquired skill
Deep and meaningful learning entrenches the knowledge and this takes effort!
Learning anything new changes our brain as we make new neural connections. Every time we retrieve and use that knowledge we are strengthening the neural pathways and the memory.
Not only are we literally getting smarter but the stuff we are learning becomes so much easier to re-learn later on when we are revising for exams.
So how do we make learning stick?
Test yourself!
Testing yourself is the number 1 proven strategy for learning anything properly.
You can use quizzes or end of chapter questions or any opportunity for explaining new learning in your own words.
And then you need to keep practicing – allow yourself to get a little rusty on a topic and then test yourself again.
And again.
And again.
Because the thing is that the harder you struggle to retrieve the information you’ve stored away in your brain and the more mistakes you make, the deeper and longer lasting the learning becomes.
It might sound counter-intuitive, but the greater the effort, the greater the reward.
Mindset is all important
Nobody likes to struggle and nobody likes to fail but perhaps we should see them both as badges of effort and super-useful tools for learning. Even though not knowing the answer (especially when we think we should) is really frustrating at least we now know what we don’t know!
If we know where the holes in our knowledge are and where the misunderstanding lies, we can fix them.
The result is that our learning is more deeply understood and we will able to apply it in lots of different contexts – exactly what we need to do in exams and throughout life.
In October’s newsletter I’ll show you exactly how to put all this into practice, so keep an eye on your inbox 😎
If this has been useful then please forward it on and thank you very much for reading.
