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LEARNING ABILITY IS probably the most important skill you can have.
Take it from Peter Brown, Henry Roediger, and Mark McDaniel, authors of Make It Stick: The Science Of Successful Learning.
“We need to keep learning and remembering all our lives,” they write. “Getting ahead at work takes mastery of job skills and difficult colleagues … If you’re good at learning, you have an advantage in life.
Learning to remember
And to learn something is to be able to remember it, say the authors, two of whom are psychology professors at Washington University in St Louis.
Unfortunately, lots of the techniques for learning that we pick up in school don’t help with long-term recall — like cramming or highlighting.
To get over these bad habits, we scoured Make It Stick for learning tips.
But be warned: If it’s difficult, it’s good thing.
“Learning is deeper and more durable when it’s effortful,” the authors write. “Learning that’s easy is like writing in sand, here today and gone tomorrow.”
Here are the takeaways:
Retrieval: Bring it back from memory
When you’re attempting to recall an idea, method, or technique from memory, you’re retrieving. Flash cards are a great example: They force you to recall an idea from memory, unlike a technique like highlighting where you’re not burning anything into your brain. The reason retrieval’s so effective is that it strengthens the neural pathways associated with a given concept.
Elaboration: Connect new ideas to what you already know.
When you try to put a new idea into your own words, you’re elaborating.
The more you can explain about the way your new learning relates to prior knowledge, the stronger your grasp of the new learning will be, and the more connections you create that will help you remember it later.
For instance, if you’re in physics class and trying to understand heat transfer, try to tie the concept into your real-life experiences, say, by imagining how a warm cup of coffee disperses heat into your hands.
Interleaving: Varying your subjects
When you work on a variety of things at once, you’re interleaving. If you’re trying to understand a subject — from the basics of economics to hitting a pitch — you’re going to learn better if you mix up your examples.
A sports case: Batters who do batting practice with a mix of fastballs, change-ups, and curveballs hit for a higher average.
The interleaving helps because when you’re out there in the wild, you need to first discern what kind of problem you’re facing before you can start to find a solution, like a ball coming from a pitcher’s hand.
Generation: Answer before you have an answer
When you try to give an answer before it’s given to you, you’re generating.
By wading into the unknown first and puzzling through it, you are far more likely to learn and remember the solution than if somebody first sat down to teach it to you.
In an academic setting, you could work finding your own answers before class starts. In a professional setting, you could supply your own ideas when you’re stuck before talking with your boss.
Reflection: Evaluate what happened.
When you take a few moments to review what happened with a project or meeting, you’re reflecting. You might ask yourself a few questions: What went well? Where can you improve? What does it remind you of?
Harvard Business School researchers have found reflective writing to be super powerful.
Just 15 minutes of written reflection at the end of the day increased performance by 23% for one group of employees.
Mnemonics: Use hacks to recall.
When you’re using an acronym or image to recall something, you’re using a mnemonic.
The hall of fame includes abbreviations — Roy G. Biv for the colors of the spectrum (Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet) — and rhyming, like “in 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue.”
Mnemonics are not tools for learning per se, but for creating mental structures that make it easier to retrieve what you have learned.
Calibration: Know what you don’t know.
When you get feedback that reveals your ignorance to you, you’re calibrating.
“Calibration is simply the act of using an objective instrument to clear away illusions and adjust your judgment to better reflect reality.”
This is necessary since we all suffer from “cognitive illusions”: We think we understand something when we really don’t. So taking a quiz — or gathering feedback from a colleague — helps you to identify those blind spots.
For a deeper dig into the science of learning, make sure to pick up “Make It Stick.” It’s an illuminating read.
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Welcome to Ireland. Nobody is guilty. Nobody does time. Nobody pays money back. Sick to death of it at this stage.
You elect the System/Government you deserve.
Funny I don’t remember the candidates I voted for saying they’d stand up for people gouging six figure salaries from charities.
The establishment have been making laws to protect itself against any kind of fruitful investigation or accountability since the founding of the state.. We need a new secular democratic republican constitution.
When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men living together in society, they create for themselves in the course of time a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it.
Frederic Bastiat
Perfectly articulated and correct comment
Just look at recent history. Half a billion on two tribunals which found adverse findings against MANY top-establish-tees. Not so much as a Garda interview, never mind a case being brought against them. This ‘let’s eat cake’ mentality can only end bad in the long run.
The Oireachtas need to bring in a rule that any body that gets state funding is required to account for it on request from Oireachtas Committees.
Prionsais
That would exclude the PAC from asking the very question that Mr Flannery has been outraged over .
Having retired some seven years ago from the position of CEO of Rehab why would the Committee want to know the value of his pension fund and his salary at that date?
This form of questioning is so far outside the remit of the Committee it is evidence of bias and prejudice. It is also the reason why there will be no compulsion on the man to attend.
Mary Lou must be correct in her assertion that the Treatment of witnesses was even handed and fair!
Flannery continued to receive payments from the CRC after his retirement ,as a ‘consultant’ , if he has nothing to hide let him come and answer questions. The same goes for Kerins.
“Richard Rodgers” – On this particular subject , you consistently try to “protect” and suggest preventing these people from answering questions from a Dáil Committee entrusted with ensuring the legal usage of Public Money !
I ask you – Why Richard ?
Are you trying to protect “Friends” ?
Was the misuse of funding so criminal that you feel that it might be dangerous for Sean & Sheila Citizen , to find out what rip offs that these people were involved in ?
Please explain your reasons please ?
Ps. – I missed you Richard , are you fully recovered from the Election Results ? More great news over the weekend !
If the proposed Oireachtas banking inquiry follows the same tortuous path the public will remain as ignorant of sharp practice in the banking sector as they are of feather bedding in the charity sector. Why is disclosure of truth so painful? Are the politicians only attempting to apply the same standards of disclosure and transparency to charities that applies to the Exchequer funding of political parties?
@Myles look forget the banking inquiry they cannot even appoint members to inquire without messing it up and fighting about who should be appointed. No hope for the inquiry having any success….
Kerry, this messing about is intentional.
It’s nothing to do with the truth – it’s about the Uber Irish protecting each other and nothing more – something has managed to escape into the public domain and the aim now is a “controlled descent”.
Hard to imagine or picture Angela Kerins playing basketball….
Let it rain! White chocolate!
Someone put that meatloaf looking… mullet headed…sumo bodied WEAPON in a room alone with Mary Lou for an hour.
And let’s see what happens!
I don’t understand why there is a question of compellability; you reap what you sow.
When did it all start, this corruption and greed? My assumption is that it started small and grew. Nobody goes into public office with the intention of cleaning out the coffers, it’s just when they see everybody else at it and how easy it is, it becomes too easy. They just thought they would never get caught.
The people of this island voted only two years ago not to increase the powers of committees, and that means no compellibility to attend or answer questions. They did this because they were unhappy with government. Now they can’t understand why their actions have led to this situation, where people can effectively give two fingers to the state. The CRC told out and out lies before Christmas to try protect their bear sales. If the people of Ireland had actually taken the time to inform themselves of what each proposed constitutional amendment is about, and read the documentation sent to their door, rather than just voting against “the government” or believing soundbites from vested interests, the board members of the CRC would now be up on charges for contempt, and the politicians involved in the bank bailout would be shi77ing themselves.
Well said Barry, behind every bad politician is a woefully misinformed, uneducated electorate. Simple as that.
I disagree with your analysis Barry. I believe most objected to the constitutional amendment because they did not want to award judicial powers to legislators. This is in keeping with best Democratic practises.
In a properly functioning democracy these people (Kerins & Flannery) would be answering to a judge for the misappropriation of public funds. Not getting involved in a farcical Leinster house soap opera.
As there were no proper rules in place on the use of other monies for salaries etc. How were they misappropriating public funds? They took exactly the maximum allowed from public funds for salaries, then topped it up from other income streams within their organisations. Our committees lack teeth, so nobody fears them. The civil liberties nonsense was that it proffered judicial powers. It didn’t. It merely made attendance compulsory, and refusal to answer or knowingly answering contemptuous. At this stage, the judicial system would become involved. This seems to be the norm is most other “functioning” democracies.
Governmental committees with teeth that can compel individuals to submit testimony are performing a judicial function.
If existing rules are inadequate legislators need to explain their negligence in this regard.
So if legislators were doing what they are well paid to do rather than setting themselves up as a quasi-judiciary these issues may be dealt with in an effective and efficient manner without the theatrics.
“Other functioning democracies” is a bit of a stretch considering where we find ourselves. I believe dysfunctional democracy would be more appropriate.
her only regret was she didn’t rob them of there own personal savings! She is deeply proud of her actions with the previous smiley pictures! shes a dirty lil rat that deserves a slap!
I wonder if she paid for that Rod Stewart wig with rehab funds?
Great article. Thanks for the info, itâs easy to understand. BTW, if anyone needs to fill out a Maryland Form PAC, I found a blank form here.
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