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“Learning How to Learn,” the most popular course on Coursera

nytimes.com

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Re: “Learning How to Learn,” the most popular course on Coursera

#136

Post by tdsamardzhiev »

aeorgnoieang wrote: post #6

The very first sentence: > The studio for what is arguably the world’s most successful online course is tucked into a corner of Barb and Phil Oakley’s basement, a converted TV room that smells faintly of cat urine. I feel embarrassed on the Oakley's behalf. But I'm not a cat owner so maybe a room in one's home smelling (however faintly) of cat urine isn't particularly embarrassing. Am I unreasonable in thinking that…

You're perfectly reasonable. Journalism at its "finest".

Re: “Learning How to Learn,” the most popular course on Coursera

#137

Post by galkk »

dharmon wrote: post #127
nlawalker wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> A lot of it is cruft and motivation for the underlying core ideas. Someone else made the exact same remark about Cal Newport's book "Deep Work" earlier this week in another thread. I find this to be true about a lot of books/courses/content of a "self-help" nature that are designed to be practical and applicable - the real helpful stuff boiled down to its essence could fit in a tri-fold pamphlet (or a 350-line pas…

Specifically calling out the Deep Work book, I recall after the 6 months of promo, talks, and general marketing of the book the author wrote a blog post calling for participants to actually, well, you know, help test if the ideas in the book actually had any scientific merit. I was already pretty disillusioned with the self help crowd (even those who claimed a scientific background), but that was the nail in the coff…

Omg, did that really happened?

I either missed it or didn't read properly, but I'm definitely going to unsubscribe.

p.s. I've read the book and felt that there is too much noise and anecdotes for actually useful content.

Re: “Learning How to Learn,” the most popular course on Coursera

#138

Post by kraftman »

nlawalker wrote: post #116
sp527 wrote: post #9

Took the course. A lot of it is cruft and motivation for the underlying core ideas. The techniques suggested are things many people are already familiar with: recall, deliberate practice, interleaving, spaced repetition, Einstellung, Pomodoro, Feynman Method, Cornell notes or similar (to force recall), exercise regularly, sleep well, focus on concepts not facts (chunking), etc. A composite of these dramatically enhan…

>> A lot of it is cruft and motivation for the underlying core ideas. Someone else made the exact same remark about Cal Newport's book "Deep Work" earlier this week in another thread. I find this to be true about a lot of books/courses/content of a "self-help" nature that are designed to be practical and applicable - the real helpful stuff boiled down to its essence could fit in a tri-fold pamphlet (or a 350-line pas…

Just finished 'so good they cant ignore you' and thought similar. It made some great, interesting points, but they were just too padded out.

Re: “Learning How to Learn,” the most popular course on Coursera

#139

Post by Iv »

sp527 wrote: post #9

Took the course. A lot of it is cruft and motivation for the underlying core ideas. The techniques suggested are things many people are already familiar with: recall, deliberate practice, interleaving, spaced repetition, Einstellung, Pomodoro, Feynman Method, Cornell notes or similar (to force recall), exercise regularly, sleep well, focus on concepts not facts (chunking), etc. A composite of these dramatically enhan…

When half the students say "It was just obvious stuff" it means that it was an incredibly useful and essential class for the other half.

I remember talking with two students who took a class my friend was teaching at uni: it was critical thinking with several example of typical manipulation techniques, from marketing techniques to what cults use.

One student told me "It was interesting but a bit obvious. Anyone knows that, no?" and the other one said "I learned a lot of interesting things about source checking."

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