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Ask HN: Do you have a process or a framework to learn specific skills quickly?

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Re: Ask HN: Do you have a process or a framework to learn specific skills quickly?

#81

Post by Exuma »

toiletaccount wrote: post #71
Exuma wrote: post #70

I learn the hardest things first, not the easiest thing (ie I flip right to the Black-Scholes formula when learning options, gradient descent in neural networks, etc etc). I find that by going after the hardest things first, you learn the most information in the quickest way as all supporting things must be researched on the way. If you only go after easy basic things and try to work your way up, the pressure (and ra…

This depends on what's being learned and the scope of it. We don't start teaching kindergardeners math by diving into linear algebra. The main thing to me is to practice constantly, and to practice doing it properly. There's also the psych factor, making a little bit of progress every day encourages you to make more progress. Keep the ball rolling, etc.

The post specifically asks about learning things quickly. This is directly proportional to how uncomfortable one can be without quitting.

If someone is dissuaded from learning something because they need to be encouraged, then that is contrary to learning things quickly, at that point its just regular learning.

Re: Ask HN: Do you have a process or a framework to learn specific skills quickly?

#83

Post by reader_mode »

SuboptimalEng wrote: post #50

For most of out lives, we are taught to learn subjects in a linear manner - pick up a book on Calculus, read it from start to finish, and you can do calculus. This breaks down when learning something like React. There are a lot of tangential technologies that can throw you off in this process. --- I have a 3 step process for learning new frameworks and technologies in ~1 week with a 10-15 hr time commitment. This spe…

I've tried watching technical tutorial videos but I often found people making them aren't really experts in the domain, so I end up watching impressions of a mediocre developer trying to wade through some topic.

There are good videos (usually experts giving talks) but I wouldn't start with those.

Re: Ask HN: Do you have a process or a framework to learn specific skills quickly?

#84

Post by aronowb14 »

I built a process for myself when self teaching coding that generalizes pretty well (have used for it for coding, basketball, 3D art, and most recently cooking).

Revolves around Dr. Strange quote: “mastery comes from theory and practice”.

I start by finding books/resources for absolute beginners. Examples: (Salt fat acid heat [cooking] blenderguru [3d art] Murachs intro to Java [coding].

Next I go through the entire resource cover to cover, and as I learn I add interesting projects to an ongoing list. I find the more I learn, the more interesting the subject gets and the more I want to learn.

The key to getting this cover to cover completion to work though is habit building. I force myself to do the activity every day for at least ten minutes. It sucks in the beginning, but after 2-3 days it becomes super duper easy and I find myself working for hours over that ten minutes.

Once I finish the intro resource: I find the next resource that suits my level… rinse and repeat after that :).

Other stuff that helps/optimizes the process:

Focus on meta learning. Figure out what works for you as you learn. Reflect often.

Surround yourself with experts on the topic if you can.

Re: Ask HN: Do you have a process or a framework to learn specific skills quickly?

#85

Post by BoiledCabbage »

scarecrowbob wrote: post #37

I learn a lot of songs, both lyrics and performance on other instruments. I've memorized 500-800, and I have a couple hundred tunes I routinely perform in front of people. Slow, perfect practice of component parts in all things is the only easy way to gain skills, IMO. Long-term periodic repetition is the easy way to keep skills. So, for instance, I can learn most generic country songs in about an hour. As with most…

If you're not already familiar with the term, it's "spaced repetition" - And is big in learning/memory.

Re: Ask HN: Do you have a process or a framework to learn specific skills quickly?

#86

Post by rogers18445 »

Start from the highest level, wrap all low level concepts into black boxes to call on demand from the higher level without understanding their internals. Unwrap black boxes for understanding only as needed.

Pretty much the opposite of "higher" level education.

Re: Ask HN: Do you have a process or a framework to learn specific skills quickly?

#87

Post by tomaszs »

I use flashcards to note down most important things I want to remember while scanning the subject. Than I take a flashcard and deepen the knowledge about the part of the subject. That is why I have created Summon The JSON. Flashcards boost my learning pace and I am more enthusiastic about learning new stuff

Re: Ask HN: Do you have a process or a framework to learn specific skills quickly?

#88

Post by fouc »

I think for the examples of skills you mentioned, taking notes would be key. Use one of the tag-based or tree-based note-taking search-friendly apps that often gets mentioned in HN. The act of organizing your thoughts and information in order to take notes would help internalize that skill. In all likelihood you might never look at your notes again, except once or twice, and that's fine - it was worth it from the beginning.

You could even write blog posts about these things you are learning, that would go a step deeper into helping you internalize these skills.

Re: Ask HN: Do you have a process or a framework to learn specific skills quickly?

#90

Post by TameAntelope »

I'm actually pretty terrible at learning new things, but one thing I think has been effective is to immerse oneself into the community of practitioners. Be social about the thing you're trying to learn, you at least get a pretty good understanding of the current "meta", if nothing else.
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