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Learning needs to be effortful to be effective

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Re: Learning needs to be effortful to be effective

#41

Post by leidenfrost »

hiisukun wrote: post #29

There is a field of education, that studies teaching and learning! In fact many of you who attended university and studied at a "school of computer science" would have been in a building next to a "school of education". This post is interesting, but it reads like a layperson (from a teaching point of view) coming up with some fairly good theories of learning (of which there are quite a few) and discussing how applyin…

There's a free course in Coursera called "Learning How to Learn" and it radically changed how I view learning and education in general. I wish I knew about this when I was a teen.

If I take a valuable nugget of information about it, is that real learning comes through experience: using the information, recalling it fron memory and manipulating it in some way. This goes from just writing what you hear to a personal project. Anything behavioral, more than just receiving and thinking, helps to actually learn.

Re: Learning needs to be effortful to be effective

#42

Post by keiferski »

The spacing effect (and spaced repetition tools) are a "hack" to this: by being prompted to review an item just as you're about to forget it, you use more mental effort – and then remember it better. This allows you to minimize effort while maximizing retention.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spacing_effect

Re: Learning needs to be effortful to be effective

#43

Post by wudangmonk »

First chapter of PAIP has this gem that always stuck with me..

You think you know when you learn, are more sure when you can write, even more when you can teach, but certain when you can program. -Alan Perlis

Whenever I want to learn something, after reading the textbooks and doing the problems I always try to implement something that uses that knowledge. For Math/Physics I can vouch for its effectiveness.

Re: Learning needs to be effortful to be effective

#44

Post by ReactiveJelly »

whartung wrote: post #30
hiisukun wrote: post #29

There is a field of education, that studies teaching and learning! In fact many of you who attended university and studied at a "school of computer science" would have been in a building next to a "school of education". This post is interesting, but it reads like a layperson (from a teaching point of view) coming up with some fairly good theories of learning (of which there are quite a few) and discussing how applyin…

Well, regarding this, I can’t speak to the theory behind it. But as a general rule, specifically when it comes to programming, I’ve always advocated that when presented with an example, someone should type the code in and not copy paste it. That the act of typing gives you time to briefly consider each element of the text and their relationships to each other, rather than as an opaque blob pasted all at once. Sure, f…

Agreed. And it builds muscle memory. It's the difference between saying "Of course I can walk a mile" and actually walking a mile.

Re: Learning needs to be effortful to be effective

#45

Post by oh_sigh »

vsnf wrote: post #36
hiisukun wrote: post #29

There is a field of education, that studies teaching and learning! In fact many of you who attended university and studied at a "school of computer science" would have been in a building next to a "school of education". This post is interesting, but it reads like a layperson (from a teaching point of view) coming up with some fairly good theories of learning (of which there are quite a few) and discussing how applyin…

> In fact many of you who attended university and studied at a "school of computer science" would have been in a building next to a "school of education". Is this a reference to some specific university?

I don't really understand it either, but in my alma mater, a random small public liberal arts college, it is the case that the building closest to the CS building was the education building.

Re: Learning needs to be effortful to be effective

#46

Post by chrismartin »

I recently picked up a delightfully pre-digital habit: read books with a red pen in your hand (or any color different from the print). In the margins of the pages, ask questions, note points of confusion, or challenge the author. Mark sections to revisit (or skip entirely) later. Fidget with the pen to engage your motor neurons.

At the end of each chapter, there's usually a mostly-blank page. That's your spot to summarize or react to what you just absorbed.

The only downside is it requires your own dead tree copy, and anyone who borrows it later will inherit your goofy notes.

I've even tried printing out blog articles that I want to read more actively (2 pages per sheet, double sided).

Re: Learning needs to be effortful to be effective

#47

Post by noisy_boy »

chrismartin wrote: post #46

I recently picked up a delightfully pre-digital habit: read books with a red pen in your hand (or any color different from the print). In the margins of the pages, ask questions, note points of confusion, or challenge the author. Mark sections to revisit (or skip entirely) later. Fidget with the pen to engage your motor neurons. At the end of each chapter, there's usually a mostly-blank page. That's your spot to summ…

I am doing something similar with online courses but digitally (so maybe it is not as effective as what you described). As each section of the video finishes, I write a summary in an Obsidian notebook. So everytime I resume the course, I use those notes as recap before I continue (also an opportunity to add additional thoughts or insights to the notes). Do it often times and you basically have ingested the summary of the course. If you have forgotten the details after an year, you just need to re-read the notes.

The biggest advantage I see in this approach is that it works with multiple mediums and provides sufficient space, flexibility of formatting and ability to search.

Of course, feeling of a real book in hand is something else.

Re: Learning needs to be effortful to be effective

#49

Post by dzink »

Is effort or is repetition making the difference? Consuming massive amounts of digital content guarantees a shallow exposure to a lot of topics, but “effort” could just mean repeating and manipulating the same topic long enough to make it stick longer than others. For me, decades ago I learned how to mechanically learn hundreds of english words per day by simply writing each word repeatedly on 4 lines of a large notebook. With each writing my mind would mechanically repeat the word, the translation, the spelling. In an hour I could be done and move on to more fun stuff, knowing my mind has effectively retained a bunch of new language. Mental effort = none. Repetition and manipulation of the knowledge counts more than passive consumption, but it doesn’t need to be a lot of effort.

Re: Learning needs to be effortful to be effective

#50

Post by hiisukun »

vsnf wrote: post #36
hiisukun wrote: post #29

There is a field of education, that studies teaching and learning! In fact many of you who attended university and studied at a "school of computer science" would have been in a building next to a "school of education". This post is interesting, but it reads like a layperson (from a teaching point of view) coming up with some fairly good theories of learning (of which there are quite a few) and discussing how applyin…

> In fact many of you who attended university and studied at a "school of computer science" would have been in a building next to a "school of education". Is this a reference to some specific university?

Hah -- nope, although the other person replying to you is a funny example, and it's true for at least one university near me. It was more of an indirect comment about forgetting to search for fields of expertise outside your own, despite potential proximity.
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