1-Make a decision to want to learn. This should be your first formal lesson in learning. I'm not talking in generalities and the obvious "no duh, of course I want to learn". What I'm saying is you need to make it a mission, a mental declaration to not give up until you understand that which you need or want to understand. Sounds obvious but it's not. Even when you "need" to understand something you may find yourself making excuses such as "I'll learn that later", "I know enough already", "I'll study my notes", "I don't need to know this in the real world" which are all rationalizations for not understanding something. Making a decision to learn is like declaring war. You may not have asked to go war but someone has declared war on you. Make it your priority to win-make it your decision to win.
2-The second most important aspect in "learning to learn" for me is to understand when you don't understand. Sometimes it's obvious but most of the time it's not. After all, who likes to admit they don't understand instruction and risk being called stupid or have their self confidence shaken? It is easier and less stressful to fool yourself into believing you understand instruction when you really don't. After any learning transaction you must honestly determine whether you really understood the lesson or not and make a declaration of it; "Yes, I got this" or " No, I don't get it". It's tougher than you think. There are times when you know for sure you understand but there many times you're just no sure. "I think I got this?, Yes, that's good enough for me..." Your awareness of how much you really understood is often only revealed after a test when it's too late and the damage has been done. Learning to understand yourself on this key point will improve your academics exponentially. Think about, you can't help yourself by fooling yourself. Do you need to stand up in the middle of class and shout "I don't get this!" Maybe. It could be that or you wait until the class is over and make your declaration to the teacher. My point is be 100% honest with yourself. Don't pretend you know when you don't; it's a waste of time.
3-Confidence Psych out. How many times have you looked at a problem, especially the wordy confusing ones and thought I can't do this! We struggle with self-doubt and loads of anxiety even before we make an attempt at a solution- We are utterly dejected and give up. When we are shown the solution and it is explained to us we kick ourselves in the a#@ and utter something like " I didn't know it was that easy!" or "of course I could have done that" "oh, that's it?" So what's going on here? I will tell you: We are getting "psyched out". Generally speaking (just my own opinion) tests are not designed to test your knowledge but to "weed people out" from those that can "problem solve". Many educators still subscribe to the "exclusive members only club; "only smart people like me are worthy of success" and they educate and write tests to find new members. In any event the reality is, no test is going to proclaim, "hey there, don't worry, you can handle this, it's not as hard as it seems" and that is the lesson here; it's not as hard as it seems. Don't get psyched out. Even the toughest things to learn are easy if you don't get "psyched out". Here is my personal psych out example, play along and test yourself...
The number N of bacteria present in a culture at time t (in hours) obeys the law of uninhibited growth N(t)=500e^0.087t
1-Determine the number of bacteria at t=0 hours
2-What is the growth rate of the bacteria
Looks like a tough question but you will be amazed by how easy it really is. This question is all "Psych out" nothing more.
*answers at end of article
4-Change venues. Some teachers are triggers for instant failure. Many students simply won't engage with a teacher they perceive have it out for them or do not care about them. A teacher who gives me a bad grade by de-facto becomes an anxiety producing threat, ruining my future and career. The mind is hardwired to identify fear, like a big fat "F" and all the anxiety that goes with it gets labeled as a threat; How can I learn anything from that person? Even if you're not getting the big F but just getting by with a low grade, it still triggers your flight or fight response. The only way to overcome this obstacle is to find another teacher more compatible with you. This is EXTREMELY controversial I know because you cannot in most cases change your assigned teacher but if you can you must. Like Einstein said (paraphrasing) "You cannot solve problems by using the same kind of thinking that created them". You cannot create understanding from the same source that created misunderstanding in my opinion.
5-Don't move on Unlike above where I recommend "changing venues" this "don't move on" applies to specific problems within a healthy learning environment where for the most part you do understand. However moving on when we don't understand is the Achilles heal of public education and that is Time constraint. The wheels of learning will move on with or without you even if you don't understand. You cannot stop the classroom learning schedule because you don't get it. This is where you have to get creative and get help as soon as possible. "We can't hold up the entire class because one or two kids don't get it!" Let's face it, no one will get 100% of the instruction offered, save for a gifted child. We cannot focus on making sure everyone "gets it", it's just not feasible. Remember this; There is a unwritten rule in teaching that is "satisfactory understanding". That's why we have a grading system. They tell you it's a rating system but it is not. It's only there to move you along, nothing else. You must live with how satisfied you are with your understanding; It's your decision how far you want to go.
6- Running Your Race. This may be the most essential point to understanding learning. I can't emphasize this enough, so I will use an analogy. Let's say you're running a race with your teacher who is a seasoned marathon runner who knows the course and the directions to the finish line and has been doing this for years. You on the other hand are far less experienced, maybe no experience, untrained, have never seen the course and maybe you have of some handicap preventing you from running. Now imagine you both line up at the starting line, the start pistol fires into air and you're off, like it or not! You both start running towards the finish line and you try to keep up with your teacher who is obviously fit for this race. He or she knows they have to help you run this race as best as they can with some coaching, coaxing and clear instructions but there's one caveat; The teacher can't stand in place and can't carry you. They also can't run along side you at your pace either; they must move on as part of the race rules. You soon start to fall behind. But no problem! You can still hear the voice of your teacher far ahead, however their voice fades, their instructions lost and soon your teacher vanishes completely out of sight. You stop running the race; you are out of breath, lost and left behind; You feel abandoned. This little story shows how a student gets left behind in the classroom, feeling isolated and lost. Some students can run the "race" or keep up with the teacher make it to the finish line but others may never get there. Once the student stops "running the race" the learning process stops. You must recognize "how to run your race" and learn new strategies like getting to the starting line as fit as possible-Don't join your teacher at the starting line wearing a pair of boots and a back pack full of bricks...and if you can't keep up with your teacher, you may need to do this-see instructional video below....
7- Take detours. I love doing Calculus and other mathematics for fun. I am not a mathematician by any means or even a good one but in learning Calculus I discovered a few key lessons about learning. You will have to stop many times and review previous material that you should have learned or remembered from the past. I will often "detour" and spend time to relearn seemingly unrelated material. I realized that Calculus or any other complicated subject is just a series of simple steps all put together. OK there is critical thinking, and being creative (try doing trig identities...) to come up with solutions but for the most part you can break anything down to series of comprehensible easy steps-after all a computer can do it and it can't think at all, but given simple instructions in sequence it can solve very difficult problems... Sometimes detouring won't help you out immediately, but something interesting happens; in learning the simple steps you gain confidence to solve the bigger problem. It's in the little things, the slight edge that gets us by. I discovered Calculus is a breeze if you concentrate on the algebra. I detoured, stopped learning Calculus and brushed up on my algebra to solve the Calculus, if I stumbled again, I repeated the process. I changed my approach and took a detour because most teachers will misinform you telling you you don't understand the material at hand when in fact you need to detour and take another route.
8-Mental Laziness- Remember as a kid when you were asked to take out the trash or clean your room and you just didn't feel like it, you would rather lounge on the couch or watch TV? There is also a "mental taking out the trash" as well and it's equally as tiring as physical work. Mental laziness for me is insidious because it masquerades as, "I don't get it", " I can't do this, what's the point if it's going to be wrong anyway". Of course we don't like doing things that don't interest us or things we are just not good at. For those things we need to work extra hard to overcome that mental lazy hurdle and it's not easy. Resistance, frustration, and dragging your feet set in and stop you before you even start. Writing a paper, doing a long math problem learning how to conjugate a verb etc. The secret? As in the previous steps break it down to small manageable steps. When you conquer these small steps it becomes incentive for self motivation.
9-Timing; Recognize that sometimes for whatever mysterious reason we are not ready to learn that we are being "forced" or asked to learn. Maturity? Yes, that plays a factor in our learning. It could be you just don't give a damn about mathematics or history and rather be doing something else and you may feel "I don't need to learn this." It could be you genuinely do not like that which you are being taught or you may not like it because you're not good at it. They say when the student is ready the teacher will appear but what happens if you're just not ready or will never be ready? This is the toughest obstacle to learning of them all: Resistance. I have no magic bullet solution and can only offer up a cliche; Don't be that person that reflects back on life and says "I wish I would have tried harder when I was back in school, now it's too late". Who knows, maybe some clever psychologist will figure this one out. The only thing I can offer is the awareness of this self defeating enemy known as Resistance. I don't know why resistance exists but I do know it won't make you smarter, pay the bills, get you places or get you anything in life worth while when you're in that state of being-think about it...
10-Fear. Learn not to care. As I mentioned above fear in the modern age is the greatest "F" word there is. Fear served us well hundreds of years ago in the jungle when we needed to be on our most vigilant guard every moment of our life to survive. Fear may help us today in certain situations, like if you are in some violent confrontation. However for the most part this evolutionary survival trait does not serve us well in our everyday lives. It is true that without a healthy dose of fear many of our daily tasks would not get done to the best of our ability. Think of someone who does a poor job at work because they know they won't get fired, for example. On the flip side of that, if we care too much our ability to perform will diminish if not stop all together. Remember in this state of mind our bodies are set to fight or flee, not to think rationally. Of all the obstacles to learning I mentioned above in this article, this one got me the most. I didn't realize this throughout any of my years of schooling. It didn't hit me until years later when I was helping someone with a math problem that took a fair bit of concentration. Simple math problems I could easily explain to my kids but this problem required more skill. As I said before I knew exactly how to do this problem so I forged ahead to explain to a friends kid who is in high-school. I started out and made some simple mistake right into it. I turned red and was flustered. I felt embarrassed. My mind went blank. No matter how hard I tried I could not figure out where I went wrong and resigned with some excuse not to finish the problem. It was an awful experience. Later that night I went to my notes and discovered what I was doing wrong which was so simple, I just couldn't figure it out in the heat of that moment; Flight or flight had sunk in and I went blank. Had this been a test or some other stress evoking situation I would have failed at something I knew how to do. That is scary. Fortunately only my ego was bruised that time. My advice is learn how to relax. We don't need to fight or flee when we are taking a test, it's a big lie your life will end if you do bad. Learn what is triggering your flight or fight response and tell it, "I don't care!" Learning not to care may just save you...but don't take it to far!
Conclusion:
In our ambitious ultra competitive capitalistic society we promote the sink or swim approach, like it or not. So if you don't want to help yourself no one else will. It's a dirty little secret that you are being "weeded out" from kindergarten to High school: Harvard bound or ditch digging. This is one reason why I believe we are academically outperformed by almost every other developed country; we don't take time to develop our potential. Rather we as a nation embrace the "cream of the crop" and let everyone else struggle as they may. Don't give in. Develop your own methods for success and keep learning.
Do what works for you
I hate FOIL. Do you remember in mathematics class multiplying out polynomials using this FOIL method, a technique employed by every math teacher; First, Outer, Inners, Last? - Simple concept right? I hated it, with a passion. I thought it was confusing something so simple and making more work than necessary for me. Just take the first term and multiply by all the others, move onto the next term and do the same, easy. This damn FOIL didn't work for trinomials etc. I thought it was stupid, hate me go ahead for saying this. My point is there are other methods out there for learning something, just because you don't like or get what's being presented to you doesn't mean there isn't anything else out there that you would understand and like. I may have mentioned it above but ever watch an instructional YouTube video maybe on math presented by one person and you don't get it? However you watch a different video teaching the same exact thing and Bam! As Tony Robbins said: "Your greatest resource is your resourcefulness"
Best of luck to all, L. Portal
Answers to Psych out:
1) 500
Solution: N(0)=500e^0.087t
N=500e^0
N=500 (anything to the zero power is 1)
2) 8.7%
Solution: Take the exponent rate move decimal over two places.
***Disclaimer: I am not a certified teacher; The above article is based on my own personal experience.
3-Confidence Psych out. How many times have you looked at a problem, especially the wordy confusing ones and thought I can't do this! We struggle with self-doubt and loads of anxiety even before we make an attempt at a solution- We are utterly dejected and give up. When we are shown the solution and it is explained to us we kick ourselves in the a#@ and utter something like " I didn't know it was that easy!" or "of course I could have done that" "oh, that's it?" So what's going on here? I will tell you: We are getting "psyched out". Generally speaking (just my own opinion) tests are not designed to test your knowledge but to "weed people out" from those that can "problem solve". Many educators still subscribe to the "exclusive members only club; "only smart people like me are worthy of success" and they educate and write tests to find new members. In any event the reality is, no test is going to proclaim, "hey there, don't worry, you can handle this, it's not as hard as it seems" and that is the lesson here; it's not as hard as it seems. Don't get psyched out. Even the toughest things to learn are easy if you don't get "psyched out". Here is my personal psych out example, play along and test yourself...
The number N of bacteria present in a culture at time t (in hours) obeys the law of uninhibited growth N(t)=500e^0.087t
1-Determine the number of bacteria at t=0 hours
2-What is the growth rate of the bacteria
Looks like a tough question but you will be amazed by how easy it really is. This question is all "Psych out" nothing more.
*answers at end of article
4-Change venues. Some teachers are triggers for instant failure. Many students simply won't engage with a teacher they perceive have it out for them or do not care about them. A teacher who gives me a bad grade by de-facto becomes an anxiety producing threat, ruining my future and career. The mind is hardwired to identify fear, like a big fat "F" and all the anxiety that goes with it gets labeled as a threat; How can I learn anything from that person? Even if you're not getting the big F but just getting by with a low grade, it still triggers your flight or fight response. The only way to overcome this obstacle is to find another teacher more compatible with you. This is EXTREMELY controversial I know because you cannot in most cases change your assigned teacher but if you can you must. Like Einstein said (paraphrasing) "You cannot solve problems by using the same kind of thinking that created them". You cannot create understanding from the same source that created misunderstanding in my opinion.
5-Don't move on Unlike above where I recommend "changing venues" this "don't move on" applies to specific problems within a healthy learning environment where for the most part you do understand. However moving on when we don't understand is the Achilles heal of public education and that is Time constraint. The wheels of learning will move on with or without you even if you don't understand. You cannot stop the classroom learning schedule because you don't get it. This is where you have to get creative and get help as soon as possible. "We can't hold up the entire class because one or two kids don't get it!" Let's face it, no one will get 100% of the instruction offered, save for a gifted child. We cannot focus on making sure everyone "gets it", it's just not feasible. Remember this; There is a unwritten rule in teaching that is "satisfactory understanding". That's why we have a grading system. They tell you it's a rating system but it is not. It's only there to move you along, nothing else. You must live with how satisfied you are with your understanding; It's your decision how far you want to go.
6- Running Your Race. This may be the most essential point to understanding learning. I can't emphasize this enough, so I will use an analogy. Let's say you're running a race with your teacher who is a seasoned marathon runner who knows the course and the directions to the finish line and has been doing this for years. You on the other hand are far less experienced, maybe no experience, untrained, have never seen the course and maybe you have of some handicap preventing you from running. Now imagine you both line up at the starting line, the start pistol fires into air and you're off, like it or not! You both start running towards the finish line and you try to keep up with your teacher who is obviously fit for this race. He or she knows they have to help you run this race as best as they can with some coaching, coaxing and clear instructions but there's one caveat; The teacher can't stand in place and can't carry you. They also can't run along side you at your pace either; they must move on as part of the race rules. You soon start to fall behind. But no problem! You can still hear the voice of your teacher far ahead, however their voice fades, their instructions lost and soon your teacher vanishes completely out of sight. You stop running the race; you are out of breath, lost and left behind; You feel abandoned. This little story shows how a student gets left behind in the classroom, feeling isolated and lost. Some students can run the "race" or keep up with the teacher make it to the finish line but others may never get there. Once the student stops "running the race" the learning process stops. You must recognize "how to run your race" and learn new strategies like getting to the starting line as fit as possible-Don't join your teacher at the starting line wearing a pair of boots and a back pack full of bricks...and if you can't keep up with your teacher, you may need to do this-see instructional video below....
7- Take detours. I love doing Calculus and other mathematics for fun. I am not a mathematician by any means or even a good one but in learning Calculus I discovered a few key lessons about learning. You will have to stop many times and review previous material that you should have learned or remembered from the past. I will often "detour" and spend time to relearn seemingly unrelated material. I realized that Calculus or any other complicated subject is just a series of simple steps all put together. OK there is critical thinking, and being creative (try doing trig identities...) to come up with solutions but for the most part you can break anything down to series of comprehensible easy steps-after all a computer can do it and it can't think at all, but given simple instructions in sequence it can solve very difficult problems... Sometimes detouring won't help you out immediately, but something interesting happens; in learning the simple steps you gain confidence to solve the bigger problem. It's in the little things, the slight edge that gets us by. I discovered Calculus is a breeze if you concentrate on the algebra. I detoured, stopped learning Calculus and brushed up on my algebra to solve the Calculus, if I stumbled again, I repeated the process. I changed my approach and took a detour because most teachers will misinform you telling you you don't understand the material at hand when in fact you need to detour and take another route.
9-Timing; Recognize that sometimes for whatever mysterious reason we are not ready to learn that we are being "forced" or asked to learn. Maturity? Yes, that plays a factor in our learning. It could be you just don't give a damn about mathematics or history and rather be doing something else and you may feel "I don't need to learn this." It could be you genuinely do not like that which you are being taught or you may not like it because you're not good at it. They say when the student is ready the teacher will appear but what happens if you're just not ready or will never be ready? This is the toughest obstacle to learning of them all: Resistance. I have no magic bullet solution and can only offer up a cliche; Don't be that person that reflects back on life and says "I wish I would have tried harder when I was back in school, now it's too late". Who knows, maybe some clever psychologist will figure this one out. The only thing I can offer is the awareness of this self defeating enemy known as Resistance. I don't know why resistance exists but I do know it won't make you smarter, pay the bills, get you places or get you anything in life worth while when you're in that state of being-think about it...
10-Fear. Learn not to care. As I mentioned above fear in the modern age is the greatest "F" word there is. Fear served us well hundreds of years ago in the jungle when we needed to be on our most vigilant guard every moment of our life to survive. Fear may help us today in certain situations, like if you are in some violent confrontation. However for the most part this evolutionary survival trait does not serve us well in our everyday lives. It is true that without a healthy dose of fear many of our daily tasks would not get done to the best of our ability. Think of someone who does a poor job at work because they know they won't get fired, for example. On the flip side of that, if we care too much our ability to perform will diminish if not stop all together. Remember in this state of mind our bodies are set to fight or flee, not to think rationally. Of all the obstacles to learning I mentioned above in this article, this one got me the most. I didn't realize this throughout any of my years of schooling. It didn't hit me until years later when I was helping someone with a math problem that took a fair bit of concentration. Simple math problems I could easily explain to my kids but this problem required more skill. As I said before I knew exactly how to do this problem so I forged ahead to explain to a friends kid who is in high-school. I started out and made some simple mistake right into it. I turned red and was flustered. I felt embarrassed. My mind went blank. No matter how hard I tried I could not figure out where I went wrong and resigned with some excuse not to finish the problem. It was an awful experience. Later that night I went to my notes and discovered what I was doing wrong which was so simple, I just couldn't figure it out in the heat of that moment; Flight or flight had sunk in and I went blank. Had this been a test or some other stress evoking situation I would have failed at something I knew how to do. That is scary. Fortunately only my ego was bruised that time. My advice is learn how to relax. We don't need to fight or flee when we are taking a test, it's a big lie your life will end if you do bad. Learn what is triggering your flight or fight response and tell it, "I don't care!" Learning not to care may just save you...but don't take it to far!
Conclusion:
In our ambitious ultra competitive capitalistic society we promote the sink or swim approach, like it or not. So if you don't want to help yourself no one else will. It's a dirty little secret that you are being "weeded out" from kindergarten to High school: Harvard bound or ditch digging. This is one reason why I believe we are academically outperformed by almost every other developed country; we don't take time to develop our potential. Rather we as a nation embrace the "cream of the crop" and let everyone else struggle as they may. Don't give in. Develop your own methods for success and keep learning.
Do what works for you
I hate FOIL. Do you remember in mathematics class multiplying out polynomials using this FOIL method, a technique employed by every math teacher; First, Outer, Inners, Last? - Simple concept right? I hated it, with a passion. I thought it was confusing something so simple and making more work than necessary for me. Just take the first term and multiply by all the others, move onto the next term and do the same, easy. This damn FOIL didn't work for trinomials etc. I thought it was stupid, hate me go ahead for saying this. My point is there are other methods out there for learning something, just because you don't like or get what's being presented to you doesn't mean there isn't anything else out there that you would understand and like. I may have mentioned it above but ever watch an instructional YouTube video maybe on math presented by one person and you don't get it? However you watch a different video teaching the same exact thing and Bam! As Tony Robbins said: "Your greatest resource is your resourcefulness"
Best of luck to all, L. Portal
Answers to Psych out:
1) 500
Solution: N(0)=500e^0.087t
N=500e^0
N=500 (anything to the zero power is 1)
2) 8.7%
Solution: Take the exponent rate move decimal over two places.
***Disclaimer: I am not a certified teacher; The above article is based on my own personal experience.
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