Accelerate Your Learning – 2 Simple Techniques

Dan Fletcher asked:




Have you ever wondered why some people are so much quicker at learning things? How they seem to remember complex things with ease? Despite popular belief, it is NOT because they are smarter! No, it’s because they know (and use) 2 simple learning techniques that help them to learn quicker.

No-one wants to spend extra time studying. Luckily these 2 techniques don’t take
much time at all. While other’s may have to study for hour upon hour, only to get
average results, people using these techniques can get outstanding results from just
a few minutes a week.

The techniques aren’t just for academic study either. They can be used for anything,
by anyone. Perhaps you are taking ballroom lessons? Then use these techniques to
quickly dance your way to the top of the class! Or maybe you are studying a martial
art? You can use these techniques to master your latest kata in no time.

Basically, these techniques will dramatically accelerate how well you learn
ANYTHING. They are particular powerful though when used with special “wiki”
software that works in a way that is similar to how your subconscious works. But
more about that later…

The 2 key techniques to accelerate your learning are reinforcing, and reviewing.

Technique 1: Reinforcing

5 to 10 minutes after you have learnt something (say right after you have had a
lesson), you should write down what you just learnt. This reinforces the learning,
and improves how well you will recall it later. If you don’t do this, the lesson will
quickly fade from your memory. You won’t forget everything, but you won’t
remember anywhere near as much as you would by writing down some quick notes.

You DON’T have to write an encyclopedia. Sometimes just a single word will do. No-
one understands you better than you do! Which bit of the lesson did you struggle
with? Which bit do you think you’ll have trouble remembering? Write THAT down!

Don’t worry about it being 100% accurate either. If you learnt something new, but
you can’t exactly remember it, just write it down the best you can. You can always
fix it later if you need to. Writing down something wrong is better than not writing
down anything at all.

Technique 2: Reviewing

You should skim over your notes periodically. How often is up to you, but I find that
once a week works well for me. The better you know the material the less often you
have to review it. Things from a year ago may only need reviewing every 3 months,
but something hard that you only just learnt may need reviewing every day until you
start to really understand it.

It’s also worth reviewing right before a lesson. If you are anything like me, you
spend the first 5-10 minutes of any lesson trying to remember where you were up
to in the previous lesson. By doing a quick review before hand, you can get up to
speed before the lesson, and hit the ground running. You won’t waste any of your
time during the lesson playing catch-up.

Tools for Reinforcing and Reviewing

What are the best tools for reinforcing and reviewing?

I will cover 3: Paper-based, word-processor, and wiki-based.

Paper-Based: This is the simplest option. Just buy a little notebook, and write into it.
Use a page per subject. The biggest disadvantages to this option are that you can’t
edit, and you can’t search. Despite the disadvantages, this is still a good option, and
definitely worth considering if you dont have access to a computer.

Word-Processor: This option requires a computer. Just use any standard word-
processor( even Microsoft notepad would do), and type your notes into it. You may
want to have different subjects in different files, otherwise the file will get very long.
This option has advantages over paper, because you can edit what you have written,
and you can search. The biggest disadvantage is that it isn’t very organised. You
either end up with one big file, or lots of files scattered around all over the place.

Wiki-Based: Wiki systems are internet based systems that allow you to very easily
edit a website, without needing advanced programming skills. In the past you
needed to setup a webserver to use a wiki, but now days you can download software
right onto your computer that does everything for you.

The advantage a wiki has over a word-processor is that you can structure your
learning material just like a website. This means you can have different pages for
different subjects, and link it all up. This “network” structure, is much like how the
human subconscious works, so it will help you to organize your notes in a way that
optimizes learning. It sounds complex, but a wiki is really no harder to use than a
normal word-processor.

Any of these options will accelerate your learning, but if you get the chance, you
should really try a wiki-based system. The extra freedom and flexibility a wiki-
based system gives you will definitely accelerate your learning, and a wiki is much
easier to use than you think.