In this blog, I talk about a few aspects of learning that I feel aren’t stressed as mcuh as they should be.

I find the lack of stress on the importance of recall while learning quite intriguing. I feel that recall at (increasing) intervals of time after learning a concept is the key to both remembering longer and also having a deeper understanding. Thinking about is multiple times, noticing inconsistencies when you think about it again and fixing them is the key. It’s crazy that this isn’t stress more often in the present environment.

Also, often people aren’t given credit for thinking deeply about an idea talk against the idea of thinking deeply. Children are given credit for getting the correct answer but not for thinking about the same problem in multiple ways, analysing what each change in parameter of the question would lead to, try to visualize and imagine what’s exactly happening, etc. I used to do this a lot when I was in my inter studies (and don’t do it as often now– which is bad) and I was doing notably better than all my peers.

Here are a few things that you could use while learning:

• Recall the concept after a few hours, a day, a few days, etc. Exact intervals depend on you and the topic you’re learning; use your best judgement.
• When you recall, talk to yourself in such a way that you were explaining this to a 5-year old; use simple words (adpoted this idea from Richard Feynman).
• Revisit topics that you’re not clear about and spend time understanding and thinking closely.
• Create a virtual system (or goals) where you give yourself credit for thinking about any concept deeply.

Related blog post here.

The present learning system endorses learning quickly far too often than learning deeply. We’re never asked to spend more time after solving the problem and think about it from different angles, understand what small changes in parameters would do, etc. This is essential.

Hypothesis, gonna work by this. “If you wanna do ground breaking work, learning few concepts deeply is much better than learning lots vaguely.” Many people miss this, I don’t want to.