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Learn How To Learn Part 1

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29 views3 pages

Learn How To Learn Part 1

Uploaded by

futbolozan55
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Sunday, April 16, 2023 11:09 AM

LEARN HOW TO LEARN


Introduction
-Researchers have found that we have two fundamentally different modes of thinking.
The Focused and the Diffuse modes.
-We're familiar with focusing. It's when you concentrate intently on something you're trying to
learn or to understand. But we're not so familiar with diffuse thinking. Turns out that this more
relaxed thinking style is related to a set of neural resting states.
-In diffuse mode thinking, you can look at things broadly from a very different, big-picture
perspective.You can make new neural connections traveling along new pathways. You can't
focus in as tightly as you often need to, to finalize any kind of problem solving. Or understand the
finest aspects of a concept. But you can at least get to the initial place you need to be in to home
in on a solution.
-You can't be in both thinking modes at the same time.
-Dalí used to have an interesting technique to help him come up with his fantastically creative
Surrealist paintings. He'd relax in a chair and let his mind go free, often still vaguely thinking
about what he had previously been focusing on. He'd have a key in his hand, dangling it just
above the floor, and as he would slip into his dreams falling asleep, the key would fall from his
hands and the clatter would wake him up, just in time so he could gather up those diffusemode
connections and ideas in his mind, and off he'd go back into the focus mode bringing with him
the new connections he'd made while in the diffuse mode.
-When you're learning something new, especially something that's a little more difficult, your
mind needs to be able to go back and forth between the two different learning modes.
-Metaphors provide powerful techniques for learning.
-Learning something difficult takes time.

Procrastination
-Everybody has some issues with procrastination. Because if you're working on something, it
means you're not working, on a lot of other things.
-When you look at something that you really rather not do, it seems that you activate the areas of
your brain associated with pain. Your brain, naturally enough, looks for a way to stop that
negative stimulation by switching your attention to something else. But here's the
trick. Researchers discovered that not long after people might start actually working out what
they didn't like, that neurodiscomfort disappeared. First, you observe, and get a cue
about something that causes a tiny bit of unease. You don't like it, so to make the sensation
go away you turn your attention from whatever caused that unease.You turn toward something
more pleasant. The result, you feel happier, temporarily.
-Can try to use ''The Pomodoro Technique''.All you need to do, is set a timer to 25 minutes, turn off
all interruptions, and then focus. That's it! Most anybody can focus for 25 minutes. The only last
important thing is to give yourself a little reward when you're done. A few minutes of web surfing,
a cup of coffee, or a bite of chocolate, even just stretching or chatting mindlessly, allowing your
brain to enjoyably change its focus for a while.

Practice Makes Permanent


-Neurons become linked together through repeated use. The more abstract something is, the
more important it is to practice in order to bring those ideas into reality for you. Even if the ideas
you're dealing with are abstract, the neural thought patterns you are creating are real and
concrete. At least they are if you build and strengthen them through practice.
-When you first begin to understand something, for example, how to solve a problem, the neural
pattern from is there, but very weak. When you solve the problem again fresh from the start,
without looking at the solution, you begin deepening that neural pattern.
-When you're learning, what you want to do is study something. Study it hard by focusing

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-When you're learning, what you want to do is study something. Study it hard by focusing
intently. Then take a break or at least change your focus to something different for a
while. During this time of seeming relaxation, your brain's diffuse mode has a chance to work
away in the background and help you out with your conceptual understanding.If you don't do this,
if instead you learn by cramming, your knowledge base wil be built on poor foundation.

Memory(!)
-The two types of memory are related;working memory and long term memory.
-Working memory is the part of memory that has to do with what you're immediately and
consciously processing in your mind. Your working memeory is centered out of the prefrontal
cortex. Researchers used to think that our working memory could hold around seven items or
chunks, but now it's widely believed that the working memory holds only about four chunks of
information.We tend to automatically group memory items into chunks so it seems our working
memory is bigger than it actually is. Although your working memory is like a blackboard, it's not a
very good blackboard. You often need to keep repeating what you're trying to work with so it
stays in your working memory. For example, you'll sometimes repeat a phone number to yourself
until you have a chance to write it down. Repetitions needed so that your metabolic vampires
that is natural dissipating processes don't suck those memories away. You may find yourself
shutting your eyes to keep any other items from intruding into the limited slots of your working
memory as you concentrate. So, we know that short-term memory is something like an inefficient
mental blackboard.
-Long term memory is like a storage warehouse, and just like a warehouse, it's distributed over a
big area. Different kinds of long-term memories are stored in different regions of the
brain. Research has shown that when you first try to put an item of information in long-term
memory, you need to revisit it at least a few times to increase the chances that you'll be able to
find it later when you might need it. The long-term memory storage warehouse is immense, it's
got room for billions of items. In fact there can be so many items they can bury each other. So it
can be difficult for you to find the information you need unless you practice and repeat at least a
few times. Long-term memory is important because it's where you store fundamental concepts
and techniques that are often involved in whatever you're learning about.
-When you encounter something new, you often use your working memory to handle it. If you
want to move that information into your long-term memory, it often takes time and practice. To
help with this process, use a technique called spaced repetition. This technique involves
repeating what you're trying to retain, but what you want to do is a space this repetition
out. Repeating a new vocabulary word or a problem solving technique for example over a
number of days. Extending your practice over several days does make a difference. Research
has shown that if you try to glue things into your memory by repeating something 20 times in one
evening for example, it won't stick nearly as well as if you practice it the same number of times
over several days. This is like building the brick wall we saw earlier, if you don't leave time for the
mortar to dry, that is time for the synaptic connections to form and strengthen, you won't have a
very good structure.

Sleep
-Being awake creates toxic products in your brain.Turns out that when you sleep, your brain cells
shrink. This causes an increase in the space between your brain cells. It's like unblocking a
stream. Fluid can flow past these cells and wash the toxins out. So, sleep which can sometimes
seem like such a waste of time is actually your brain's way of keeping itself clean and healthy.
-Taking a test without getting enough sleep means you're operating with a brain that got little
metabolic toxins floating around in it, poisons, and make it so you can't think very clearly. It's kind
of like trying to drive a car that's got sugar in its gas tank, doesn't work too well. In fact, getting
too little sleep doesn't just make you do worse on tests. Too little sleep over too long of a time
can also be associated with all sorts of nasty conditions including headaches, depression, heart
disease, diabetes and just plain dying earlier.
-It seems that during sleep, your brain tidies up ideas and concepts you're thinking about and
learning. It erases the less important parts of memories and simultaneously strengthens areas
that you need or want to remember. During sleep, your brain also rehearses some of the tougher
parts of whatever you're trying to learn, going over and over neural patterns to deepen and
strengthen them.

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strengthen them.
-Sleep has also been shown to make a remarkable difference in your ability to figure out difficult
problems and to understand what you're trying to learn. It's as if the complete deactivation of the
conscious you in the prefrontal cortex at the forefront of your brain helps other areas of your
brain start talking more easily to one another allowing them to put together the neural solution to
your learning task while you're sleeping. Of course, you must also plant the seed for your diffuse
mode by first doing focused mode work.
-If you're going over what you're learning right before you take a nap or going to sleep for the
evening, you have an increased chance of dreaming about it. If you go even further and set it in
mind that you want to dream about the material it seems to improve your chances of dreaming
about it, still further. Dreaming about what you're studying can substantially enhance your ability
to understand.

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