
Ask HN: How to learn new things better? - kahrkunne
So in the spirit of new year&#x27;s resolutions I&#x27;m planning to learn some new things this year; specifically, I want to to draw, and I want to at least get started learning Japanese. I&#x27;d also like to keep improving my skill at mahjong, which I picked up last year, and keep on learning tech-related things.<p>However, I find it pretty difficult to pick up new things. Learning to draw especially is pretty overwhelming for me; I have no idea how to start, as someone with no skill or experience in drawing whatsoever. Learning a language is also pretty intimidating, and it doesn&#x27;t help that I find the usual way of learning languages (grinding flash cards) to be distinctly awful (not to mention I&#x27;m terrible at it).<p>As HN seems like a community where people love to learn new things, how do you guys go about things like these?
======
Asdfbla
Maybe just throwing it out there as an additional resource: Coursera has a
"learning how to learn" course, which includes lots of references about the
theory of learning but many hands-on tips too. It's not too time consuming and
doesn't cost anything, so probably can't hurt to look at it. I liked it and
try to apply some of the ideas when learning.

[https://www.coursera.org/learn/learning-how-to-
learn/](https://www.coursera.org/learn/learning-how-to-learn/)

~~~
amelius
Can somebody who has finished academic education still learn from this course?

~~~
yasserkaddour
Yes, absolutely, I took it this year and it helps me a lot. There is also the
book "A mind for number"[1] by Barbara Oakley the course author with a little
more content if you prefer.

[1] [https://www.amazon.com/Mind-Numbers-Science-Flunked-
Algebra-...](https://www.amazon.com/Mind-Numbers-Science-Flunked-Algebra-
ebook/dp/B00G3L19ZU)

------
gargarplex
I enjoyed duolingo ([https://www.duolingo.com](https://www.duolingo.com)) for
learning Swedish. I liked the game mechanics, honestly. Here's why:

* Positive reinforcement: cheerful noises and visual progress once I completed a section.

* Negative reinforcement: if I didn't practice at all that day, I would get a notification at 11pm. If I ignored for a while, they were super passive aggressive, saying things like "These don't seem to be working. We'll stop sending them". I felt guilty and would start agin.

* I wanted to keep my daily streak going. It made me feel like Jerry Seinfeld with his "write a joke a day; put an X on the calendar" technique.

* I liked the concepts of experience (exp) and levels; it let me feel like I was making concrete progress, even if I was totally incompetent. I indulged my gamer side while still being productive!

* duolingo works just as well on browser as mobile

* Training sessions were short enough that if I only had a few minutes of downtime, as long as I had my phone on me, I could actually be productive. This made subway rides that much better.

* duoolingo offers a practice mode where I could work specifically on my speed if I had longer chunks of time and wanted to dive deeper.

And today, I can totally speak intelligible Swedish [1]. It worked.

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OxoXe5FDIkA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OxoXe5FDIkA)
– some phrases are off (I should've said "hur man sköter marknadsföring
själv") and pronunciation is off.

~~~
nothrabannosir
It's personal, but Duolingo has gone a bit south for me. They are
(understandably) focusing on getting users to pay. It just hit me in an
unfortunate way: Duolingo is all about "streaks". After a fifteen day streak,
I was greeted with "You broke your streak! Buy it back for $3.50." I hadn't
broken it, I remembered the exact lesson I did, 100%. Sent them an e-mail; no
reply. A week later, I'm talking to my sister, exact same thing happened to
her 180 day streak... Another e-mail, again no reply.

All in all, a petty detail, of course. It was the lack of response to support
e-mail that got me, not so much the situation itself.

Used to be a fan, but that wasn't a great moment. :(

~~~
lacampbell
Weird how they went down the path of charging money for the 'game' parts, as
opposed to the actual materials parts. I'd gladly fork over $50-100 for a
mandarin duolingo course with an option for traditional characters. I wonder
if these volunteers making courses realise that they can make actual money off
of high quality recordings of HSK vocab.

------
welanes
So, I've spent the last 7 days working on a new feature to help people set and
work towards goals.

The concept goal: Learning Japanese! (I've been 'learning' for 3 years now).

Here's a screenshot:
[https://i.imgur.com/afAW49V.png](https://i.imgur.com/afAW49V.png).

Basically it's a moodboard that combines a timer, todos, insights, notes,
images and links.

'How does that help me learn new things better' you ask?

The challenge with goals - as I see it - is keeping the path from the you of
today to the aspirational you (the one that speaks Japanese) clear. January
kicks off, a whole bunch of _life_ gets in the way and when you finally get
time to focus that path has become a nebulous mess.

The idea with Goals is to be able to open the app and immediately know:

1\. What have I achieved so far: insights on hours spent, tasks completed and
how close you are to your goal.

2\. What do I have to do next: this is your "how". Tasks, links, audio files,
notes.

3\. Why am I doing this, again? images, media, notes.

The 'Why' doesn't really fit into most methods of learning but I think
forgetting this is the biggest point of failure.

I'm going to grab a coffee and get this shipped. I'll post it to Show HN
tomorrow and you can see if it's for you.

~~~
kahrkunne
I'll be sure to lurk HN tomorrow for it!

Also pleasantly surprised to see Kashiwa Daisuke mentioned in that screenshot

~~~
welanes
You're a fan? April #02 is beyond perfect.

PS: slightly behind on dev. Be sure to lurk tomorrow too, just in case ;)

------
adpoe
I've decided to learn many, many things over the years: programming languages,
human languages, musical instruments, drawing/painting/art, sports, math,
chess, etc...

What it comes down to is spending time getting your hands dirty making things
(or getting real practice), even if your output sucks for a long time. (And it
will.)

Favorite personal example: One day, when I was around 19, I decided that I
wanted to be an artist. I hadn't seriously drawn anything since I was about
10. My current skills were atrocious, but I started drawing every single day,
anyway, undeterred.

Of course, at first I was awful. But I copied old master paintings, drew
pictures of famous sculptures, etc.; all of my free-time, I spent drawing. And
slowly, but surely, I got better at it. I did this every day for probably
about 3 years or so, and by the end of it, I was very accomplished. But it was
a constant effort that took __years __. I probably did over 1,000 drawings,
hundreds of paintings, and so on. And about 90% of them were awful. But the
good stuff, it was really really good. I guess that 's the price sometimes.
Nobody is a genius all the time. Even Michelangelo, or Picasso.

The thing is, if you find something you enjoy, it doesn't feel like work or
drudgery. (Even though drudgery is the only way to get better.) Instead, it's
an activity that you _want_ to spend time on, and when you do--time passes so
quickly you don't know where it went. It's like living life on fast forward.
(Maybe that feeling's the real-life inspiration for the old trope of the
training montage. A deep kernel of truth beneath the fantasy, after all?)

~~~
infinityplus1
So,are you working as an artist now?

~~~
adpoe
I write software as career, but I still do art as a hobby. I actually tried
making a career out of art when I was younger, but it's very very hard to make
ends meet, when that's your main source of income.

It's an industry with only a handful of big winners and stars who can make it
a fulltime job (at least during their lifetime). And I wasn't quite good
enough to be one of them =)

It is really fun and satisfying to make art though, and I'd recommend it to
anyone who wants to explore that aspect of their creativity. I feel like I
gained a lot in life, qualitatively, from my time focusing on art. 'Hackers
and Painters', right? '

------
sp3n
I have been learning to draw for the past 2 months or so. I want to get into
digital painting but I am still learning the fundamentals with a pencil +
paper.

A few things that have helped me so far:

\- Setting aside at least 1 hour a day to draw. This one is the most
important.

\- Drawing from the Right Side of the Brain by Betty Edwards

\- Fun with a pencil by Andrew Loomis

\- Ctrl+Paint: [http://www.ctrlpaint.com/](http://www.ctrlpaint.com/)
especially the Traditional Drawing, Composition, Perspective and Anatomy
sections.

\- Sycra's YouTube channel:
[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL0373FA2B3CD4C899](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL0373FA2B3CD4C899)

~~~
aerique
For the OP if she happens to have a Wii U I want add Art Academy: Atelier to
that list. I'm working through that now and it's keeping me engaged.

------
kayman
Block out your calendar to learn a specific task.

Don't overthink. Just do it.

And after a few months of trying and reading the process will get better
automatically.

Key is to just start and be regular.

~~~
teach
Agreed. Unless you're doing barbell squats it's far more important in my
experience to just _get started_.

Waiting to start until you have the perfect equipment or technique or form or
strategy raises the starting friction and prevents me from doing a great many
things I should be doing.

------
CuriouslyC
Check out Dr. Robert Bjork's page on desirable difficulties
([https://bjorklab.psych.ucla.edu/research/](https://bjorklab.psych.ucla.edu/research/)).

Additionally, you need to write about whatever you're learning. Essays,
reviews, whatever strikes your fancy. Learning really happens when you try to
use the information.

~~~
kahrkunne
I'll try writing about what I'm learning, I really like the sound of that!
Another one of my new year's resolutions was to start writing things anyways -
I feel like I frequently write entire essays in my head, but I never put them
to paper.

------
rm_-rf_slash
I learned Chinese at my best pace by watching Chinese TV streams while
practicing calligraphy over and over, as well as studying vocabulary and
grammar with the streams of Chinese TV in the background.

Chinese TV sucks. I paid no attention to the ctl+c-ctl+v plots. However it did
help me learn tonality in a way that the butchered American classmate
pronunciations could never do. Subtitles also helped with learning characters.

I have found that learning works best with as much immersion as possible. It
is never as casual as a subway commute crossword puzzle.

------
simonhughes22
Spaced repetition is very effective, although again it does require flash
cards, but optimizes (i.e. minimizes) the frequency at which you have to
review them based on how you are learning.

~~~
teach
Anki[0] is an excellent, free spaced-repetition app if making paper flash
cards isn't your style.

[0] [http://ankisrs.net/](http://ankisrs.net/)

~~~
simonhughes22
Yes, I use that a lot. Mmenosyne is also good.

------
Broken_Hippo
On learning to draw:

A bit of background: I drew before I could write, started oil painting when I
was 7 or 8. I'm 38 now, and usually work with pen and watercolors.

The first thing I suggest you do is check out some lessons. There are a lot
of, "how to draw" for children (and adults) that are really useful -
especially for people and animals. I still use reference photos and look up
techniques from time to time, actually. I also suggest watching Bob Ross. I
might not paint landscapes, but his technique is definitely good - you'll
likely pick a bit up even if you don't paint.

I'd also suggest learning about color theory, perspective, and eventually how
light sources affect the work - some of these can be forgotten if you do more
abstract stuff. Remember, part of drawing is basically training your fine
motor skills and muscles to do things: This all gets better with time, and why
folks suggest sketching daily. This is the same with painting.

Some folks can paint but can't draw as well: I fully suggest trying some
painting along with the sketching. You might find that you like doing abstract
art, focusing more on texture, use of space, and colors than actual form too.
(You can draw just as abstractly, and doing so is good line and texture
practice).

And random advice: Switching from pencil to ink isn't as scary as it seems. It
helps to break things up into smaller pieces. Sometimes it helps to change a
color photo to black and white.

And I'm out of stuff from the tope of my head.

------
wturner
What works for me is to integrate the thing I want to learn into my lifestyle
and do it everyday. If I have a day where I am inspired or particularly
creative I just funnel that energy into the topic. Along the way I give myself
small project goals that emerge from exploring the activity.

The ideal scenario is to become immersed so the topic becomes "part of you".

I also give myself a two year gestation period of incremental learning to see
results and build muscle memory. I did this with programming and once you do
it with one topic, you will build the confidence that it will come to fruition
with anything else you decide to do.

I'm not a fan of peddling the idea that anything worth learning can be learned
"fast". It may work for some people, but I think they are the minority. it's
been my experience there's usually a fair amount of self deception involved in
"fast" learning....or "fast" anything for that matter. This works for some
people - I'm not one of them.

If you want to learn a new language then walk around with headphones listening
to people speak it. When you talk to people in English in your head ask
yourself how to say the same thing in the alternate language. etc....

~~~
g00gler
This. I had programmed on and off for awhile, never anything big, until I
started doing it everyday. Now it's part of who I am and the way I think,
kinda crazy.

------
JoshTriplett
Even if you're a self-taught person, you don't have to learn everything that
way, rather than (for instance) taking a class or otherwise going through a
course of study. Not necessarily a university class; check out your local
community center, or seek out a local artist that also teaches on the side.

------
medell
The first time I learned a new language I didn't use these tools and I failed
miserably. Looking back, I'm thinking "Why did I use 300 hours and spend $X of
cash?" without taking the time to learn about learning.

This is especially true with languages, unless you can be fully immersed, but
I still recommend it. Look into metacognition and spaced repetition. You'll
need a system that works for you but look for techniques backed by research.

Specifically, Fluent Forever is a fantastic book on learning how to learn
languages and Scott Young's blog mentioned is great. I second the art
recommendation "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain". Good luck!

------
akbar23
Check out Beyond Brilliance-a book that was just released out of UC Berkeley
designed to teach you how to learn. www.beyondbrilliance.org

------
xiaoma
Wow! I feel like we're kindred spirits! Drawing on the left side of the brain
is an incredible book that did it for me. I've been writing about language
learning all over for years, but this interview with Gabriel Wyner is a great
spot to start: [http://lingsprout.com/en/experts/gabriel-wyner-making-
your-o...](http://lingsprout.com/en/experts/gabriel-wyner-making-your-own-
effective-language-learning-resources)

He was in the process of studying Japanese at the time of the interview and
had some specific comments about it vs the several languages he's learned
before.

~~~
rcdexta
You mean Drawing on the right side of the brain?
[http://drawright.com/](http://drawright.com/)

I was wondering if there was another school of thought that I missed out
completely till now! :)

~~~
xiaoma
Yeah, that's the one. Guess all the upside drawing confused my left and right
:D

------
wasyl
From my experience it's amazing to spend at least 20 minutes every (I mean
every) single day on the thing you're learning. Whether it's playing an
instrument or learning language, there are days when you seem to not have time
for that - but 20 minutes is easily found, and it really, really, really
helps. I think I've seen some research regarding that, but I might be
remembering wrong. What I know for sure is that it both helped me learn more
efficiently, but also helped me through weeks of lesser motivation

~~~
yhylord
Is it still realistic when you want to start multiple things at once? Or
should you really go one by one?

------
throwaway_proc
I want to strongly recommend this book on procrastination:
[https://www.amazon.com/Procrastinators-Digest-Concise-
Solvin...](https://www.amazon.com/Procrastinators-Digest-Concise-Solving-
Procrastination/dp/1453528598/)

I started studying (math) at university this fall for the first time in my
life. I'm 32 years old. I have extreme problems to adjust myself to the
workload that is required. The other freshmen struggle as well, but I have
clearly more problems.

The problems arise most noticably when I'm not subverted to direct peer
pressure, that is, when I'm not sitting in university to do homework with my
group partners. As the workload is (or seems) so extreme, at least for us
freshmen, I just didn't have time to do anything else than sit in uni to do
homework, often until 8 or 10 pm or even into the night when there was a
deadline the next morning.

What I should have done differently so far is prioritizing the learning of
material over just trying to get stuff done inefficiently. I realise that
these inefficiencies and getting rid of them are a normal part of growing up
academically.

The procrastination problem starts to show up most visibly in my spare time,
where I have the time but just cannot bring myself to learn the material. This
is where the book really helps. I admit, I just finished it and it will take
some time to show results. The thing is, I knew for years (which I have wasted
partially) that gaming, reddit, HN, twitch.tv, etc. are a strong negative
influence for me. The book helped me realise just how bad my procrastination
problem really is and it already helped me be more productive in situations
where otherwise I just couldn't bring myself to work on important stuff due to
distractions.

~~~
afarrell
Some tools you might find useful: [https://freedom.to](https://freedom.to)
[https://selfcontrolapp.com/](https://selfcontrolapp.com/)

------
tudorw
You could try this technique; MAP training: combining meditation and aerobic
exercise reduces depression and rumination while enhancing synchronized brain
activity

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4872427/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4872427/)

------
daniel-levin
I would advise you to be as experimental as possible, and see what works for
you. Each person learns things in their own way. Just picking a particular
path (such as using Duolingo, as others have suggested) may work. It may not.
I have found that this rings especially true in technical subjects.

My personal suggestions are Duolingo, and "Drawing on the Right Side of the
Brain" by Betty Edwards. I went from stick men to badly-proportioned but
otherwise lifelike still-lifes in a few hours with this book. I have a very
strong audio memory so Duolingo works well for me. The most important aspect
to getting not-terrible at anything is deliberate practice [1]. Drills, and
boring exercises work very well for me.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Practice_(learning_method)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Practice_\(learning_method\))

------
pravenj
My methods are divided into 2 -- binge and short bursts. In both I tend to use
open ended questioning, perspectives and reflections as ways of enhancing the
learnings.

Binge is method I use to learn a lot about a topic in the shortest period
possible. I start a binge with either trying to understand more about a topic
or to try an see whether a hunch I have in regard to the topic is well worth
following.

Short burst is a method I use to learn something more deeply and more over a
longer term. In this I put in 5-10 minutes 3-4 times a day maybe for a period
of about 2-3 weeks. Then rest and reflect for a couple of weeks and then go
through the cycle again.

I have written a post about it here : [http://prjoshi.com.np/2017/01/02/on-
learning/](http://prjoshi.com.np/2017/01/02/on-learning/)

Hope it helps.

------
samuell
While I'm myself interested in learning more about this topic (the Coursera
course mentioned here sounds interesting), I found this book really really
interesting:

"So Good they Can't Ignore you", by Cal Newport

[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13525945-so-good-they-
ca...](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13525945-so-good-they-can-t-ignore-
you)

It might not go into so much detail on learning (although it touches on the
topic a bit), but it puts straight same basic "laws of nature", as I see it,
about what really makes you grow: Deliberate practice, and absolutely not the
modern phrase "follow your passion".

I like to connect that to the old wisdom of Solomon, in the book of proverbs
in the Bible:

"All hard work brings a profit,

but mere talk leads only to poverty."

(Prov 14:23)

------
smcl
For your language learning once you get to the point of "I can write sentences
reasonably well and can fill most gaps using a dictionary" I'd recommend
keeping a little blog or diary and writing to it every other day. It would be
even better if you had a Japanese friend who could do a little
spelling/grammar checking for you. I've been doing this for a while over
email/text with Czech, but have started putting it on a blog - im only three
posts in but it's already very satisfying to look back at what I've got. And
they can be SUPER mundane and simple too, mine look like they could be written
by a child (without the alcohol) -
[http://czech.mclemon.io](http://czech.mclemon.io)

------
biddlybobbily
Some tips from me: -Free language apps or a rosetta stone package for
Japanese, children's workbooks are actually great, eg. from 'gifts of the
orient' website \- Drawing: find images you like on deviantart or google
images and sketch them in your own style Mahjong: possibly do what my partner
did with chess; play against the computer, get books on techniques, follow the
experts.

The most important thing with voluntary learning is that it stays voluntary-
keep the passion! If you force yourself to study at a certain time and one day
fail to do so, you'll beat yourself up and lose the will to learn. You're
doing this for yourself, so do it with joy. Good luck!

------
melling
If you want to learn a language, find a cheap immersion school in a country
and spend 3 months there. Guatemala is great for Spanish. I hear Montreal is
good for French.

Drawing... well, I'm not having much luck with that. Did 6 months of drawing 1
hour a day last year. Think I got a little better. Reddit has a couple of
useful groups to follow:

[https://www.reddit.com/r/learntodraw/](https://www.reddit.com/r/learntodraw/)

[https://www.reddit.com/r/ArtFundamentals/](https://www.reddit.com/r/ArtFundamentals/)

------
imh
Practice and persistence. It's as simple as that. You won't learn much unless
you make time for it. Don't focus too much on learning perfectly the right
way, just get started and keep at it.

------
buzzybee
Find a cyclical, ritualized behavior that you can engage in as a way to ramp
up towards your main task of the day. For example, first you clean your tools,
then you do a warmup, and then you are prepared for something high intensity.
You can learn a lot of things by engaging persistently in the warmup activity,
and as you feel able, you can "break through" to deeper levels. Don't jump
around to different intensity levels or try to force calendar time on them;
smoothly build up and then break.

This is how I'm trying to make it work, at least.

------
egypturnash
With any new skill you need to be willing to sink a lot of time into it. And
you need to be fine with being _absolutely terrible_ at it in the beginning.

I usually tell people who want to learn to draw to go to
[http://johnkcurriculum.blogspot.com/2009/12/preston-blair-
le...](http://johnkcurriculum.blogspot.com/2009/12/preston-blair-lessons-
fundamentals-of.html), get the Preston Blair book, and start doing these
exercises by master animator John K (creator of 'Ren & Stimpy'). You will get
a lot better, a lot faster. These exercises focus on simple cartoon characters
who wear a lot of their construction on the outside; once you can draw cartoon
characters, you can keep drawing more of them if that's your thing, or you can
build on top of that and start learning anatomy and drawing more complicated
characters. (Or do both.)

There's other well-regarded drawing courses on the internet and someday I
should probably pick a new one to send noobs to, what with John K kind of
being an asshole - but I learnt a hell of a lot when I worked under him, and
he is really good at teaching this stuff.

Most of what I know about drawing more complicated figures came from a
combination of Bridgeman's "Constructive Anatomy" and Loomis' "Figure Drawing
for All It's Worth", and a life drawing teacher who hewed very closely to Glen
Vilppu's drawing manual. If you can fit some life drawing classes into your
life then TAKE them, you will learn a ton.

Also: Make a space in your life to do this. I ride the bus a lot, and before
the advent of smartphones, I'd have little to do to amuse myself besides stare
out of the window, read a book, or pull my sketchbook out and draw. Maybe draw
some idea floating around my head, maybe draw something I glimpsed out the bus
window, maybe something based on my fellow passengers, maybe just some cubes,
or the hand I wasn't drawing with. I got a lot of practice in without feeling
like I was making myself "practice". Whatever you may be learning, if you
regularly drop yourself into a time and place with nothing much to do besides
the thing you wanna learn, then you'll do it more often.

Don't blow several hundred bucks on a ton of paints, or on pro software and a
Wacom tablet. Just start with a few hardback sketchbooks and some pens and
pencils. Oh, and not mechanical pencils. Just grab like a pack of Ticonderoga
2.5Bs, they're cheap and pretty good. And try holding them so that the _side_
of the point addresses the paper for a lot of the beginning of your drawing;
this will do several things for you:

* it will train you to keep your wrist fairly steady, and to draw more with your entire arm; keeping your wrist straight and steady will help keep the Carpal Tunnel Fairy away. * it will make your initial lines light, and prone to fade away as your hand brushes the paper; this keeps you from bearing down to gouge an impossible-to-erase line in the paper, and gives you more room to make mistakes before having a dark, illegible mess of lines you can't draw over.

Don't get lost in trying to save a drawing, either. Paper's cheap, turn the
page and try the same subject again, or a new one.

When you make a picture you like, hang it over your drawing board, turn it
into your computer's backdrop, and keep trying to draw something better than
it. You may find yourself hating it because you start seeing all the mistakes.
That's great - go draw something new that doesn't make those! (This may take
many tries, some mistakes are harder to stop making than others.)

Don't worry about "your style". If someone points out a mistake in your
drawing and you find yourself wanting to say "but that's my style!", then you
are just covering up your weaknesses unless you can actually sit down and bust
out a version of the drawing that Does It Right. When you can do that you can
legitimately say "dis mah style". Steal stylizations from artists you love
(you're looking at other people's art, right? A lot?), make your own based on
reality.

You will find a lot of people declaring "rules" of drawing. Always do this,
never do that. The truth of the matter (IMHO) is that _all rules of art are
actually just warnings:_ "never do this" really means "if you do this without
thinking about what you're doing it'll probably turn out badly". Know the
rules, know which ones you're breaking, and break the _fuck_ out of them while
staying well within the boundaries of the other rules you know.

(I spent a decade in the LA animation scene, then burnt out and draw comics
now. If you wanna look at my work to decide if I'm someone who you should
listen to in this, it's all at
[http://egypt.urnash.com](http://egypt.urnash.com))

------
snailletters
I am currently learning Japanese, I started only a month or so ago. I have
found two amazing resources (made by the same people,) that I'm sure will be
of a great help to get you started with Japanese. They have a text book called
TextFugu, that not only teaches you Japanese, but they walk you through the
hard parts of getting started and essentially teach you to motivate yourself
to learn. They also have a spaced repetition online program (similar to Anki,)
called WaniKani that helps you learn Kanji.

~~~
DavideNL
Must check out in my opinion: "Human Japanese" (it starts at 0) :
[http://www.humanjapanese.com/home](http://www.humanjapanese.com/home)

------
hoodoof
Took me many, many years to "learn how to learn".

The key thing to understand is that when learning something new, you will
likely be pretty bad at it for a long time until you have practised and
researched it ALOT. Then you will find you have gained some expertise.

When you anticipate this, I think you are much less likely to give up on the
basis of "I'm no good at this".

Anyone can become competent at pretty much anything, given effort and
practice.

AND IMPORTANTLY, by "practice" I mean doing it for real, not doing training
exercises.

------
JesseAldridge
I just read the audiobook version of this: [https://www.amazon.com/Make-Stick-
Science-Successful-Learnin...](https://www.amazon.com/Make-Stick-Science-
Successful-Learning/dp/0674729013/)

It's pretty good.

The main idea is that learning is supposed to feel hard. That sense of
frustration and confusion is what building new neural connections feels like.

------
vskarine
Tim Ferriss wrote a book on how to learn things fast. It's called 4 Hour Chef:
[https://www.amazon.com/4-Hour-Chef-Cooking-Learning-
Anything...](https://www.amazon.com/4-Hour-Chef-Cooking-Learning-
Anything/dp/0547884591) He gives a lot of tips but it's up to you to test them
out and see what works for you.

~~~
mrleinad
Here's a cheatsheet so you don't need to read the whole book
[http://boingboing.net/2012/11/21/timothy-ferriss-cheat-
sheet...](http://boingboing.net/2012/11/21/timothy-ferriss-cheat-sheets.html)

------
garysieling
I find learning more motivating within the context of a project, although that
is more relevant to drawing or tech knowledge.

Also, I built a search engine for lectures, which has a lot of talks from tech
conferences, which I find helpful for learning about software development
topics - [https://www.findlectures.com](https://www.findlectures.com)

~~~
jdotjdot
Thanks for sharing! I really enjoyed looking around the site. What do you use
under the hood for searching and faceting, Solr?

~~~
garysieling
Yeah, solr- the UI is custom. The real work is getting metadata that gives
good signals for quality :)

------
colearn
Find someone to learn with you. It is much easier when you are learning with
someone. You are much less likely to loose motivation and can focus. If you
can not find someone in your friends then you can use
[https://colearn.xyz](https://colearn.xyz) to find someone to learn with you.

------
Clubber
I don't have a reference but when I was learning iPhone development back in
2009, I read somewhere that it's best to learn things in the morning (when you
wake up) because your mind is best at absorbing new things. I tried it out and
it seemed to improve the pace I was retaining things.

------
cha-cho
Kathy Sierra gave an informative talk on the topic of learning at the 2015
O'Reilly Fluent conference. It's entitled "Making Badass Developers".

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FKTxC9pl-
WM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FKTxC9pl-WM)

------
gravypod
I've not done this, but intend to, if you want to learn Japanese I've had many
people recommend this to get started:
[http://store.steampowered.com/app/438270/](http://store.steampowered.com/app/438270/)

~~~
xiaoma
You don't need an app to learn Hiragana. I studied Japanese in college and
started in a summer class.

Learning hiragana was a requirement _before_ starting day 1.

To be honest it only took a few hours and all we had to do with was a few
pages of photocopied writing pages with some mnemonics. Now you can just
download the equivalent, or even get a full guide with videos:
[https://www.tofugu.com/japanese/learn-
hiragana/](https://www.tofugu.com/japanese/learn-hiragana/)

Seriously, hiragana/katakana are one area where you don't need a hack. For
learning how to actually understand the language, then you'll need to buy
books/CDs/Podcast subscriptsions/classes/etc...

------
du_bing
I think you should feel that things are done frequently. So decompose big
things you want to do into little, viable things, and do one little thing a
time. So you can feel that you are successful every time, it's great, then
it's more likely that you can continue.

------
pps
I was learning with his method, works perfectly
[https://www.scotthyoung.com/blog/myprojects/portrait-
challen...](https://www.scotthyoung.com/blog/myprojects/portrait-challenge/)

~~~
truth_sentinell
What have you learned with it so far?

~~~
pps
How to draw portraits! From a drawing like 7yo to drawing in similar way to
his last work. In less than a month. It is really easy. Seriously. It's all
about drawing what really is instead of drawing from your imagination. Because
normally we are looking at things and still seeing our mental representations
not the real objects. This book is most important part (unfortunately all this
right/left brain is pseudoscientific, but all other parts are very useful), I
didn't do his other exercises, because I was already good with that and have
other problems in which I needed to focus. I'm now using his methods (focus
and persistence, deliberate practice) and learning to play a guitar. Again,
great improvements in no time.

------
itamarst
"Design for how People Learn" is pretty good book on helping people learn.

------
Zelmor
Find a teacher (drawing and japanese), invest time and effort, stick to it.
These seem to work for me for most things.

------
adamnemecek
I've observed a couple of things about the way I learn and I think that these
are pretty general

a.) Print is a lot better than digital.

b.) You shouldn't read books linearly. I generally jump around a lot and read
a particular book several times. The first pass might take just an hour or
two, I generally try to understand the structure of the book, create a
scaffolding of sorts, I might get 15%. During the second pass I might try to
get the next 30%. I should have a good idea of the concepts of the book, I
might not be able to solve all the problems. In the next pass, get the next
30%. The fourth pass is optional if you really need to understand 100%. The
best part is that a lot of times, you don't actually have to do all the
passes, the first two might be enough.

The one thing I always hated about school is how you are forced to master each
chapter 100% before moving forward. Sometimes going forward actually helps you
understand previous chapters because it puts them in context.

c.) Highlighting helps me a bunch. Some people have the issue that they might
end up highlighting too much. I don't highlight when it's all new to me, but
only after I might have finished the chapter, I'll go back and think about
what's important to highlight. It feels like the process of selecting what's
important might be more important than the highlighting itself. But when you
come back to it later, the highlighting definitely helps. Writing some notes
with a pencil in the book is also good.

d.) More important than fully mastering all the material is making sure that
you aren't bored or frustrated. If you can't move forward with something, give
it some time, come back to it.

e.) Generally if I'm confused, doing a quick review pass from the very
beginning of the book tends to clear things up a lot.

f.) Doing a "compare and contrast" between things that seem similar (or even
if they don't) is usually a good way of strengthening some connections.

Btw, over the last couple of weeks, I've been trying to learn ML almost full-
time. In the process, I think I managed to figure out what are the best
resources for this and I'm in the process of setting up a website discussing
what I've found. I started working on this yesterday so it's not quite ready
yet. However, if you'd like to check out ML in 2017, I'm hoping to make the
process a lot less painful. You can sign up here if you'd like to get notified
when it's ready

[https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfnksZmz7oH9Vpjtxp1...](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfnksZmz7oH9Vpjtxp1phXLXx2sS4jArtozMiZ0pTKyfA6bgg/viewform)

~~~
rimantas
Regarding point b) there even is a book, aptly titled "How to Read a Book"
which pretty much explains the similar approach. Although it does recommend to
read linearly at first.

------
dualogy
> _However, I find it pretty difficult to pick up new things._

That's the whole idea of it, sonny.

> _Learning a language is also pretty intimidating_

If you're like most people, then the very experience of having learned your
very first language, your mother tongue, was probably "quite the struggle,
that you never experienced as quite-the-struggle, because you had no
preconceived notions as to what constitutes quite-the-struggle".

Doubtlessly everyone keeps at it that finds it somewhat gratifying. Question
then, when is it gratifying and when not? I posit it's gratifying not
primarily when you garner praise or grades from others but simply when you
realize you grasped things about it this week you didn't, or had no idea of,
just the previous week.

Just be a kid, poke holes in everything, bend it, try to break it, combine
everything with everything, laugh or marvel at what results.

Now languages and drawing are a bit different. What's the point of "learning
to draw" when you can't draw the most outrageously "you" way. Don't draw
"nicely", that should evolve over time. Draw what comes naturally to you. If
only random lines come to you at first, great, that's the first annoyance
that'll before long force you to figure out the trick to arriving at slightly-
less random figures. Go wild. Languages are slightly different as at the end
you want to comprehend and be comprehended. Maybe human languages are
somewhere in the middle of the spectrum from wild drawing and highly-
restricted formal grammars such as programming languages. If you keep
tinkering at these extreme-ends-of-the-spectrum, as always things more-in-the-
middle might fall into place a little more easily.

Where am I getting with all of this? Learning (anything) from first-principles
by falling-down-and-getting-up and trial-and-error and not-constantly-
assessing-your-current-proficiency is the long and hard way, but it's the
surefire way and the natural way. And for many, certainly in this crowd I'd
wager, the most gratifying one.

> _Learning to draw especially is pretty overwhelming for me; I have no idea
> how to start, as someone with no skill or experience in drawing whatsoever._

Well what would be the point of learning if it wasn't overwhelming, if you
already knew where to start and where to go from there, if you already had the
skill and experience. I truly do wonder now what your definition of "learning"
is ;D

I found whenever I invested much time in just enjoying in a deep, "almost
professional-fulltime-fan" way, the works of highly skilled creators you
respect and admire in a topic (painters/certain comic drawers, musicians when
it comes to learning instruments or composition, or for languages brilliant
authors of awesome works as well as perhaps poets/songsmiths) the repeated and
active and prolonged immersion in their work can set the stage properly and
"pre-seed your brain" in profound hard-to-explain-or-analyze ways. This very
period of active admiration irresistably leads parts of the brain on a
diversionary trail of "just how did they achieve all this brilliance" that'll
keep finding new leads and cues to then prompt you to purposely proceed with
in earnest.

Quite wordy, huh? I'm sure there's a 1000 handy "learning anything you want in
21 days" guides out there also. Shame I never felt the need to procure one, my
I could be a master painter and most proficient converser in a whole _host_ of
languages by now! Wouldn't that be impressive. But this never seemed like fun.
Wanna learn for fun and with fun, set small goals and even smaller
expectations, and allow as much time as possible. Maybe it's just me but "I'd
like to be a great painter (or French speaker) in 21 years" sounds like a much
more delightful endeavour than in-21-days (or weeks). Because if _that 's_ the
outset, chances are as a byproduct you'll already be "really quite decent,
better than you expected" after 21 weeks to months but more importantly, by
that time you'll no longer even worry about this, as keeping immersedly
spending much time with X, Y and Z became just part of who you are as-a-rule.

That's probably the most wordiest way I've ever said "Just Do It and Keep At
It". Well I've done my silly deed of the day, time to get back to my own
hackery now.

------
whyileft
I don't have much on learning in general but drawing has been a big chunk of
my life so I figured I'd just chime in on that.

Drawing is a giant world that means many different things. Being good at
drawing is also very subjective.

A fantastic example of that is the book "Drawing from the Right Side of the
Brain" which I see mentioned already. That book is an interesting read and I
did enjoy it myself, but I should caution that it teaches more about visually
tracing. Some people consider that an example of skilled drawing and if that
is what you are looking for then go for it.

From another angle some people consider skill at drawing to be how pleasing it
is to look at. This generally has more to do with the line work and shading
and color usage. You can draw a significantly anatomically inaccurate arm with
beautiful line work and styling and some people would consider that skilled
drawing.

Yet another would be to create something from the mind without a visual
reference. This has more to do with an understanding of mass and depth and
space than either of the two above. And to some people this is what they would
consider skilled drawing.

These are only three of the many, many possible goals of a drawing.

Why am I telling you this? Because to me the endeavor of learning to draw is
learning what you personally consider a good drawing. The physical world is
not made up of lines and smudges. When you draw you are continually making
those translations and decisions. That process of discovery is what will lead
to you become better at it.

In the end, there are only two reasons why you put a line in the wrong place.
Either you physically missed the correct spot with you pencil, or more likely,
because you haven't discovered where the right spot is yet.

~~~
Mark222
You seem to be knowledgeable in this topic, maybe you know any good books
about the other aspects of drawing you are talking about? "Drawing from the
Right Side of the Brain" is mentioned often, but other books less so.

Thank you

------
ObeyTheGuts
To draw nice quick just focus on fundamental - perspective, creating 3d
illusion on 2d, look up coil technique drawing on utube, it really makes even
ur stick figures look pro

