

Learning to Learn - jsonmez
http://simpleprogrammer.com/2012/09/23/learning-to-learn/

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_exec
Does anybody have any (other and more thorough) resources for 'learning how to
learn'? Perhaps book suggestions? One of my goals is to become an autodictact
/ polymath and I'm seeking way to make the process of acquiring new data /
skills / learning more time-efficient and more organized (and systematic).

Are there any kind of 'learning theories/strategies' out there? I'm not
seeking resources per se (I know about Khan academy, MIT OCW, 'bookportals' on
Tor etc), but rather some sort of systematic method similar to the one
described in the link but perhaps more detailed and (maybe)
anecdote-/experience-based.

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kriro
The Pragmatic Programmers have a book on learning called "Pragmatic Thinking
and Learning". I own it and would highly recommend it, one of the more
underrated books. It covers the Dreyfus learning model which was mentioned in
the article.

The examples and language tend to be programming related (for example one
chapter is titled "Debugging your Brain" iirc) because that's the intended
audience but I'd also recomend it for non-programmers.

Very good blend of theory (Dreyfus model, r-/l-mode) and practical advice on
how to improve your learning and generally use your brain better.

[http://pragprog.com/book/ahptl/pragmatic-thinking-and-
learni...](http://pragprog.com/book/ahptl/pragmatic-thinking-and-learning)

~~~
_exec
I actually do own a copy, thank you for reminding me to read it again. Very
useful strategies and the type of 'metaphors' used in the book (CS/IT-related)
made it easy to understand.

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hvass
Despite the fact that this was filtered through HN seeing a stock picture of a
key and then skimming quickly and seeing even more stock pictures turned me
off from reading the article. I thought it'd be interesting to point out.

~~~
jsonmez
Interesting. I usually add images to post to help break up the text and make
some mental connection between sections that I am talking about and a picture.

So Q. Is the problem that the images are stock images? Or is the issue that
there are images?

Wouldn't just a bunch of text and no images make it much harder to get through
the content?

Not arguing one way or the other, just curious on thoughts on this.

~~~
crisnoble
IMO, if the images don't aid the text, they are unnecessary. If people are
going to read an article that long, the pictures aren't going to help break up
the content. For me they were a bit distracting and actually caused some weird
line breaks (I actually stated thinking about creating a bookmarklet that
would zap unwanted DOM elements with a click).

Other examples of long blocks of text which people read include books,
articles on <http://alistapart.com> (okay they have one but it is classy and
fits with the site), and long comment threads on hacker news.

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onedev
I think this is spot on. I agree with many of the things in the article.
Especially the part about setting quantifiable goals. Too many times I find
myself not doing this and getting "lost" in the process of learning and then
kinda giving up from being overwhelmed.

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q-base
I totally agree, but what really sets this apart is not only the quantifiable
goals. The key, in my opinion, is to have a practical goal. If your goal is to
learn C# and be able to write it fluently, then that is kind of quantifiable.
But if you set out to learn C# to program a specific game/applikation etc.
then in my opinion, you would learn much more along the way.

~~~
cmrx64
I attribute that more to having direction. Sometimes when learning things one
simply meanders through a field, absorbing knowledge as they find it, and
figuring out how to use it.

When you have a concrete goal (I want X to happen), you can (usually!) figure
out what you need to learn in order to make X happen.

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wonderzombie
Apropos of learning new programming languages, part of the way I familiarize
myself with new programming languages (or technologies, as applicable) is by
maintaining a list of toy projects. These projects ought to be relatively
well-defined. Big bonus points for being able to scale upward in complexity;
some languages are more similar to others, and so it's less challenging to do
basic stuff.

Examples: IRC bot, todo app, text adventure, sudoku solver.

Beware of getting stuck approaching these problems in the same ways as you did
a previous language, though. :)

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crisnoble
What tools do you use to mindmap your learning plan when you decide to pick up
a new topic? I have tried workflowy and trello, but something is missing....

I wish there was a dedicated app for creating your own syllabus or learning
path.

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christiangenco
Markdown and a good text editor?

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prisonguard
arrived here expecting a heated debate on email obfuscation, thank you hn!

