
Ask HN: How do you learn new things? - gavribirnbaum
I am an avid learner. And I am trying to improve the process of how I learn new skills and disciplines (programming languages, design, physics).<p>How does your process look like? What do you do to learn? Is there any software you use? How&#x27;s the experience? Any tips?
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Pinbenterjamin
There are impossibly diverse options for learning today.

Ideally, you'll want to find which methodology (or -ies ideally) works best
for you, and continue to branch from there.

The idea of 'how do you learn' extends above answers like 'books' or 'youtube'
or 'coursera', and fits better in the categorization of 'I like to Listen', 'I
like to try', 'I like to watch'.

Ideally, find which of these, or which combination of these is most
interesting to you, and then find the appropriate tool to leverage that.

Personally, I like to Read, and I like to Do.

I have a brainstorming meeting with my Team once every 2 months where we
spitball home project ideas, and have a show and tell from work we've done in
our spare time. Once I've settled on an idea, I apply the above concepts to
learn as much as I can about it.

For example, the last project was to build and solve a Rubiks cube. I read
about the mathematics of a Rubiks cube, and built models alongside. I know
that having reference material, and an instance of CLion open next to me is my
recipe for successful learning.

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otras
To look at the metagame of learning, I highly, highly recommend the Coursera
course _Learning How To Learn_ by Barbara Oakley:
[https://www.coursera.org/learn/learning-how-to-
learn](https://www.coursera.org/learn/learning-how-to-learn). If you're more
into books, she also has _A Mind For Numbers_ , which covers essentially the
same material.

For me, the biggest thing is practice, particularly deliberate practice and
spaced repetition. For software, any timer will do for pomodoros, and Anki has
been a godsend for spaced repetition. The iOS app is expensive at $25, but the
ROI has been huge for me.

