Things I have difficulty remembering in a pinch:- names of people I haven't seen in a while
- concepts, unless I've "gotten my hands dirty" implementing them
- stuff I read online
- tend to skim, missing details
- distractions on individual pages/screens
- Instapaper/Readability/full-screen mode (esp. with the iPhone) ease this
What seems to work for me- cue cards
- especially true when I make the cue cards
- examples where it worked:
- learning Chinese in my twenties. I folded cue cards in two, then used the four sides for
- outside: pronunciation in Pinyin
- other side, outside: simplified character, since that's what we used to learn
- inside: English translation
- other side inside: traditional character, in order to at least recognize them in contexts outside mainland China (North American Chinatowns, for example), which tend to use traditional)
- notes on the edges, such as which chapter of the textbook the word or phrase came from
- taking an exam on railway safety procedures in my early thirties
- reading the book twice, as recommended by the examiners, who said the test was simple, absolutely did not work. Failed the exam miserably using that method
- my girlfriend stepped in an noticed that I had to try a different approach, and suggested cue cards
- one side: the situation
- other side: what to do in that situation
- learning by doing
- true in my late twenties/early thirties
- I can read all about how to install a web server, but actually rushing through the instructions and breaking things leads to more success
- "muscle memory", as much as muscle memory can be applied to typing on a keyboard
- taking photos of stuff, mostly because it's easy
- if not remembering the thing, then at least remembering where I can look it up
- tagging is useful not for the social aspects, but for the individual aspect. That is, I don't expect anybody to know or guess what I tag something with, but I do know what I would tag something with if I need to find that something
Don't know either way if they work for me (questions about my learning style):- does taking notes and reviewing them work?
- in fact, almost any lecture or event I attend will be well-documented, likely video- or at least audio-recorded. So why even bother in the first place?
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