Effective learning: Twenty rules of formulating knowledge (1999)

Summary

Dr Piotr Wozniak, February, 1999 (updated)This article will help you overcome one of the greatest difficulties you will face when trying to accelerate learning: formulating knowledgeThe speed of learning will depend on the way you formulate the material. The same material can be learned many times faster if well formulated! The difference in speed can be stunning! The rules are listed in the order of importance. Those listed first are most often violated or bring most benefit if complied with!There is an underlying assumption that you will proceed with learning using spaced repetition, i.e. you will not just learn once but you will repeat the material optimally (as in SuperMemo).The 20 rules of formulating knowledge in learning1) Do not learn if you do not understandTrying to learn things you do not understand may seem like an utmost nonsense. Still, an amazing proportion of students commit the offence of learning without comprehension. Very often they have no other choice! The quality of many textbooks or lecture scripts is deplorable while examination deadlines are unmovable.If you are not a speaker of German, it is still possible to learn a history textbook in German. The book can be crammed word for word. However, the time needed for such “blind learning” is astronomical. Even more important: The value of such knowledge is negligible. If you cram a German book on history, you will still know nothing of history.The German history book example is an extreme. However, the materials you learn may often seem well structured and you may tend to blame yourself for lack of comprehension. Soon you may pollute your learning process with a great deal of useless material that treacherously makes you believe “it will be useful some day”. 2) Learn before you memorizeBefore you proceed with memorizing individual facts and rules, you need to build an overall picture of the learned knowledge. Only when individual pieces fit to build a single coherent structure, will you be able ...