Fast Learning Method

I always want to learn faster, faster, and excited about it. Mastering those important disciplines, expertise and skill will be your professional capital, helping you earn money and enjoy life. If good is your goal, learning can lead you to the desired place.

Although learning faster has many benefits, most people are reluctant to learn how to learn. Probably because we don't believe in this kind of thing, in our opinion, the speed of learning depends only on good genes and talents. It's true that there are people who have talent, but research shows that your learning methods are also important. Deeper knowledge processing, and sometimes repetitive restudying, in some cases doubles your learning efficiency. Yes, the study of "deliberate practice" shows that without the right approach, learning will always stagnate.

Today, I want to share my learning strategy and see how I can complete 4 years of MIT computer Science in 12 months. The strategy is tempered by 33 lessons, trying to figure out how to learn faster, what works and what doesn't.


Why is cramming useless?

Many students may laugh at me, thinking that it takes only 1 years to learn 4 years of course. After all, I can always cram, do not know what can pass the exam, is not it? Unfortunately, this strategy won't work at MIT. First of all, the MIT exam is demanding problem-solving skills, and often has a few types of questions that have not been seen. Second, MIT's curriculum is gradual, and even if you can pass a test by rote, the seventh lesson in the same series may not be enough. In addition to rote memorization, I have to make an alternative to accelerating the understanding process.


Can you speed up your understanding?

"Ah ha! "When we finally figured it out, we all cheered. The problem is that most people don't think in a systematic way. The classic student's way of studying is to listen to lectures, to read books, and if not, to do a lot of exercises (poke) or take notes again. Without a systematic approach, it seems impossible to understand faster. After all, the psychic mechanism of epiphany is completely unknown.

What's worse, understanding itself is hard to call a switch. It is like the layers of the Onion's epidermis, from the most superficial understanding to deep-seated comprehension, consolidating the cognition of the Scientific Revolution. Skinning such an onion is a process of understanding that the average person knows little and is easily overlooked.

The first step to accelerating learning is to uncover the process. How to understand the problem and deepen your understanding depends on two factors:

1. Establish knowledge linkages;
2. Self-debugging troubleshooting.

Knowledge linkages are important because they are an access point to understand an idea. I struggled with the Fourier transform until I realized that it turned the pressure into pitch, or the radiation into color. These insights are often linked between what you know and what you don't understand. Debug troubleshooting is equally important, because you often make mistakes, these errors root to the end, or the knowledge is incomplete, chest underachievement bamboo. Poor understanding is a software program that is riddled with errors. If you can effectively self-debugging, will greatly speed up the learning process. Establishing accurate knowledge connections and debugging errors is enough to form a deep problem perspective. Mechanized skills and rote memorization are usually only useful if you have a positive intuition about the nature of the problem.

Delve (the Drilldown Method): You learn faster

Over the course of the last few, I have perfected a way to accelerate the process of understanding through layers. This method has so far been used in various subjects, including mathematics, biology, Physics, economics and engineering. With just a few changes, it works well for mastering practical skills, such as programming, design, or language. The basic structure of this method is: knowledge, practice, introspection. I'll explain each stage and let you know how to execute them as efficiently as possible, while giving detailed examples of how I applied to the actual course.


First stage: Knowledge coverage

You can't organize an attack if you don't even have a topographic map. Therefore, the first step in the study is to have a general impression of what you need to learn. In class, this means you need to read a handout or read a textbook, and if you teach yourself, you may want to learn a few more books on the same subject.

One of the mistakes students make is to think that this stage is the most important. In many ways, this phase is the least efficient, because your input per unit of time is only for the smallest amount of knowledge return. I often accelerate to complete this phase, it is very good, so that I can devote more time to the next two stages.

If you are watching a video of course lectures, it is best to tune to 1.5x or 2x speed fast forward. This is easy to do as long as you download the good video and then use the "speed" function of the player (such as VLC). I used this way to finish the course video of a semester in two days. If you're reading a book, I suggest you don't take the time to highlight the text. This will only keep your knowledge understanding at a low level and, in the long run, make learning inefficient. A better approach is to read only occasional notes, or to write a summary of a paragraph after reading each of the main chapters.

Here is an example of my computer vision this class of notes.


Stage Two: Practice

Doing exercises can greatly contribute to your knowledge understanding. However, if you are not careful, you may fall into two efficiency traps:

1. No immediate feedback: research shows that if you want to learn better, you need instant feedback. Therefore, it is best to do the answer in the hand, the world I have, each completed a question on the answer, self-censorship. A late practice without feedback or feedback will only seriously hamper learning efficiency;
2. Stuffed: Just as some people think that learning is beginning in the classroom, some students also think that most of the knowledge understanding is produced from the exercises. Yes, you can always end up with a knowledge framework through stuffed, but the process is slow and inefficient.

Exercises should highlight the areas of knowledge that you need to build a better intuition. Some tricks, like the Feynman technique I'm going to talk about (the Feynman technique), are pretty effective. For non-technical disciplines, it requires you to master concepts rather than solve problems, so you often only need to complete the minimum number of exercises. For these subjects, you'd better spend more time in the third stage, forming a discipline of insight.


Phase III: Introspection

Knowledge coverage, and doing exercises, is to let you know what you do not understand. This is not as easy as it sounds, after all, it is difficult to know what to know and not to know. You think you know, in fact, not, so the old make mistakes, or, you have a comprehensive discipline in the heart of the end, but also do not see exactly where you do not understand.

The next technique, which I call "Feynman's skills," will help you to check out the gaps and go farther on the way to knowledge. This technique helps you fill in the gaps in knowledge, especially those that are most difficult to fill, when you can accurately identify points of knowledge that you do not understand. This technique can also be dual-use. Even if you really understand an idea, it also allows you to relate more ideas, so you can continue to delve into and deepen your understanding.

Feynman skills (The Feynman technique)

The inspiration for this technique stems from the Nobel Prize for Physics, Richard Feynman (Richard Feynman). In his autobiography, he mentions that he has struggled with a difficult research paper. His approach was to scrutinize the supporting material of the paper (supporting material) until he had mastered the relevant knowledge base, enough to understand the difficult ideas.

The Feynman technique is also the same. To deal with a knowledge side complex such as hair, rich connotation of the idea, should be divided into small pieces of knowledge, and then deal with each other, you can eventually fill all the knowledge gap, otherwise, these gaps will hinder you to understand the idea. For this, take a look at this short tutorial video.

The Feynman technique is simple:

Take a blank sheet of paper;
Write an idea or process that you want to understand on the top of the white paper;
Explain it in your own words, just as you teach others.

The most important thing is to divide one idea into another, although it may be possible to repeat some of the points of knowledge that have been understood. But you will eventually reach a tipping point that cannot be explained clearly. There is the knowledge gap that you need to fill. To fill this gap, you can look up textbooks, ask teachers, or search the Internet for answers. In general, once you have precisely defined your confusion or misunderstanding, it is relatively easy to find the exact answer.

I've used this Feynman technique hundreds of times to make sure it can handle a variety of learning situations. However, because of the characteristics of the learning situation, it needs to be flexible, it seems difficult to get started, so I will try to cite a few different examples.

Against the notion that you're completely out of your mind.

I still insist on the use of Feynman's skills, but open the textbook and find chapters explaining the concept. I read the author's explanation first, then carefully imitate it, and try to elaborate and articulate it in my own mind. In this way, the "guided" Feynman technique is useful when you cannot write any explanations in your own words. Here's an example that shows how I understand photogrammetry.


Dealing with a variety of processes

You can also learn about a process you need to use through Feynman's skills. Take a look at all the steps, not just what you do at each step, but also how it's done. I often understand the mathematical proof process, the chemical equation, and the biological glycolysis process. Here's an example of how I think of how to achieve grid acceleration.


Dealing with a variety of formulas

Formulas that should be understood, not just rote memorization. So, when you see a formula that doesn't understand its workings, try to divide it with Feynman's techniques. Here's an example of how I understand the Fourier analysis equation.


Dealing with what needs to be remembered

Feynman skills can also help you self-examination whether the non-technical disciplines of the profound knowledge of the concept. For a topic, if you can apply Feynman's skills smoothly without reference to the original material (handouts, textbooks, etc.), you will prove that you have understood and memorized it. Here's an example of how I recall the concept of predatory pricing in economics.

To form a deeper intuition (deeper intuition)

With the combination of exercises, Feynman's skills can help you peel off the superficial layers of knowledge and understanding. But it can also help you delve further, go farther, not only shallow understanding, but the formation of deep knowledge intuition. It's not easy to understand an idea intuitively. It seems a bit mysterious, but it's not the truth. Most intuition of an idea can be categorized as follows:


Analogy, visualization, simplification

Analogy: You understand an idea by identifying an important similarity between it and a more understandable idea; visualization: Abstract concepts are often useful intuition as long as we can build images of them in our minds, even if the picture is just an incomplete expression of a larger, more diverse idea; simplification: A famous scientist once said, If you can't explain something to your grandmother, it means you haven't fully understood it yet. Simplification is an art that strengthens the thinking connection between basic concepts and complex ideas.

You can use Feynman techniques to inspire these instincts. For an idea, once you have a general understanding, the next step is to analyze it in depth to see if you can use the above three intuition to illustrate it. During the period, even if the use of the existing image figurative meanings, is also justifiable. For example, it is difficult to think of a complex number in a two-dimensional space to understand it, but it can make you visualize the concept so that the concept is shaped in your mind. DNA replication, which is imagined to pull a one-way zipper, is not a perfect analogy, but as long as you know the similarities and differences in your mind, it becomes useful.


A strategy to learn faster

In this article, I describe the three stages of learning: knowledge, practice, and introspection. But it can make you misunderstand that they are always executed at different times, never overlapping or repeating. In fact, as you continue to understand knowledge in depth, you may go through these stages in a cycle. You have just started to read a chapter, can only have a superficial impression, but after doing exercises and establishing intuition, you come back to reread, and there will be a deeper understanding, that is, warm and know new.

Dig in, even if you're not a student.

This process is not only applicable to students, but also helps to learn complex skills or accumulate a topic of expertise. Learning skills like programming or design, most people follow the first two stages. They read a related basic book and then experience it in a project. However, you can use the Feynman technique to further, better lock in and articulate your insights. Accumulate a topic of professional knowledge, also with this reason; the only difference is that before you build your knowledge, you need to collect some learning materials, including related research articles, books, etc. In any case, as long as you understand the areas of knowledge you want to master, you delve into it and learn it deeply.

Fast Learning Method