Author: barboakley

Cheery Friday Greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

What can you do to increase your study hours?

A student asked this question, “What can I do to increase my study hours?” on Quora—click here to see the great answer by one of our Learning How to Learners, Vineet Raj.

We Swamped Rafa’s Servers

Learning How to Learners were so enthusiastic that we swamped Rafa’s server last week with requests for his excellent daily planner. He’s updated the planner here, and now also has a Spanish version, so feel free to check it out—especially if you couldn’t get on last week. 🙂 )

Learning How to Learner writes a wonderful book!

Guitar teacher Brian Parham took Learning How to Learn and was inspired to use many of these approaches, (which grow from the findings of some of the world’s leading researchers), in his teaching. In fact, Brian now begins many of his private guitar lessons, seminars, and workshops by overviewing some of the simple yet effective learning techniques described in Learning How to Learn—chunking, deliberate practice, spaced repetitions, and the importance of rest and relaxation. Brian notes, “Without a doubt, these basic concepts can shave years off of the guitar learning curve!” Using timed sessions of the Pomodoro technique on his daily commute, Brian has written a powerful book: The Ultimate Rock Guitar Dojo for Kids: White Belt Edition. If you’re wanting to learn the guitar, or improve your techniques for teaching guitar, check it out!

Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

Barb, Terry, and the entire Learning How to Learn team

Cheery Friday Greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

Lots of things happening in learning! First, Barb did a fun podcast for Jordan Harbinger’s show The Art of Charm. Jordan is a great guy, and his show is one of the most popular on the web, with hundreds of thousands of listeners. Find out why by listening to our podcast.

An Inspirational Story

We want to tell you about Rafa Hernández, a 48-year-old Spanish man who is beginning to study physics and math. Rafa has read A Mind for Numbers and follows Learning How to Learn on Coursera–they’ve been very helpful for him. He notes:

“I have ADHD and severe focusing difficulties. I need to change my habits and design a new strategy to deal with this disability. Until I took Learning How to Learn, I tried to solve my cognitive problems by intensifying my focus efforts with more time. But this approach only caused a great deal of anxiety for me. I grew exhausted from studying the same material over and over again to try to learn it. Now, I’ve stepped back and become more structured about my learning time and the time I spend not consciously learning. It’s been terrifically helpful!”

Rafa has designed a wonderful daily planner template to help him schedule his daily tasks. You can find the template here. Notice how incredibly creative Rafa has been in creating this very useful planner, despite (perhaps because of!) his learning challenges. Download the template and enjoy! (And yes, we donated towards Rafa’s educational fund.)

Strong Science behind Learning

Recently, Barb was in Milano Italy at the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society conference, learning about the latest breakthroughs in technology and how they can help us better understand how the brain functions. Wonderful stuff! She wrote an article for the EMBS magazine, Pulse, about how bioengineering and related scientific and technical disciplines are helping to advance our understanding of learning.

Fun Learning!

To close out summer with Labor Day weekend, our friend Nelson Dellis, four time memory champion, just filmed a video of him memorizing a deck of cards while holding his breath under water. Wow! And while you’re watching, don’t forget to take part in Dart Neuroscience’s extreme memory challenge! Dart Neuroscience is doing their part for humanity, to help improve our understanding of memory. By taking this test, you can play a role in helping scientists do research.

Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

Barb, Terry, and the entire Learning How to Learn team

Cheery Weekend Greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

We Need You!

We’re recruiting new Community Mentors at the moment. If you’re interested in helping Learning How to Learn as a Mentor, then we’d love to hear from you! This form has more details on what being a Mentor means: to apply, please read the form, fill it out, and submit your answers by no later than October 24.

We’d like Mentors of all backgrounds. We’d particularly like to hear from Spanish and Portuguese speaking Mentors, but we do want Mentors who speak any and all other languages as well! Thank you in advance for being willing to volunteer if you have the interest!

Learning with MOOCs

Last weekend, Barb was able to attend the “Learning with MOOCs II” conference held at Columbia University. It was an amazing experience to be among many of the major players involved in the creation and research behind MOOCs. One of those fascinating players is Jonathan Haber, the Director of Learner Assessment at the Woodrow Wilson Academy of Teaching and Learning (affiliated with MIT). Jon has written a book about MOOCs titled MOOCS. Barb devoured it this week, and highly recommends it for anyone who wants to learn more about the fascinating development and future trends related to MOOCs. Jon actually spent a year taking MOOCs, so he is writing as an extremely knowledgeable insider—you’ll love his book!

Our Favorite MOOC website

Our favorite information place about MOOCs is Class Central, whose motto is “Never stop learning!” This incredible website is run by Barb’s good friend Dhawal Shah—an amazing man who has deep insight into how to help us all benefit from the wealth of knowledge available on MOOCs. Check out Class Central, and while you’re there, feel free to leave a review of Learning How to Learn!

Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

Barb, Terry, and the entire Learning How to Learn team

Cheery weekend greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

New Learning after Traumatic Brain Injury

Learning How to Learner Laurel Shannon Lawson was a professional executive and leader until she was hit by a bus in 2008, and then run over as a pedestrian in 2010. In addition to spinal and other injuries, she sustained traumatic brain injury. As part of Laurel’s rehabilitation, she undertakes cognitive exercises as well as physical rehab on a daily basis. It is hard work, but Laurel is doing the best to make the most of everything she can. Since her injury, Laurel has had to learn a lot about her own brain as it no longer automatically does some of the things it would do before. Learning How to Learn is helping her with this process—she feels it is also exercise for her brain in helping it to regrow its capacity.

Laurel would love to hear from others who have or love someone with brain injury. Words of encouragement are always appreciated, too! Please post in the discussion forum here, or just follow along in the discussion.

A Kickstarter Campaign for a Children’s Book to Improve Memory from Memory Expert Nelson Dellis

Some of you know Barb’s friend–four time US memory champion Nelson Dellis, who has done videos like this latest one where he memorizes the names of 80 people at a fundraising event (wow!). Nelson is writing and illustrating a children’s picture book for kids ages 5-7 years old that teaches a simple, but powerful, memory technique. He has started a Kickstarter page to fund the book’s printing and publication, and he’s asking for your support. If you are interested in a copy, just pledge the $25 option and you’ll get a personally signed edition when the book comes out. There are other cool pledging options to help Nelson as well. (And yes, we purchased a copy ourselves to help support Nelson’s great work.)

A Mind for Numbers

Don’t forget that A Mind for Numbers, the background book that Learning How to Learn was based on, is available now not only in English, but also in

● Russian (Думай как математик),

● Spanish (Abre Tu Mente a los Numeros),

● Korean (제 목: 숫자감각)

● Portuguese: (Aprendendo a Aprender)

Enjoy–and feel free to leave a book review to help inform other learners!

Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

Barb, Terry, and the entire Learning How to Learn team

Cheery greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

A Meetup in Singapore!

This week’s email is going out a little early because Barb is currently in Singapore, and she’d like to meet up with any local Learning How to Learners. Our meetup will be at the offices of Adam Khoo Learning Technologies Group (AKLTG):

Date: 1 November 2015 (Sunday)

Time: 10am

Venue: AKLTG Office 115 Eunos Ave 3 #05-04 Singapore 409839

Barb will be speaking at a parenting seminar together with Adam Khoo in the afternoon on November 1 to share learning tips for parents to help their children. There are 15 free tickets for Learning How to Learn students, their friends and family–just go to https://unlocking21clearningcode.eventbrite.sg and use the promo code: BOLR

Incidentally, Barb had dinner with Yusoff Abdul Latiff and his family here in Singapore earlier this week. Yusuff took up painting portraiture in his retirement–the results are a stunning tribute to our abilities to learn new skills even as we grow older.)

Does Your Child Procrastinate?

We’re often asked what to do to help children improve habits that can lead them into procrastination. This book, Not Now, Maybe Later: Helping Children Overcome Procrastination, by Dr. Joanne Foster, gives some great ideas that might help.

A Podcast with Barb and Scott Barry Kaufman

Barb was on her friend Scott Barry Kaufman’s Psychology Podcast, talking about learning how to learn. Scott is a fascinating man who went from being relegated to special education as a child, to moving into the realms of the gifted–he is now a preeminent researcher and writer on intelligence and creativity. (He writes about his personal story in his book Ungifted: Intelligence Redefined.) Take a listen to the podcast if you’d like to hear more!

More about the Flash Anzan Method

A lot of you were fascinated by last week’s email where we mentioned Manabu Watanabe’s post about the Flash Anzan Method. Well, that wasn’t the end of the story–here’s Manabu’s further posting. (Press the “to be continued” section at the bottom and go on to the next page–the videos of the little girls calculating while playing a different game are really quite amazing.)

Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

Barb, Terry, and the entire Learning How to Learn team

Cheery Friday greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

Barb is in Beijing today to speak at Baidu headquarters about learning. It’s an exciting day!

Unbelievable: the Flash Anzan Method

Barb’s friend Manabu Watanabe is the author of the intriguing and well-researched book Juku: The Stealth Force of Education and the Deterioration of Schools in Japan. Manabu has recently posted about a stunning technique known as the “Flash Anzan Method.” Read about it here–and watch the amazing video! As Manabu writes “It is not a story about gifted people, but rather a matter of training.”

Is Anyone Truly Unteachable and Unreachable?

Have you ever wondered how people are able to change themselves? Be inspired by Ashley’s unbelievable climb from a juvenile delinquent to engineer, and now to a doctoral student. Check out the story “Finding Yourself: The trials and tribulations of Ashley Liddiard,” which begins at the bottom right of the pdf here. Ashley (her married name is now Ashley Kleinhans) is now a researcher at the Mobile Intelligent Autonomous Systems Group in Pretoria, South Africa. Way to go, Ashley!

Teaching English

Our friend Justin Shewell, a Senior International Educator from Arizona State University, just helped launch a terrific new first course in a specialization about teaching English. Check out Teach English Now! if you’re interested in learning more. Teach English Now! uses metaphors and stories and all sorts of learning approaches that we advocate in Learning How to Learn, so we think you’ll find the course to be a terrific one.

Reporting problems

If you have questions or need help, please post in the Course Forums so your classmates or our mentors can reply. You can find all forums on the main Discussions page, and sub-forums below each video.

You can also use the ‘Report problem’ flag on each page to let us know about an issue with the course content or to make a suggestion. Please know that we read and appreciate your feedback, but at the moment there’s no way for us to reply and tell you so.

Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

Barb, Terry, and the entire Learning How to Learn team

Cheery Weekend greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

The Inspiration Behind Learning How to Learn

Here’s an interview with Barb “Формула успеха: как математика помогает людям жит.” (Okay, so the interview’s in Russian.) The interview provides additional background about the book A Mind for Numbers—which formed the basis for the MOOC Learning How to Learn. A fun fact is that A Mind for Numbers was inspired when one of Barb’s engineering students asked Barb how she’d managed to initiate a shift from linguist to engineer at the ripe age of 26, after she’d left the Army. The book tells the story. What’s truly inspiring is how inspiring students themselves can be!

Good Books About Learning

If you’re trying to keep up your reading about learning, one of the best of the recent books about learning is Make It Stick, by Brown, Roediger, and McDaniel. This insightful book was co-authored by some of the most influential researchers around. Another book is How We Learn, by New York Times reporter Benedict Carey. Enjoy!

If You are Using the Coursera App

If you’re using the Coursera app, please update to the most recent version—it will help prevent problems if you might be submitting a quiz.

Mind Wandering—the Good, the Bad, and the MOOC-relevant

Here’s an article about the importance of mind-wandering and aspects of the “diffuse mode”: “Why We Should Stop Worrying about Our Wandering Minds.” This article contrasts in an intriguing way with Julie Sedivy’s wonderful Nautilus article “Can a Wandering Mind Make You Neurotic?” (And here’s Barb’s recent Nautilus article “Why Virtual Classes Can Be Better Than Real Ones.” MOOCs are often best built with short videos that don’t bog down when our minds wander.)

Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

Barb, Terry, and the entire Learning How to Learn team

Cheery Wednesday greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

South Africa, here we come!

Our email is a bit early again this week–that’s because Learning How to Learn is coming to South Africa! Barb and her husband Phil (also known as “the Hero”), will be having dinner in Cape Town with a Learning How to Learner on the evening of November 13th. We’ll be meeting at 6:00 pm, November 13th in the lobby of the Holiday Inn Express at City Center Cape Town–join us there to then hopefully go to dinner with us if you can! (Email Barb if you would like at oakley@oakland.edu–she might be a bit delayed getting back just in that she’s got some long plane rides ahead over the next 36 hours.) Barb will also be a keynote speaker at the Higher Education Learning and Teaching Association of Southern Africa (HELTASA) conference: 17-20 November 2015, Potchefstroom, South Africa. And finally, she’ll be in Durban to speak on November 26th (organized by Henre Benson, benson@casme.org.za). Barb would love to meet you if you happen to be in any of those places!

Mother of Civilization Library

The Mother of Civilization Library is a volunteer organization which sets up work in Indus Valley Sindh, the southern part of Pakistan. Their project is to help and facilitate a libraries program in Sindh by collecting books. If you might have any spare new or used books that you would like to send to the Library program, they’d be thrilled! Your donation could do much to stimulate and encourage the growth of learning, especially among the young generation of needy and destitute students. Please send books to:

Rashid Anees Magsi, Project Manager, Mother of Civilization Library, Street: Sobho Khan Magsi, City: Radhan Station Dadu, Province: Sindh, Postal Code: 76310, Country: Pakistan, Phone: 00923003609982, Email: moc.library@gmail.com

(And yes, we’ve sent some books!)

This week’s reading

This week, we’ve got a heavy duty recommendation for those of you who like in-depth neuroscience. After Phrenology: Neural Reuse and the Interactive Brain, by Michael Anderson, is a deeply thought-provoking read that also provides insight into why metaphors and analogies can be such a powerful tool to help with learning. If you’re looking for a more straightforward introduction to neuroscience, it’s hard to beat Jamie Ward’s The Student’s Guide to Cognitive Neuroscience.

Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

Barb, Terry, and the entire Learning How to Learn team

Cheery Friday greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

The behind the scenes sizzle in MOOC-making

Barb’s article “Why Virtual Classes Can Be Better than Real Ones” has gotten a lot of interest by “MOOCers and shakers” in industry. Check it out if you want to learn some of the behind the scenes thinking that helped bring you Learning How to Learn.

Special MOOCs

As Barb travels the world, she makes a special point of doing everything she can to meet with deeply knowledgeable, yet fun-filled instructors who have a special passion and insight for making MOOCs. One such instructor is Dr. Jogesh K. Muppala at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. Jogesh (who actually coined the “MOOCers and shakers” term we used above), is an instructor with the Full-Stack Web Development Specialization. If this is a subject of interest for you, check out Jogesh’s MOOC!

Nelson Dellis’s Kickstarter Campaign for a Children’s Book to Improve Memory

A few weeks ago, we mentioned four time US memory champion Nelson Dellis. He’s writing and illustrating a children’s picture book for kids ages 5-7 years old that teaches a simple, but powerful, memory technique. Nelson has started a Kickstarter page to fund his book’s printing and publication. Due in part to the powerful support of Learning How to Learners, Nelson’s fund has reached an incredible $11,000 US dollars–far beyond his initial goal of $3,500. His campaign is now winding down into the last few days. All additional monies will go towards printing extra copies of the book that Nelson will be sending out and donating to schools around the country–the more he prints, the more he donates. If you are interested in a copy, just pledge the $25 option and you’ll get a personally signed edition when the book comes out! There are other cool pledging options to help Nelson as well. (And yes, we ourselves purchased a copy ourselves to help support good-hearted Nelson’s wonderful work.)

A great book to help build your ability to focus

We highly recommend Dan Harris’s book 10% Happier: How I Tamed the Voice in My Head, Reduced Stress Without Losing My Edge, and Found Self-Help That Actually Works–A True Story. If you find yourself having trouble with the “focus” aspect of learning, this book may give you some insights. Plus, it’s a highly entertaining read. 🙂

Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

Barb, Terry, and the entire Learning How to Learn team

Cheery Friday greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

Discussion Forums

The discussion forum is often a fountain for fascinating conversation. Here you can find a discussion of the difference between the two intriguing, but sometimes confused, topics of “transfer” and “interleaving.”

A Surprise Book Recommendation for Teachers—and for Everyone

Barb was recently asked for her best recommendation for a book for teachers. She recommended the book Rebel Yell: The Violence, Passion, and Redemption of Stonewall Jackson, by S. C. Gwynne. Jackson was everybody’s idea of a complete incompetent—his students, who often disliked him intensely, enjoyed making fun of him. Yet unbelievably, this “incompetent” became one of history’s greatest military leaders—adored by his men and able to pull victory from seemingly certain defeat time and time again.

Teachers can sometimes too quickly make assessments of their students’ abilities, unaware of hidden depths of character. And we are sometimes too quick to judge ourselves as well as others. Rebel Yell gives insight into the wondrous surprises that can lie within the human spirit. And if you’re feeling up for it, get S. C. Gwynne’s previous fantastic book, Empire of the Summer Moon, about the Comanche empire. This book speaks magnificently to the fact that different eras in history call for learning different skills. The change in the skillsets needed even during a single lifetime can be immense—and the 21st century hasn’t been the only time of rapid change. (Cynthia and Quanah Parker’s stories are incredible!)

Class Central

As you might have guessed if you’ve been following Learning How to Learn for a while, we’re big fans of Class Central, the best “one stop shop” to discover more about MOOCs on any subject you might be interested in. Feel free to check out Class Central’s offerings—and to leave a review of Learning How to Learn. 🙂

Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

Barb, Terry, and the entire Learning How to Learn team