Category: Uncategorized

Cheery Friday greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

Barb on Quora!

One of Barb’s favorite “diffuse mode” pastimes is reading questions and answers on Quora. To her delight, she’s been asked to take questions in a session that is running on June 3rd. Go here to post questions for her!

Help Translate Learning How to Learn to Your Favorite Language

Do you speak a language other than English and love Learning How to Learn? Join Coursera’s Global Translator Community—the “GTC”—to help translate this course into other languages! To join the GTC, click here. Once you’ve joined, click here to begin translating this course! The GTC has recently been simplified and streamlined—we think you’ll be very happy with what you find! If you’re already a Transifex user, here are docs that can assist with the transition to the new interface. If you do have any troubles getting into Learning How to Learn, please email Barb at oakley@oakland.edu and she’ll make sure you can get started.

Improving Your Test Taking

Retiree Steve Batty took Learning How to Learn earlier this year and shared its concepts with a close friend—a chemist by education who builds and maintains a water and soil testing company’s computer systems. Steve’s friend is also a Microsoft Certified Engineer and is studying to take the Certified Microsoft 2012 server exam. Steve related to his friend our suggestion that when you run across a test question you can not solve, you should move on and then come back to it after you have reached the end of the exam questions. Steve also told his friend why this can help. Steve notes that his friend “has done that in his last several practice exams and it has allowed him to improve his scores by 15 to 20 per cent. He marveled at how, when he returned to the tough questions most of the time, the correct answer was obvious to him.” The “hard-start jump-to-easy technique,” which we discuss in week 4 of the MOOC, really does work!

In his retirement, Steve has put together a nice blog that compiles great information on neuroplasticity in a way that anyone can learn more about this fascinating topic. Enjoy!

Great info on MOOC-taking and MOOC-making from Class Central!

Class Central, our favorite all-knowing MOOC watcher, has published a fantastic series that help with various aspects of MOOCs and learning. The first article is “ Can Learning Help with Mental Health Conditions?”–a terrific article by our very own Lead Mentor on Learning How to Learn, Rebecca Judd. The second article is “MOOC Motivation Hacks: 30 Tips and Tricks to Keep You On Task.” LHTL is in #27. These sounds tips will really help.

Class Central’s great articles culminate in a three part series describing the differences between MOOCs and books: “Which Will Win: MOOC vs. Book? (Part 1 of 3).” The second part, “MOOC vs. Book – Part 2: Complementary Learning Channels,” features a discussion with Barb about how her book A Mind for Numbers helped with construction of Learning How to Learn.

Next week, Professor Raj Raghunathan, author of the intriguing book If You’re So Smart, Why Aren’t You Happy?, will describe the rather different relationship of how his book helped with the development of his MOOC. (Raj, a.k.a. Dr. Happy Smarts, has done the upbeat A Life of Happiness and Fulfillment MOOC.)

Consciousness and Humor—Books of the Week

We’re always very interested in consciousness as one of the most integral aspects of learning. One of the best—and most colorfully beautiful—books we’ve ever read on consciousness is Phi: A Voyage from the Brain to the Soul, by Giulio Tononi. This wonderful book blends art with science in a way that metaphorically advances your understanding of consciousness–no straight research book could ever do as well.

On the other hand, if you’re looking for the funniest, most uplifting career advice around, How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big: Kind of the Story of My Life, by Scott Adams. From the very beginning, we were riveted—will Adams’ voice freeze in terror in front of a massive audience? Adams’ many disastrous, hilarious failures en route to great success give hope for us all.

That’s all for now. Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

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

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Cheery Friday greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

Rap version of Learning How to Learn from Focus: Hope (the chorus features “Coursera!”)

Here’s a short, fun, upbeat rap song sent along by Mrs. Ifeoma Okechukwu, the Manager, the Center for Advanced Technologies Engineering Education, Focus: HOPE. It features several of her talented adult learners, who have figured out a wonderful way to remember the key ideas of Learning How to Learn. (Love the “Coursera, Coursera” refrain!)

Great Visual and Book on Overcoming Procrastination

One of the best visuals we’ve seen in a long time is “How to Get Motivated: A Guide for Defeating Procrastination.” Go to the discussion forum where it is posted and check it out.

Procrastination, as it turns out, is probably one of our Learning How to Learner’s biggest challenges. The visual we mentioned above is based on a terrific book—The Procrastination Equation: How to Stop Putting Things Off and Start Getting Stuff Done, by Piers Steele. Of all the books we’ve read on procrastination (and we’ve read a lot), we found this one to be the best—highly recommended!

“Deutsche LHTL-Mannschaft – übersetze ein paar Untertitel, verwandle ein paar Sätze!” (Learning How to Learn in German )

Our new German Lead, Sebastian Koelper, is asking for German-speakers to join him in establishing his team to create a complete German version of Learning How to Learn. If you’re interested in joining Sebastian’s team, please go to the discussion forum here for information about how to get started!

Barb in the United Kingdom

Also remember Barb will be giving a keynote on learning at the Liberating Leaders Conference in Petersfield, Hampshire UK on 25 May 2016. If you’re anywhere in Europe and doing anything with leadership in education, this conference shouldn’t be missed.

The human story behind the progress of science

One of our most memorable books of recent years is The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot. What we especially appreciate about this book is that it plays fair to all concerned—it tells a riveting personal story about Henrietta Lacks and her extraordinary family. But it also helps us better understand how science is learning to grapple with profound ethical issues. An intriguing short book in a related vein is our friend Jef Akst’s Personal Trials: How Terminally Ill ALS Patients Took Medical Treatment Into Their Own Hands. Jef is a senior editor for The Scientist—it’s eye-opening to learn of how seemingly ordinary people are beginning to band together to help tackle some of medicine’s most intractable challenges.

That’s all for this week. Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

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

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Cheery Friday greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

Barb’s in Ottawa, Canada, in a talk open to the public—so bring your friends and family!

Barb will be speaking in Ottawa on Monday, 30 May 2016 from 8:30 – 10:00 AM at a talk open to the public (although they kindly ask for you to register here beforehand). Barb will give insights behind the making of Learning How to Learn, and she will also describe key highlights from Learning How to Learn in a fun and insightful way. This will be a fantastic event at Carleton University’s breathtakingly beautiful conference space, so if you’re anywhere near Ottawa, don’t miss it!

“Need to remember something? Better draw it, study finds”

As you know, one of the MOOCs we feel strong affection for as a sort of sister course is Memory and Movies, by John Seamon. (John’s accompanying Memory and Movies book is also terrific). John’s most recent class email makes mention of a great article “Need to remember something? Better draw it, study finds.” Even if you’re a terrible artist, drawing a picture instead of writing the words makes an incredible difference in your ability to remember something.

Crash Course and VSauce

We’ve been pointed towards the “Crash Course” series of educational videos on topics such as physics, calculus, philosophy, the development of video games, Leonardo DiCaprio and the nature of reality. These are fantastic videos that are not only educational, but highly entertaining. On a side note, we’re sometimes asked by potential MOOC-makers and educational videographers about how to make scientific topics watchable even as the science sometimes goes deep. Crash Course gives, yes, a crash course on how to do it. Incidentally, we’re also fans of Michael Stevens of VSauce—here’s a sample video “Why Do We Have Two Nostrils?”

Errata Corrige: Bengali Forum Link

We’re forming a new Bengali version of Learning How to Learn (শিখতে শেখা-আপনাকে সাহায্য করবে কঠিন বিষয় আয়ত্ত করতে). Already we’ve had many volunteers from last week’s announcement. Unfortunately, there was a bad link to the new Bengali Discussion Forum—you can find the right link for the discussion forum here. This will be the first ever translation of any MOOC into Bengali. If you speak Bengali, Arifa could really use your help as part of the little team she is forming. If you haven’t done it already, please fill out this form to join a terrific group! (If you don’t know what “Errata Corrige” means, it is a cool Latin term for “Error Correction.”)

Books of the Week—three (well, five altogether) more GREAT biographies!

If you haven’t read about three of the greatest characters in the history of Western civilization, Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, and Augustus Caesar, well, it’s about time! (Okay, we also snuck Winston Churchill into the mix.) If you read the biographies below in any order, you’ll get a wonderful sense of the contrasting characters of some of the world’s most intriguing historical characters. When Barb read these books, she was flabbergasted to realize that she had previously learned so little about these magnificent figures from the past, whose legacies still shape the modern world.

• Julius Caesar, by Philip Freeman. A riveting look at the great man’s controversial achievements, with deep insights into his personal life. Who knew that Caesar would put his entire life at risk, refusing to give up his beloved wife when so ordered by the empire’s dictator? Instead, he became a fugitive.
• Alexander the Great, by Philip Freeman. We liked Philip Freeman’s Julius Caesar book so much, and there were such compelling stories of how Alexander had influenced Julius Caesar, that we couldn’t resist reading this compelling book. Incidentally, Alexander benefited from having Aristotle as his teacher—which just goes to show how much a good education can do for a person in their ability to have a (sometimes controversial!) impact. Behind the scenes, it’s worth noting that the engineering feats of both Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar and their men are what really made them so successful.
• Augustus: First Emperor of Rome, by Adrian Goldsworthy and Augustus: The Life of Rome’s First Emperor by Anthony Everitt. We read two contrasting books about Augustus, an enigmatic character with a very different kind of genius than either Julius Caesar or the great Alexander. See what you think of the differences between the two books.

We love reading biographies by different authors of the same historical figure—it gives a surprising sense of how much the biographer her- or himself matters. If you really want a sense of the contrasting opinions that can arise in biography, read Gretchen Rubin’s awesome Forty Ways to Look at Winston Churchill: A Brief Account of a Long Life.

That’s all for this week. Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

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

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Cheery Friday greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

Dramatic changes in the textbook industry, and taking Learning How to Learn, helps an open-minded learner to retool his career

Learning How to Learner Tom Willkens writes:

“At twenty-eight years old, I felt trapped in my publishing career, both intellectually and professionally stagnant—and my quant skills had seriously degenerated. After my father sent me a link to Learning How to Learn, I inhaled the information and self-experimented to rebuild my skills from the ground up. One year later, after acing my GREs, I’m now enrolled in a special Master’s in Computer Science program at the Brandeis University Graduate School.

“My goal is to enter the field of adaptive learning software. Part of my first career as a freelancer was spent designing tests for a major textbook publisher, and they’re now switching up their whole business model. Everything is in a state of total flux, and it’s pretty exciting! You might have already seen it, but this article, ‘Artificially intelligent software is replacing the textbook—and reshaping American education’ gives a good overview.”

(Incidentally, if you’re looking for a knowledgeable expert who is keenly interested in every aspect of adaptive learning software, it would be a good idea to reach out to Tom Willkens.)

Our top-choice textbook to help improve retention in college

Speaking of the textbook industry, our top choice textbook for for university instructors and administrators who are trying to improve retention while empowering students is On Course: Strategies for Creating Success in College and in Life, by Skip Downing. Hands down, it doesn’t get better than Skip’s book, which is heading into its third decade of service to higher education (the 8th edition has just come out). As far as we can determine, On Course is the #1 student success textbook in the world, and for good reason. In all honesty, if we could do another MOOC to couple with Learning How to Learn for students, we wish it would be a MOOC based on On Course. There is also a Study Skills Plus edition and a Facilitator’s Manual, as well as annotated instructor versions. There is solid research evidence that On Course works to make substantive improvements in retention—having read the books and used some of the approaches for years in our own teaching, we can understand why.

Australian Senior Mentor Linda Walker weighs in with intriguing MOOC suggestions

New on Coursera is ADHD: Everyday Strategies for Elementary Students from The State University of New York & The University at Buffalo. The first session begins on 23 May. Barb has met some of the producers of this course, and it looks like it will be outstanding, especially for parents of children with ADHD. Another topic that frequently comes up in Learning How to Learn discussions is learning with dyslexia—in this regard, the MOOC Supporting Children with Difficulties in Reading and Writing, from Coursera-University of London is generating very positive comments.

The University of Leeds has four ‘Learning Online’ MOOCs on FutureLearn designed to help high-school students transition to university or the workplace: Learning and Collaborating, Managing Your Identity, Reflecting and Sharing and Searching and Researching. Linda notes: “I’ve just started Searching and Researching, and I’m looking forward to Week 2 which promises to help me think critically about the information found online, and make judgments about its quality and usefulness – a useful upgrade to my self-taught researching skills!”

A Pomodoro Clock coded by a Learning How to Learner

One of our learners, Brandon Gottschling, has coded a pomodoro clock for desktop and mobile. Check out the Pomodoro clock, and the positive comments from other learners, on this thread.

Learning How to Learn in Bengali! শিখতে শেখা-আপনাকে সাহায্য করবে কঠিন বিষয় আয়ত্ত করতে

Our new Bengali Lead is Arifa Shahnaz, who is spearheading efforts to transform Learning How to Learn into Bengali (বাংলা অনুবাদ: শিখতে শেখা-আপনাকে সাহায্য করবে কঠিন বিষয় আয়ত্ত করতে). This will be the first ever translation of any MOOC into Bengali. If you speak Bengali, Arifa could really use your help as part of the little team she is forming. Please fill out this form to join a terrific group!

This is an excellent volunteering opportunity to translate world’s most popular course and to work with the dynamic and vibrant global translator community along with a cross cultural team of diverse learners. And think of the impact you will have on the lives of 300 million+ Bengali speaking community worldwide!

You can also connect with Arifa via linkedin @ https://bd.linkedin.com/in/arifa-shahnaz-11b2b0111. (Here’s a discussion forum devoted to the new Bengali group.)

Arifa says: “Can’t wait to hear from you. Let’s do it together (চলুন একসাথে করি) !!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Barb’s favorite biographies—the continuing series

To wrap up this email, here is one of Barb’s favorite biographies: Peter the Great: His Life and World, by Robert Massie. This is truly one of the greatest biographies ever written, and fully deserving of its Pulitzer Prize. Not only does the book provide great insight into Peter the Great—it also takes us down some of the stranger rabbit holes of history. Who knew that Sweden’s Charles XII squirreled himself away in Turkey, driving his hosts crazy and refusing to leave? Barb babbled so much about the fascinating insights from this book that her family began rolling their eyes when she brought it up. 🙂

That’s all for this week. Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

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

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Cheery Friday greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

Are You a Medical School or Pre-Medical School Student—or Just Interested in Learning Hard Stuff?

Check out this excellent article “How We Studied for the Boards,” by Farokh Jamalyaria, MD. Farokh discusses a medicine-specific strategy that many of his physician colleagues and he have used over the years to learn dense, complicated information quickly and effectively, and to do well on board exams.

Class Central

Here’s Class Central’s latest article from their series of roundup articles about trends in MOOCs: “Less Experimentation, More Iteration: A Review of MOOC Stats and Trends in 2015.” The increasing interest is astonishing! We believe a particularly important trend are MOOCs which provide college credit. Class Central feels similarly—here’s an intriguing article about precisely that phenomenon: MOOCWatch Jan 2016: Credits and Credentials. This latter article was written by Anuar Andres Lequerica, an expert on the intersection between games and learning—he manages a podcast/newsletter where he summarize the latest news, research, events, and job postings.

Exciting News—Learning How to Learn is now in complete Chinese and Spanish as well as Portuguese versions!

Yes, it’s true—now Learning How to Learn is available in complete translation (meaning that the webpages and quizzes are all translated, as well as captions on the videos), in three different languages: Chinese and Spanish as well as Portuguese. It is a tribute to Coursera’s heartfelt desire to help people learn effectively around the world that Learning How to Learn is now Coursera’s most-translated course. Do you have Chinese, Spanish, or Portuguese-speaking friends? You might ask them to spread the word!

Help with Translating Learning How to Learn

Speaking of translations, Coursera is working hard to try to streamline the process of helping with translations. If you’d like to help with translating Learning How to Learn into your favorite language, please sign up for the Coursera Global Translator Community (GTC). (Take a look at the great pdf that walks you through the sign up process.) Once you’re signed up with a Transifex account, just make sure you’re logged in to Transifex and you should then be able to find the translation project for Learning How to Learn here. If you have a problem, just email our own special Learning How to Learn contact at Coursera, at LHTL-translations@coursera.org.

A Language Learning Resolution

Haven’t made a New Year’s resolution? As Learning How to Learn Senior Mentor Linda Walker notes, it’s not too late. “Dr Ruth Arber and Dr Michiko Weinmann, Co-Directors of Deakin University’s Centre for Teaching and Learning Languages (CTaLL), argue that learning a new language should be top of your list”: Why learning a new language should be your New Year’s resolution. In Learning How to Learn, we always encourage doing something unexpected, and what better unexpected thing to do than a New Year’s resolution in February!

Our Top Recommendations for Language Learning Books

Since we’re on the topic of language learning, we’d like to give you our top three language-learning books. Here they are:

• Fluent in 3 Months: How Anyone at Any Age Can Learn to Speak Any Language from Anywhere in the World. This book is by Barb’s friend Benny Lewis–it’s an inspirational as well as pointed how to manual about how to pick up other languages. Benny originally thought he couldn’t learn other languages. But when he changed his approach, it worked wonders–he now speaks ten different languages!
• Fluent Forever: How to Learn Any Language Fast and Never Forget It by Gabriel Wyner is a great complementary volume to Fluent in 3 Months. Like Benny, Gabriel is self-taught in his foreign-language learning–he uses imagery to help remember faster and more fluently.
• Harmony of Babel: Profiles of Famous Polyglots of Europe by Kató Lomb. This is an older book, but it’s fun to read because of its inspirational stories and great insights from a variety of perspectives into language learning.

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!

London Taxi Drivers and Learning

Barb’s recent trip to London for the Learning Technologies Conference was terrific! (Here’s an intriguing Google Hangout discussion about little known, but vital aspects of learning with Barb and educational psychologist Tesia Marshik, hosted Sukhvinder Pabial.) The trip was also especially interesting because Barb had the chance to speak with plenty of London taxicab drivers, who are among the most highly trained and professional group of drivers in the world. One taxi cab driver spoke of how he had been a poor student when he was younger. But after he spent three years studying locations in London (chunking!) to take the taxicab driver test–a formidably difficult feat–he understands much more about the learning process. He now plans to return to school, which was something he never thought he could do before. Learning well changes our brains, and makes it possible to learn more things–things we never thought we could learn. That thoughtful, persistent London taxicab driver is an inspiration for all of us.

Learning How to Learn in Princeton, New Jersey!

Barb will be kicking off the IEEE Integrated STEM Education Conference in Princeton, New Jersey on March 5th (here is the complete program description). Anyone can attend this conference, and it’s really inexpensive–only $35 for K-12 teachers if you register by February 29th. There are also student travel assistance awards, especially for those from the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states in the USA. Barb would love to meet you!

MOOC Overview

Here’s a fascinating overview article “MOOCs Grow Up” by Blaine Flamig in Computer Power User that provides perspective on where MOOCs are coming from and where they’re going. Learning How to Learn is featured towards the end of the article.

MOOC of the Week

Senior Mentor Cristian Artoni has an intriguing MOOC suggestion: Critical Perspective On Management by Professor Rolf Strom-Olsen. This is an On Demand course that can be followed at your own pace. All the topics are related to a critical thinking approach to management–for example, how was it possible for Romans to build a flourishing grain trade market without rapid information access such as we can get now through the telephone and internet?

Shadow Education

Most of you know our friend Manabu Watanabe in Japan, who previously introduced us to Flash Anzan. Manabu is back with several intriguing postings about what he calls the “shadow education” system–a growing force internationally. If you love education, a tendency is to focus on the bright side–but it is only by also taking into account the shadows Manabu alludes to which will allow us to become better. (You can follow Manabu on Twitter.)

In-Video Quizzes on Mobile Apps

Great news! In-video quizzes are now available to learners using Coursera’s mobile apps, not just for those using desktop computers. Thanks to Coursera’s hard-working team for this (and many other) achievements!

Great Memorization and Learning Strategies from Master Learners!

Nelson Dellis, four time US memory champion, just filmed a fantastic interview with Alex Mullen, an American memory competitor and medical school student at the University of Mississippi. Alex recently won the World Memory Championships in China last December (although Nelson beat him last year, and is still the USA Memory Champion. 🙂 ) In this interview, Nelson and Alex talk about competition and memorization strategies, and Alex’s studying strategies and tips for students. 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.

Best Book, Bar None, On Memory

Our very favorite book on memory and memory techniques is Moonwalking with Einstein, by Joshua Foer. If you want to spend an enjoyable time curled up with a book, there’s nothing better than reading about Josh’s unlikely story of going from memory championship reporter to becoming a memory champion himself. And you’ll learn plenty of helpful information for you while you’re at it!

Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

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

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Cheery Friday greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

MOOCs for Teacher Development

If you are an elementary or secondary school teacher anywhere in the world, we would really appreciate it if you might take the following very brief survey about MOOCs. This will be very useful for a panel being hosted at SXSWEdu called ‘MOOCs & Teacher PD: Mindless Snack or Hearty Fare?‘ with our friend Charlie Chung from Class Central, and Coursera’s Julia Stiglitz.

Can You Help by Becoming a Mentor for Learning How to Learn in Chinese?

Are you a speaker of Chinese and would you like to help out by volunteering on as a Mentor for 学会如何学习, the new version of Learning How to Learn in Chinese? If so, please volunteer here! Learning How to Learn is now not only the most popular course in the world—it is also Coursera’s most widely translated course. This is because Learning How to Learn is something that is helpful for virtually everyone, everywhere. Your own help in improving this course can make a difference in allowing people to better their lives!

Become the Spanish Lead for Aprendiendo a Aprender?

We are looking for one person to volunteer to become the Spanish Lead for the new Spanish Language Platform of Learning How to Learn — Aprendiendo a Aprender. This person would be responsible assembling a team of volunteer Spanish-speaking mentors, sending out monthly or weekly emails to the entire set of Spanish-speaking learners, and helping improve the translation quality of the course. More information, including a link to the application form, is here.

Encouraging Reading In Young People

Our Learning How to Learner Bhairavi from India has begun a wonderful new “Purple Patch Initiative” of providing the first book to Indian parents. This program is also meant to empower parents by also giving them tools to make the book reading experience with their child successful. You can help by checking out the Purple Patch Initiative’s Facebook page, here. In a related vein, health care providers in the US often participate in program called “Reach Out and Read.” Each year, when a child gets his or her annual checkup, they get a book. Here’s a little more information about the US program. If you might like to start or participate in a similar program in your own country, you may wish to reach out to Bhairavi or to the US program for ideas or connections.

Learning and Changing

Here’s a fascinating article about why scientists can’t decide about whether salt is killing us. It seems that when scientists review the evidence, they are biased and “reluctant to change their view in light of new facts.” Unfortunately, even being a really smart scientist is no protection against jumping to conclusions and then persisting in the path you’ve chosen—regardless of contrary findings. This is part of what Learning How to Learn is about—helping you to step back and finding your own areas where you’re stuck, to help open your mind and accept new possibilities.

Excellent Books about Finding Your Hidden Biases

Here are some of the best books we know of to help you begin climbing out of your hidden biases:

• On Being Certain, by Robert Burton.
• Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts, by Carol Tavris.
• Blindspot: Hidden Biases of Good People, by Mahzarin R. Banaji.
• Pathological Altruism, edited by Barbara Oakley, Ariel Knafo, Guruprasad Madhavan, and David Sloan Wilson. (It’s your own thoughts that you know what’s best to help others that can surprisingly often lead you astray.)

Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

Barb, Terry, and the entire Learning How to Learn team Follow LHTL on Facebook | Join the private LHTL Hall of Fame group | Follow LHTL on Twitter

Cheery Friday greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

Interleaving

One of our learners, Quin Benson, has used the discussion forum to mention an excellent article: “The Interleaving Effect: Mixing It Up Boosts Learning.” We’ve often found that learners in math, science, and engineering benefit greatly from tricks like placing problems on flashcards. Write out the solution by hand on the back of the card to help “neurally encode” it. You can mix the cards up and pull them randomly to check your ability to solve the problem. Not knowing in advance what section a problem is from forms the very essence of interleaving. (Hat tip: Senior Mentor Linda Walker.)

Upcoming Visits by Barb to the Hague, Anaheim, and Princeton

Barb and some of the Learning How to Learn Mentors will be in the Hague for the Coursera annual conference on March 21-22. If you’re interested in attending a meetup with us there, please post on the discussion forum, here.

And here’s an intriguing video about the upcoming On Course Conference, April 7-9, 2016, in Anaheim, California. Barb will be headlining this one. She’s been to On Course conferences and events in the past, and loves them—they have a great way of helping you to nudge students to start thinking for themselves. Barb will have plenty of time between sessions, so please come up and say hello. Hopefully you can share some coffee or tea while you discuss learning.

And don’t forget the upcoming IEEE Integrated STEM Education Conference in Princeton, New Jersey on March 5th. This is going to be a great event, with lots of insights about teaching in STEM, kicked off by Barb’s keynote. So do come if you have the chance! Here is the complete program description.

Fantastic Biographies!

Both Terry and Barb are big fans of biographies—they’re one of the best ways to learn from the lives of other people you admire, or about history. One of Terry’s recent favorites is Tales From Both Sides of the Brain: A Life in Neuroscience, written by Terry’s friend Mike Gazzaniga. The book describes how Mike’s work led to a whole new insight into how consciousness is distributed broadly between the two hemispheres. And one of Barb’s all time favorite biographies is Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, by Jack Weatherford. Weatherford traveled thousands of miles, many on horseback, in the Great Khan’s footsteps. Biographies just don’t come better than this.

Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

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

Follow LHTL on Facebook | Join the private LHTL Hall of Fame group | Follow LHTL on Twitter

Cheery Friday greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

Time to Go Surfing—or to Ride a Unicycle

In the MOOC, we use the example of a surfing zombie to represent process versus product. That is, the idea of getting into the flow of your work. It turns out that the surfing zombie is a good metaphor for something else—the value of learning a new sport. Read this great New York Times article by Gretchen Reynolds: “Learning a New Sport May Be Good for the Brain.”

A Free Online Bachelor’s Level Biology Education

Learning How to Learner Brian Brookshire has put together an excellent post on how to capture the bulk of a bachelor’s degree in biology entirely through free MOOCs offered by top tier universities. As he relates in his posting, Brian has a bachelor’s from Stanford, and would like to pursue his doctorate in biology—despite the fact that he hasn’t taken any formal college or high school courses in biology! How to get himself prepared at low cost? You guessed it—MOOCs. (If you are a top researcher looking for a highly creative, keenly-motivated student, I’d suggest looking at Brian.)

Taiwan in the News!

Taiwan has some VERY exciting MOOC-related activities coming up—Barb will be there on April 21-22. Aren’t you curious now to know what’s going to happen? Stay tuned!

A Mind for Numbers has been continuing to grow globally in popularity—it’s now published in traditional Chinese: 用對腦，從此不再怕數字：學會如何學習，以如何創意思考，解決(幾乎)所有的問題! Enjoy!

Great Books about Statistics

We have a minor hobby of reading books about statistics and probability. In fact, statistics and probability shape everything around you, so the more you learn, the deeper your awareness of life. You don’t need to understand every detail of the math to still pick up useful insights. In fact, many of these books don’t rely on equations to convey their main ideas. Here’s our “all star” listing:

• The Lady Tasting Tea: How Statistics Revolutionized Science in the Twentieth Century, David Salsburg. One of the best histories of statistics, wrapped up in beautiful stories. A wonderful book!
• Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything, by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner. This first is still our favorite of Levitt and Dubner’s wonderful series of books. You couldn’t find a better way to understand everything from how and why school teachers cheat to the strange world of sumo wrestling.
• The Signal and the Noise: Why So Many Predictions Fail–but Some Don’t, by Nate Silver. Sometimes it’s hard to get a grasp on Bayesian ways of thinking. Not when Nate Silver writes about it! He not only makes everything easy to read—he makes it exciting!
• The Theory That Would Not Die: How Bayes’ Rule Cracked the Enigma Code, Hunted Down Russian Submarines, and Emerged Triumphant from Two Centuries of Controversy, by Sharon Bertsch McGrayne. Okay, we’re suckers for history with regards World War II, so that makes this excellent book a “two-fer”–fascinating insights about probability mixed with compelling stories about vital historical events.

Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

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

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Cheery Friday greetings to our Learning How to Learners!

Why don’t we ride zebras like horses?

Chris Higgins in Mental Floss points us towards one of the most informative, funniest little videos we’ve seen in a long time: Why Don’t We Ride Zebras Like Horses? This video grows from one of our favorite books, Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, by Jared Diamond. Diamond helped create a virtual genre of large scale studies of people and their cultures. One of the most recent books to emerge from that genre is our top recommended book last year, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, by Yuval Noah Harari

Learning How to Learn continues to grow—in many different languages!

Learning How to Learn continues as a juggernaut in the world of MOOCs. We have had nearly 1.4 million registered students since the course’s birthday. Learning How to Learn is the most-translated of all Coursera’s courses, with completely translated Spanish, Chinese, and Portuguese versions, and videos captioned in many other languages.

If you’d like to help with translating Learning How to Learn into your favorite language, please sign up for the Coursera Global Translator Community (GTC). (Take a look at the great pdf that walks you through the signup process.) Once you’re signed up with a Transifex account, just make sure you’re logged in to Transifex and you should then be able to find the translation project for Learning How to Learn here. If you have a problem, just email our own special Learning How to Learn contact at Coursera, at LHTL-translations@coursera.org.

Complexity theory

We’ve long had an interest in complexity theory. Our friend Zach Caceres, who heads the Michael Polanyi College, a wonderfully open program for obtaining a college degree at the Universidad Francisco Marroquín, has recommended the Complexity Explorer at the Santa Fe Institute. This website has excellent online courses and other educational materials related to complex systems science.

GREAT general book to get you started on chaos theory

If you’re not a scientist, (or even if you are) and you want to get a compelling overview of the birth of chaos theory—a sort of fraternal twin to complexity theory—read James’ Gleick’s Pulitzer Prize nominated, million copy best-seller Chaos: Making a New Science. It’s now in its 20th anniversary edition. We recall once speaking with a philosopher who made erroneous presumptions about how the world works (he hadn’t studied chaos theory). This misunderstanding crept back into his studies of philosophy. Whatever you know, or think you know, it can be helpful to broaden your understanding by learning at least a little about important new areas.

Have a happy week in Learning How to Learn!

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

Follow LHTL on Facebook | Join the private LHTL Hall of Fame group | Follow LHTL on Twitter .