Letters Remain

Category: learning

  • Psychology of Learning

    Tom Stafford—co-author of Mind Hacks—has written a series of posts on what psychologists know about learning. For anyone interested in education and personal development, these provide an interesting introduction to a few topics of note. Learning Makes Itself Invisible Once you have learnt something you see the world differently. Not only can you appreciate or…

  • Spaced Repetition and the SuperMemo Learning Algorithm

    Spaced repetition is a learning technique taking advantage of what is known as the ‘forgetting curve’: a predictable pattern of how we forget information. With this in mind, Piotr WoĆșniak developed SuperMemo—an algorithm specifically designed to predict the future state of a person’s memory to schedule information reviews at the optimal time. Wired profiles WoĆșniak, taking a closer look…

  • Better Communication

    Many people equate good communication skills with the ability to speak well and listen well. This assumption misses one essential component: two-way communication skills. Primarily written for mentors, this advice on good two-way communication is particularly useful for all. I especially like the Traffic Light Rule of communication: During the first 30 seconds of an…

  • Is ‘Number Sense’ (or Dyscalculia) Innate?

    Is our ability to count and estimate quantity an innate skill, or is it learned? To answer this question The Economist looks briefly at the history of counting; people who speak languages that have words only for ‘one’, ‘two’, ‘few’ and ‘many’; and dyscalculia—a condition similar to dyslexia where sufferers lack basic ‘number sense’ or…

  • Misunderstanding and Rethinking Expertise

    The public’s distrust of scientific experts has been growing in recent years, as is worryingly evident with subjects such as Creationism and particle physics (think: the LHC)—but why is this happening? Harry Collins and Robert Evans, sociologists at my alma mater, Cardiff University, believe it has to do with a “misunderstanding of expertise itself”. They talk…

  • Improving the Public’s Perception of Science

    Prof. Chad Orzel of Uncertain Principles highlights a number of ways we can all help to improve the public’s perception of science. Buy and promote science books Demand science from the media Support science education across the board Train and/or support science teachers Encourage science students in other careers Encourage good commuicators Reward outreach Written primarily…

  • The Future of Education

    Don Tapscott, author of Wikinomics, talks to The Telegraph about his views on the future of learning. The old-fashioned model of education still prevalent in today’s schools, involving remembering facts ‘off pat’, was designed for the industrial age. [
] This might have been good for the mass production economy, but it doesn’t deliver for the…

  • Raising Smart Children: Concentrate on Effort, not Ability

    An old Scientific American article looks at the findings from three decades of research into how to raise intelligent children. Our society worships talent, and many people assume that possessing superior intelligence or ability—along with confidence in that ability—is a recipe for success. In fact, however, more than 30 years of scientific investigation suggests that…

  • What Should Any Educated Person Know?

    Tucker Max creates a list of what he believes is the information any educated person should know. By no means a definitive list (far from it), but some good information regardless. English lit: Read lots of novels, especially the classics. There are hundreds of sites out there that purport to list the Western Canon, browse a…

  • How to Take Notes Like an Alpha-Geek

    It’s been a year since Tim Ferriss pressed ‘Publish’ on an article that I find myself going back to whenever I feel disorganised and overcome by endless pieces of paper: how to take notes like an alpha-geek. I trust the weakest pen more than the strongest memory, and note taking is—in my experience—one of the…