The process of learning is made easier with strategies. But what strategies should you use?
The process of learning is the process of continually updating your understanding of things. When we learn things, we always have to consider if what we already know is correct or not. We do this by questioning ourselves and questioning the world around us. When a person stops questioning whether or not their understanding of something is right, they stop learning.
One key to continually improving our understanding is improving our ability to notice and analyze details. Every time we learn to notice new details of something, we should think about how that changes our understanding of the whole. After all, “we don’t know what we don’t know.” and noticing new details in a familiar thing helps us remember to keep an eye open.
Honestly evaluating our understanding of a subject is a difficult thing. It can be tough to admit that we don’t know something. Asking questions about what you don’t know can be even tougher, especially in social situations where acknowledging not understanding something can be embarrassing. But, if we don’t do this, then we can’t move forward.
Over my years as a teacher and tutor, I have developed a simple method for making sure that students never stop questioning their understanding. I call that strategy LATER. LATER stands for Listen, Ask, Think, Evaluate, Respond. If you or your child have gotten into a rut with your learning, use this strategy to help you move forward. Let’s take a look at how to do that.
Listen.
Knowledge speaks, but wisdom listens. If you aren’t sure about something, listen carefully to what others are saying about it. It’s important to practice active listening when doing this. Listening passively is like being on the inside of a closed-door with someone trying to throw a ball from the outside. You may be aware of the ball’s presence, but you can’t catch it. Active listening is like opening that door so that you CAN catch the ball. Although listening generally means what you do with your ears, for the sake of this article, I am defining it as receiving information, whether by listening or watching (and watching includes reading).
Listening can be summarized as receiving information and noticing useful or interesting things within it. It can include reading, having a conversation, listening to audio, or watching a video.
Keywords to think about when practicing listening: Active, passive, focused, intensive.
Ask.
Learning to ask questions is critical to the process of learning. After you listen to something ask questions to help check your understanding and gain more details. Asking questions gives you the chance to listen to your own thoughts, which can be helpful when trying to understand something.
When you ask questions, you could be asking questions to others, or you could be applying question strategies to your study material. IE searching for information on Google or flipping through your book to compare things within it.
Asking questions helps to act as a filter. Always remember: The truth doesn’t mind being questioned. If what you are learning does not stand up to rigorous questioning, then it’s probably not worth spending your energy on. On the other hand, if it doesn’t stand up to rigorous questioning, that could provide you opportunities to further improve your understanding by finding out why.
Keywords to think about when asking questions are: Who, what, when, where, why, how, in what way, right, wrong.
Think.
So you have gained a new idea and asked questions about it. Now it’s time to spend some time thinking about it. Thinking comes in two varieties. One is focused thinking, the other is diffuse thinking.
What do these mean?
Focused thinking is when you are actively thinking about something to understand it. It is deep concentration. You are applying your analytical skills to comprehend its parts.
Diffuse thinking is when you let your mind wander. After you have taken some time to think actively about a thing, turn your attention to something else and let the topic take a back seat. It’s at this time that your mind will naturally start building connections between the new information and old information.
Learning is done best when you cycle between brief periods of focused, intense thought, followed by periods of casual, light activity. Think about hit like high-intensity training for your body.
A common example of this is when you get a “shower idea”. What is that? Have you ever been in the shower, letting your mind wander, and suddenly you have an idea or understand something? It’s that. It can be taking a walk, taking a shower, going for an aimless drive, going for a bike ride. Ask yourself why all the famous writers made it a habit to take daily walks.
Keywords to think about during the thinking stage: active, diffuse, intense, focus, intentional, relaxed, associative.
Evaluate.
This is where you make conclusions and form opinions.
Evaluating the outcome is exactly as it sounds. It’s really a second cycle of asking questions. Whereas the “ask” part of LATER is asking questions to other people or outside sources, evaluating is asking questions to yourself. By questioning yourself internally, you can check for logical consistency and determine if something makes sense. If it doesn’t make sense, then the evaluation stage will help you see where your understanding is incorrect, and you can repeat the cycle of listening, asking, thinking, and evaluating to improve your understanding.
Keywords to think about when evaluating are: if, and, then, so.
“If A, and B, then C, so D”.
Respond
The last step in the process of learning is to respond.
There are many different ways to respond to new information. The best way to respond is to use your new understanding to go out and seek more knowledge. In the context of the classroom, it means sharing your conclusions with your teacher and classmates. In the context of a conversation, it means giving feedback and opinions. If you are reading a book, it may mean finding other books to read for more information.
With this, you now have a strategy for improving your understanding of the process of learning. Like any skill, learning to use thinking strategies requires practice and repetition. The best part about this system of learning is that it’s a positive-feedback cycle.
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