Hey,<\/p>\n
Is it possible to pass exams without studying?<\/p>\n
When I started writing about holistic learning several years ago,
\nthe biggest and most controversial claim was that it was possible
\nto ace final exams with little or no studying.<\/p>\n
I still hold to that claim (although I wouldn’t say it’s ideal)
\nmostly from following one principle I’ll summarize as:<\/p>\n
Learn it once.<\/p>\n
This is the idea behind a lot in holistic learning and it has
\nseveral implications. No, it doesn’t excuse you for not putting in
\nthe work to really understand your subject, but it is a different
\nway of learning than most students are used to.<\/p>\n
Learn as You’re Taught<\/p>\n
One of the biggest disadvantages I see in the current academic
\nmentality is that students are often encouraged to do most of their
\nactual learning right before an exam.<\/p>\n
This is an incredibly ineffective way to learn.<\/p>\n
By following “learn it once” your goal becomes to learn things as
\nthey are taught. So whenever you’re given a reading assignment, sit
\nthrough a lecture or are given new material, your immediate goal
\nbecomes making the connections to foster a deeper understanding.<\/p>\n
Studying should only be a brief review, resparking the connections
\nthat you had laid out throughout the entire course.<\/p>\n
Learn Deeply the First Time<\/p>\n
If you don’t “get” something when you first see it, make
\nunderstanding your primary goal.<\/p>\n
Another implication of “learn it once” is that you don’t leave
\nlearning unfinished. If you’re taught the chain rule in differential
\ncalculus and don’t understand it, you don’t wait until three
\nlectures later to start working through it.<\/p>\n
How do you get that deep understanding? Well metaphor,
\nvisceralization, diagrams and other holistic techniques work. But
\nsometimes the key is simply finding a better explanation online or
\nsitting through the problem sets until you can see the pattern.<\/p>\n
You know the difference in feeling like you get something
\ncompletely and when you don’t fully understand what you’re being
\ntaught. Cultivate an obsession to push through the latter feeling
\nand not to procrastinate on it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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