I am a year 10 student from Melbourne doing a computer science course through The Odin Project (which I highly recommend to people who wish to learn more about computer science) and one of the things they teach which is how to achieve the proper mindset for effective studying and I thought I would try and write it out to be a bit more applicable to high school students since it taught some good advice about learning in general. This isn't my work and I don't claim it to be, I've just written done some of the main parts and added some analogies. I'm just doing this to give my two cents so feel free to read this.
Motivation and Mindset
We must understand why we want to learn something. Without this we won’t have the proper motivation to study something in the long term.
The next thing we need is a growth mindset. You need to be able to be resilient and continue to push despite challenges that arise. This will sometimes be referred to as Persistence or Grit. When learning something you will often be met with challenges that you cannot overcome immediately.
There are two ways in which we learn which are focus and diffuse mode. Focus mode is a more active and proactive learning where you consciously focus on learning from videos, books, textbooks, etc. Diffuse mode is a subconscious process where you are not actively learning but while doing random tasks your brain is connecting learnt knowledge to things you know that’s why taking a break from a problem is useful. This is where we make breakthroughs. A combination of these two concepts will ensure the best understanding of knowledge.
Another tip is to teach concepts to others. By teaching others, you can identify learning deficiencies and you can thus return to your resource to relearn concepts that hadn’t been properly learnt. You won’t always be able to teach someone of the exact level of knowledge you want but explaining it as simply as possible that a 10 year could understand is similar. By explaining aloud to ourselves we can similarly achieve the same results as teaching. In fact this is part of the reason to why I am writing this. So, what do you do when your stuck? When you are confused you need to use the following tools to resolve your problem:
- Google it: Most likely someone has encountered a similar problem.
- Take a break: Allow the diffuse learning state to work on your problem.
- Ask for help: Prepare research and formulate a proper question to ask someone with proper experience.
The next thing I must write about is about AI. AI is an incredible tool that can generate code (or essays about Macbeth lol) at a blistering rate however it doesn’t allow for any meaningful learning. It may be tempting to get AI to complete your work however the only one you are cheating is yourself. It can affect your core learning so that down the line where the use of AI isn’t possible you are going to be stuck in a situation that far outstrips the benefits of cheating on your assignment. There are some benefits but more for using in tandem with learning such as where AI can lead your thought process or explain your concepts in simple terms, but you must be aware of the possible negative affects AI will have on your learning at the end of the day.
Another thing I want to bring up is managing our study time. We should put consistent effort, preferably daily into something such as programming. Consistency in small steps will drastically improve your progress as opposed to big steps once a week. The analogy of small steps beating a person who skips steps and must rest is a great analogy of this. If we overload ourselves too much in short bursts, we burnout and we lose our motivation for extended periods of time. Deadlines cause a lot of stress so putting things off is the worst thing you can do. I read an interesting experience from a person who majored in computer engineering at Georgia Tech. Both business majors and engineering majors are lazy, but business majors are lazy in the sense they get things done to the bare minimum so little effort but high output. Meanwhile engineering majors procrastinate and leave things to the last minute and by the time they start it’s the night before and they try and make everything perfect. The perfect way is a mix. You need to work on things in advance and try and achieve high output with less effort but also present something good, not perfect but “good enough”.
Here are some pitfalls to avoid:
- Procrastination: This will hinder your progress, so the best solution is to use the Pomodoro technique. This will force you to work without distractions and do enough work in the time before your focus wanes.
- Not taking breaks: You may be compelled to study for long periods of time, to be fair I haven’t stopped writing for a while now and should probably take a break after this. It may seem counter-intuitive but taking breaks will put your body and mind in the optimal condition to learn. It’s like a bodybuilder taking rests between sets at the gym. You can’t work out forever and you need your muscles to recover. The solution again is to use the Pomodoro technique again.
- Digital distractions: Email, TikTok or snapchat. All three of these will hinder your progress by making you side-tracked. This will only lead to procrastination. The solution? Put your phone away and try and limit your access to distracting sites.
- Physical distractions: These are things like a TV in the background or other people talking. These are just as damaging as their digital counterpart. The solution in this case is to find a quiet place free of distractions that will encourage high quality learning.
- Rabbit holes: You will sometimes have to cover a lot of material when studying something. However, it is very easy to fall down a path of learning that isn’t related to what you need to know. The best tip is to try and focus on the path or content that has been set for you and not to stray to far from your “trail”. Rabbit holes only ruin your momentum and drive while studying.
- Comparing yourself to others: Students often compare themselves to others who are farther along their learning journey or have more expertise in different topics. This will only lead to frustration and depression. Yes, I am looking at my fellow Asians who get compared to their cousins or family friends. The solution is to realise the only person you should compare yourself to is your past self. Have you improved from a month ago? Have you gained invaluable experience in this time? Ask these to yourself and be proud of any progress you make!
- Counter productive not-taking: Notes are good don’t get me wrong and there are defiantly times where notes are a non-negotiable however it is time consuming to take to many notes of every little thing said and often leads wasted effort. The solution is to make notes that can serve as future prompts for research or to write things that must be remembered such as a definition or a tough math problem. Get comfortable reading documentation, this is essentially pre-existing notes made by someone else.
Avoid falling into these pitfalls as you will lose your motivation and energy to things that will not at the end of the day impact your learning.
Learning new skills is a journey full of obstacles you must overcome. By using these principles laid out here, you can develop effective procedures to leap over these walls and consolidate our knowledge in meaningful and memorable way.
So that is my two cents I wanted to share, If you have anything to add feel free to write it. If you want to do The Odin Project you can access it here: https://www.theodinproject.com/
That's pretty much it thank you if you read this far and have a good rest of your day and hopefully good study in the future😃 (This emoji is kinda cringe idk).
