Top 10 Strategies for Learning New Skills
You don’t need luck, youth, or even a high IQ to gain that new skill you’ve been thinking about. All you need is a little elbow grease and the right learning techniques. Whether you want to learn a new subject, gain a new skill, or enhance the ones you already have, these 10 techniques will give you the framework you need to achieve mastery
Ditch Your Learning Style
40 years of research on learning styles has found that matching teaching styles to learning styles makes no difference at all.
- The contrast between the enormous popularity of the learning-styles approach within education and the lack of credible evidence for its utility is striking and disturbing.
- So, what’s really the best way to learn? It depends on what you’re trying to learn in the first place.
Take Frequent Breaks
It’s important to let your brain relax for a while after a particularly intense session of study or practice to give it time to connect the dots.
- One good way to practice this is using the Pomodoro technique, which has you work on a project for 25 minutes, and then give yourself a 5 minute break.
Find a Mentor
Mentorship is the quickest way to take your skills to the next level
- Initially, look to friends, family, and coworkers for an expert in the skill you are trying to learn.
- When reaching out to experts, describe what you have to offer, rather than what you will gain
- Start small and see where it goes
Be Curious
Ask questions, make mistakes, and get messy
- Seek answers from many sources
- Think about why they matter, why they’re relevant
- Tinker with the tools and knowledge available
- You may end up surprising even yourself
- Still in college? Here are 20+ Productivity Apps for College Students and Young Professionals
- Protect your schedule and give yourself time for everything you want to do with these 3 Free Apps That Make Time-Blocking Easy
Teach What You Learn
One of the more surprising ways you can learn a new skill is to teach it to someone else
- When we learn with the intention to teach, we break the material down into simple, understandable chunks for ourselves
- It forces us to examine the topic more critically and thoroughly, helping us to understand it better
Make It More Meaningful for Yourself
We learn things in terms of meaning
- If you try to force yourself to just memorize random facts, you’re likely to forget them
- Make real life connections and see how it fits in the larger scheme of things
- Understand what relevance it has in practice
Spend More Time Practicing Things You Find Difficult
In order to excel at any skill, you need to push yourself out of your comfort zone and practice things you aren’t good at.
- This is known as deliberate practice, and was popularized by Anders Ericsson.
Test Yourself
Most students re-read notes before exams, but top students spend their time solving problems and taking practice exams.
- Testing even beats out methods such as re-reading and reviewing notes when it comes to making sure your learning sticks
- Why is testing so effective?
- Recall shows how much of the material you remember.
Learn by Doing
Dive in as soon as you can to master the skill through trial and error
- The more you do it, the more you learn
- Start small and reward yourself to start building a pattern of behavior that will reinforce what you’re learning
Study the Greats, and Then Practice
Mimic experts until you eventually develop your own style and technique
- Compare your work with that of experts in your field to see where you need improvement
- This form of learning can be applied to any skill such as speaking another language or playing another language
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