Marshmallow occasionally reads and reviews books about how to be a good student and today she is writing about one such book: Learning How to Learn: How to Succeed in School Without Spending All Your Time Studying (A Guide for Kids and Teens), a neat book by Barbara Oakley, Terrence Sejnowski, and Alistair McConville, published originally in 2018.
Marshmallow’s Quick Take: If you are a student, a teacher, or anyone who has felt lost in school, then this is the book for you!
Marshmallow’s Summary (with Spoilers): The book starts off with a note to parents and teachers who are reading the book to help a young student. The book officially starts with one of the authors, Oakley, introducing herself to the reader. She writes that she used to be a student who focused only on her liberal arts subjects, feeling that science and math (the subjects she struggled in) were not relevant to her because she was following her passions. However, I was a bit surprised to read the next sentence in which she reveals that she is now a professor of engineering—which requires a deep understanding of science and math as she admits. The enabling factor of this switch was her ability to learn how to learn. She next introduces her co-authors Sejnowski and McConville and then describes how her life changed and how she changed to adapt.
Most chapters in the book have case examples of somebody who, like Oakley, demonstrates the importance of knowing how to learn. Some of the chapter names are as follows: “The Problem with Passion,” “Easy Does It: Why Trying Too Hard Can Sometimes Be Part of the Problem,” “I’ll Do It Later, Honest! Using a Tomato to Beat Procrastination,” “Brain-Links and Fun with Space Aliens,” “Learning While You Sleep: How to Wake Up Smarter,” and “Learning Surprises: Pssst…Your Worst Traits Can Be Your Best Traits!”
One can probably tell that the book is full of interesting yet slightly silly-sounding topics. The authors talk about and teach a lot about fascinating neuroscience, but they explain everything with metaphors and cartoon drawings. There are a lot of pictures and the text of the book is large, so it is overall very comprehensible.
I liked how the authors synthesize the most relevant parts into tips at the end of the chapter. In order to teach the reader how to get better at learning, each chapter also has a list of questions to answer that help you do some active recall. I felt like these end-of-chapter activities make the book feel very interactive and energetic!
Overall, the authors provide a lot of intriguing information and shrewd advice. Some of the strategies were ones I had heard of before or have discovered on my own as a student, but a lot of them were also new to me. Each chapter focuses on a general theme or topic, expanding on the subject at hand throughout. This book is a great source for all students, teachers, and bunnies looking to get better at learning or just understand how the brain works better!
Marshmallow’s Review: I would highly recommend Learning How to Learn to everyone, especially students. I think (and I have heard some of my friends at school talk about this) that a lot of students feel as though they have never actually been taught how to learn. This is partially true, as most students are never told how to study or do their homework. When students are working on their own time, away from school and the direction of teachers, they are not always very good at knowing where to go or what to do. This book provides a lot of good instructions and helps steer the reader on a clearer, better path.
I regret not having read this book earlier. I will try to establish some of the habits suggested by this book and I hope that I will be better at learning and learning how to learn. I have already, on my own volition, focused a lot on how to learn and be a good student. For people also interested in this topic, I would also recommend looking at Cal Newport’s How to Be a High School Superstar and How to Become a Straight-A Student. This book is a lot more kid-friendly though, and a lot easier to read and understand. I really liked how interactive Learning How to Learn is and how it has a lot of images to break down the more complex ideas. I think the authors have done a very good thing by writing this book.
I would highly recommend that parents read Learning How to Learn with their children—the younger and earlier, the better. Too many bunnies fall behind in school because they feel like they simply aren’t smart enough to learn the material. This book shows that you don’t need to be smart, at least not in the way you think; you just need to try your best in a smarter way.
Marshmallow’s Rating: 100%.
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