Week 11.5 : The illusion of comprehension (Patreon)

(Related to Philosophy test by Glenberg, Wilkinson and Epstein, Coursera: learn how to learn and my own experience)

 When you learn, you may think you understand the subject....most of it. But in fact, you may understand only 20%-30% of the information of what you listen to or read. Because you might use the wrong method of learning.

The most common illusion I've discovered are

1. Read the text aloud like a reporter. :

If you focus on reading smoothly, you can't process the visual information fast enough for the current sentence. And when the next paragraph comes, you might forget what the current one said.

How to fix it: Taking a break after 2 or 3 sentences and try to make a visual link or give them a short definition, short conclusion before proceed.

2. Listen to a professor, teacher, or mentor who shows you how to solve the problem

Even you listen to it very carefully and 100% understand how to solve the problems, you only understand how they solve the problem. It's their understanding, not yours. It doesn't guarantee you can solve it yourself. And their confidence in solving problems may trick you to think that you can solve the problem like them too.

How to fix it: Doing an exercise without asking them for any hint. Complete the exercise from start to finish all by yourself. If it's wrong, let it be. Ask them after you have the result.

3. Taking a hint from the reference while doing a self-test.

If you search for the syntax, it's fine. But if you look at the ref to see how to do the next step, it's not fine. You may think you fully understand the problem because you write everything down as it should be, but the truth is you can remember only some part of it, not the whole process and you can't link them together. So when you face a new problem, you might not able to solve it.

How to fix it: Try to understand the exercise first, and then you do the test. Do not look at the reference while doing the test. If the result is wrong, let it be. Taking a break, re-study the ref, and do it again from the beginning until you can solve the problem from start to finish without any hint.

All of these are common student mistakes. There're plenty more of the illusions I haven't talked about. But you can avoid it by keep telling yourself that, "You'll not fully understand the subject by listening or reading only"