Excellent Sheep? Excellent Students?

I do not necessarily agree with this author's point view, data, or logic.

However if he is right, we need to something for our kids and our schools

"How to Study " by Ron Fry : Book Review

How to Study by Ron Fry, 2005, 6th edition is a wonderful book for study techniques. The section titled "How to Read Technical Text" is particularly excellent.

Reading Purposes

1. You may be reading to grasp a certain message.
2. You may want to answer a specific question.
3. You may be reading to evaluate what you are reading.
4. You may be trying to find important details.
5. You are only interested in applying what you are reading to your task at hand.

Technical Text Reading

Concentrate on:

1. Definitions, terms, vocabulary. They are the foundations.
2. Examples. They help you consolidate your understanding.
3. Visuals. They save you a lot of work. A picture is often worth more than a thousand words.
4. Relationships e.g. classifications, contrasts, cause and effects, etc.

Tie up often. Pause and  stop to check and to solidify your understanding.

Review and solidify often, especially with definitions, examples, formulas.

"What Smart Students Know" : Book Review

What Smart Students Know by Adam Robinson, 1993 is still fresh and relevant for today students. I recommend this section in particular : "What if You Get Confused while Reading?"

What to Focus while Reading?

1. Purpose


2. Your existing knowledge


3. The big picture


4. Key ideas, definitions, terms


5. Your summary


6. Your organization


7. Your mental picture


8. Your hook/cue/mnemonics

What if You Get Confused while Reading?

1. Return to the big picture.


2. Backtrack. Retrace your steps to note the wrong turns you've taken.


3. Jump to the end


4. Find an example.


5. Skip it!

Concepts

1. Definitions


2. Examples


3. Relationships

How to Organize

1. Ways to compare


2. Similarities and differences


3. Dependency, order, relationships etc

Kinds of Hooks or Mnemonics

1. Pictures


2. Patterns


3. Rhymes


4. Stories

Problem Solving

imitate -----------> understand
what --------------> why

1. Guess, trial and error. Play around.


2. Approximate.


3. Try extreme cases


4. Try special or general cases


5. Restate or re-formulate the problem.


6. Remind yourself of similar problems, or some relevant/related concepts


7. Reconstruct the problem in smaller or simpler ways. Our favorite trick.