Reading Comprehension – 4 Ways to Remember Everything you Learn

Come stai?

(that’s “How are you?” in Italian).

Many of you are students, and even if you are already out of school or you have finished your degree, as humans we are continuously learning. So we want to be able to remember all those things we read about, right?

The Business Insider suggests the following four strategies to improve your learning skills.

4 Strategies for Remembering Everything you Learn

Force yourself to recall.

The least-fun part of effective learning is that it’s hard. In fact, the “Make It Stick” authors contend that when learning is difficult, you’re doing your best learning, in the same way that lifting a weight at the limit of your capacity makes you strongest.

It’s simple, though not easy, to take advantage of this: force yourself to recall a fact. Flashcards are a great ally in this, since they force you to supply answers.

Don’t fall for fluency.

When you’re reading something and it feels easy, what you’re experiencing is fluency.

It’ll only get you in trouble.

Example: Say, for instance, you’re at the airport and you’re trying to remember which gate your flight to Chicago is waiting for you at. You look at the terminal monitors — it’s B44. You think to yourself, oh, B44, that’s easy. Then you walk away, idly check your phone, and instantly forget where you’re going.

The alternative: You read the gate number. Then you turn away from the monitor and ask yourself, what’s the gate? If you can recall that it’s B44, you’re good to go.

Connect the new thing to the old things.

“The more you can explain about the way your new learning relates to prior knowledge,” the “Make It Stick” authors write, “the stronger your grasp of the new learning will be, and the more connections you create that will help you remember it later.”

One killer technique is to come up with real-life examples of principles you’ve just uncovered. If you’ve just learned about slant rhyme, you could read poems that exhibit it. If you’ve just discovered heat transfer, you could think of the way a warm cup of cocoa disperses warmth into your hands on a cold winter’s day.

Reflect, reflect, reflect.

Looking back helps. In a Harvard Business School study, employees who were onboarded to a call center had 22.8% higher performance than the control group when they spent just 15 minutes reflecting on their work at the end of the day.

“When people have the opportunity to reflect, they experience a boost in self-efficacy,” HBS professor Francesca Gino tells us. “They feel more confident that they can achieve things. As a result, they put more effort into what they’re doing and what they learn.”

While reflecting may seem like it leads to working less, it leads to achieving more.

Vocabulary

Contend – to argue or state (something) in a strong and definite way.

Weight – a heavy object that is lifted during exercising.

Recall – to remember (something) from the past.

Ally – a person or group that gives help to another person or group.

Gate – a place in a wall or a fence that has a movable part which can be opened or closed like a door.

Terminal monitors – the screens in the airport where you can see your flight, the time it departs and from which gate.

Idly – without much thought, effort, or concern.

Relates – to show or make a connection between (two or more things).

Prior – existing earlier in time.

Grasp – to understand (something that is complicated or difficult).

Killer – very impressive or appealing/

Uncovered – to find or become aware of (something that was hidden or secret).

Slant rhyme – rhyme in which either the vowels or the consonants of stressed syllables are identical, as in eyes, light; years, yours.

Onboarded – the mechanism through which new employees acquire the necessary knowledge, skills, and behaviors.

Reflecting – to cause people to think of someone or something in a specified way.

Boost – help or encouragement.

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