Having Articulated My Learning Process Made Me Learn Easier.
I’m sharing my learning process that I picked up through years of pursuit of many endeavors. It has been helping me to be able to do them and continue improving.
I hope it will help you as much as it have been helping me.
Learning is an invaluable skill to keep you competent and valuable with our ever-evolving society.
Arming yourself with new knowledge, skills and capabilities allow you to gain new insights and expand your perspective on things. Enabling you to solve new and bigger problems, capitalize on new opportunities and achieve a goal.
But learning is a deliberate and active act, not a passive one that the investment of your time and effort would automatically result in productive learning.
Define the Essence
It allows you to figure out the overview of the discipline, and to determine the most fundamental: purpose, objectives, challenges and scope (what makes up the discipline and what doesn’t). Furthermore, it is going to be the foundation of our understanding and will act as a map for our actions and decisions further in our journey to learning.
Purpose of the discipline seems so simple that we just often neglect.
But not establishing the right understanding of this simple fact could result in misalignment with our — understanding, actions, decisions, and motivations — towards the actual goal.
Let me share my experience, My first passion is basketball which I’m still deeply in love with. But I wasn’t able to realize my potential and improve how could have improved; Not because of lack of investment of time, effort and dedication but because of flawed understandings of the game and a learning method that is not working. I should be more focus on the simple principle that it is a team sport,that it has a lot of variables involved to win more than just an individual skill set — I was playing for myself.
Examples of defining the essence of a discipline
Basketball — is a team sport, that the main objective is to outscore the opposing team in the allotted time by making baskets under a set of rules and regulations. The team with higher score win after the time expires.
Motion Graphics — its objective is to communicate, educate, explain and entertain through compelling use of visuals, animation, and audio.
Analysis
The analysis involves breaking down and classification of the complex whole into principles and elements — to understand it easier — to know its causal relationships.
I worked with a company before to edit videos and motion graphics content for its e-learning platform and worked with different artists. Most of them doing it for years, but a guy, younger among our senior artists produce amazing work better than others with longer experience. Then I asked myself, What is he doing differently? Someone can say that he is just talented and that is why, but I went to inspect.
In animation, there are 12 principles animation developed by the ‘old men’ of Walt Disney Studios, among them were Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston. It is now become widely used as a fundamental theory for all artist working with animation. That is when I realized what he is doing that beats experience. It is his knowledge of the principles and reasons why things work well, and his ability to implement those into his work that made the difference.
The Swiss knife for figuring things out
Our way of seeking explanations and gain understanding of the things we don’t understand yet is asking questions.
There are no other words you can rely upon on precision with extracting data and drilling into the specifics of things.
The foundation of questions: What, When, Where, Why, How.
( Let’s give a scenario which demonstrates the utility of these words. )
You can have a meaningful conversation with someone using only these words.
Cardo: I broke up with my girlfriend.
Bongo: What?
Cardo: Yeah, we have been together for years and it all just went to waste.
Bongo: When?
Cardo: I broke up with her yesterday.
Bongo: Where?
Cardo: At our secret meeting place.
Bongo: How?
Cardo: I texted her after work and said I have something to tell her. And there I said it’s over.
Bongo: Why?
Cardo: I thought she was the one, but she likes another one.
Example of analyzing a discipline
Understand the box
The box is all of the constraining variables such as regulations, rules, tools, skill- levels, etc. in a discipline that we need to consider and work out. We need to aware of this to formulate the best strategies, actions, decisions for the situation towards the goal — in consideration of these limitations.
For example:
· A motion designer learning how to use the tools to turn his concept and ideas generated from his imagination and implement it.
· A basketball player studying the rules and regulation, to recognize the best decisions to do in-game considering the score, time, fouls, defense, etc.
· A writer learning grammar rules and how to structure his thoughts to sentences to paragraphs.
Analogy
The analogy is useful in trying to understand a new discipline and find better ways of doing things. Because you are making connections from your prior knowledge and with the commonality with other disciplines.
For example:
• Motion graphics is like drawing, where the principles and techniques are just build up upon or combine. that is why the piece looks and feels great. And the lack of this understanding makes things look very complicated.
• If there is a reason why things work well with one discipline, then I wonder what would happen if I combine those with other disciplines.
- What if I mix the principles and techniques of a concept artist (basically like the illustration on steroids) use and apply it with my work?
Recall and Explain
The short term and long term memory
Phone number analogy
Think of a short term and long term memory like remembering a phone number. You can hold a phone number in your head after just hearing it. But if you don’t proceed on recalling and keep on reiterating it. You forget it in a moment. But if you did, you remember it for a long time.
And when you explain a topic, It forces you to recall and summarize your understandings, and put together your reasoning to communicate it to another person. It also helps you evaluate your understanding, and know what you know from what you think you know.
Having an articulated learning process, helps you to have a method to reflect on and be able to tweak things for improvement; It allows you to evaluate yourself of where you are and map out how you are going to get to the goal.
Now go forth! and learn better.
