On today’s show, we feature Scott Young, author of Wall Street Journal best-selling book, Ultralearning: Master Hard Skills, Outsmart the Competition, and Accelerate Your Career.
Scott is a writer, programmer, traveler and avid reader of interesting things. For the last ten years, he has been experimenting to find out how to learn and think better. Through this journey, he has finished a 4-year MIT computer science curriculum and learned four languages in just one year. Unbelievable, right? He does all of this by learning effectively.
If you are on a journey of learning or mastering something, this episode is definitely for you. Scott and I discuss different types of learning as well as the advantages and disadvantages of classroom learning for languages. Listen as we dive deep into the principles of cognitive science to learn and master skills effectively.
Episode Highlights:
- Getting an MIT Education (3:00)
- Most Valuable Lesson from the MIT Challenge (12:52)
- Getting inspired by Fluent in 3 Months with Benny The Irish Polyglot (15:08)
- Advantages and Disadvantages of Classroom Learning for Languages (23:52)
- Nine Principles of Cognitive Science (26:02)
- The Feynman Technique (35:13)
AND MUCH MORE!
Resources Mentioned In This Episode:
- If you want to know more about Scott, visit his website: scotthyoung.com
- Connect with Scott:
- Get your copy of the Wall Street Journal bestseller, Ultralearning: Master Hard Skills, Outsmart the Competition, and Accelerate Your Career by Scott Young
- Learn more about Scott’s experience with The MIT Challenge
- Want to try the MIT Challenge? Visit MIT OpenCourseWare for various free online course materials.
- Be fluent in other languages in just 3 Months with Benny The Irish Polyglot.
- A study on the principle of retrieval: Retrieval Practice Produces More Learning Than Elaborative Studying with Concept Mapping by Jeffrey D. Karpicke and Janell R. Blunt
- Learn Faster with the Feynman Technique
- Book Recommendations:
- The Enigma of Reason by Dan Sperber and Hugo Mercier
- So Good They Can’t Ignore You by Cal Newport
- Getting Things Done by David Allen
Quotes:
“The problem in our collective discussion about education, learning and mastery is that we just kind of conflict the two – to be an expert is to have a PhD.”
“Someone can have a lot of credentials and not have a lot of real-world skills that would make them effective as an individual, and vice versa.”
“The best way I can describe classroom learning for languages is that it is usually incomplete.”
“One of the major reasons that people struggle was because you are getting one part of the puzzle but you don’t have enough to assemble it.”
“Teaching to someone else, quite often, is a form of retrieval practice.”
“If you plan your route very well and you go in the right direction, you can reach your destination sooner.”
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