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It is extremely inefficient to just read a book 5 times, it is like throwing mud to the wall hoping that it sticks. It's much more effective to focus on each to

It is extremely inefficient to just read a book 5 times, it is like throwing mud to the wall hoping that it sticks. It's much more effective to focus on each topic and try to remember and repeat the informations just read. Having a general mental framework on the book on the other hand is very helpful.

adamnemecek 9y ago
Not it's not. It's not like each pass takes as long as if you were doing it in one pass. I would actually say that this approach is faster as it lets you focus better and on the things you want to get. > it is like throwing mud to the wall hoping that it sticks I must have not explained it well because that's the exact opposite of what I'm talking about. It's not about what sticks, it's about creating the connect-the-dots > It's much more effective to focus on each topic and try to remember and repeat the informations just read. Effective for what? Assuming that a neural net is a good approximation of the human learning model, why do nns tend to be be trained over multiple epochs?
- tigershark 9y ago
  To create the connections you have to consciously think and recall not only the topics, but also understand how they are connected and practice them. Seriously, I thought this was the last place on earth were I would have found people saying that to learn something the best way is to read a book 5 times. Because if you want to learn Java obviously the best way is to read a Java book 5 times, instead of reading one concept at a time, understanding it, recalling it, putting it in practice with exercises without looking at the book and connecting all the concepts. I will continue learning in my way that for you is for some reason so alien, good luck in learning reading 5 times.
  - adamnemecek 9y ago
    You are misunderstanding what I'm saying.
pdog 9y ago
Sorry, but you're wrong. You're not reading a book five times, cover to cover. That's not a productive use of your time. Instead, you should breeze through the table of contents. Skim the first chapter. Still interested? Skip to the last chapter and read that. Jump around to the parts that interest you. Read through it again with a broad outline of what you're reading. Encounter a boring section? Skip ahead by twenty pages or drop the book altogether. This is the best strategy for reading books for knowledge, and not just to say you've read a certain book.
- laythea 9y ago
  I agree that this scatter based approach to learning works very well for me, mainly because I am always interested in what I am learning. This approach also works for narrow scope based topics, by "flitting" between resources (internet links etc) rather than obsess about a single (possibly badly worded) article/tutorial.
- awa 9y ago
  I am reading "How to read a book" and the process you described is akin to inspectional reading. The book goes in great detail how to utilize the inspectional reading process and improve it. It also describes the next step "analytical reading" which comprises of mostly asking questions about the topic in general and about the author's intent.
- tigershark 9y ago
  I'm sorry, but I don't think you have much experience in learning. In this way you will only remember a fraction compared to focusing step by step on the different topics and purposefully recall all the concepts, ideally putting them to practice starting from scratch without looking at all at the book. Source: pretty much every research about learning agrees that the conscious efforts of recalling, especially with spaced repetition is the best way to learn something. Plus anecdotally decades of experience in learning a huge amount of topics, programming languages, human languages and whatever. If you want to learn something useful I think that it may be helpful for you the course "learning how to learn", already cited by someone else here, in coursera that explains quite well why just skimming and reading a book is a very inefficient way of learning something. Accordingly to that course and a lot of the current learning research I'm not the one that is wrong.

adamnemecek 9y ago

Not it's not. It's not like each pass takes as long as if you were doing it in one pass. I would actually say that this approach is faster as it lets you focus better and on the things you want to get. > it is like throwing mud to the wall hoping that it sticks I must have not explained it well because that's the exact opposite of what I'm talking about. It's not about what sticks, it's about creating the connect-the-dots > It's much more effective to focus on each topic and try to remember and repeat the informations just read. Effective for what? Assuming that a neural net is a good approximation of the human learning model, why do nns tend to be be trained over multiple epochs?

tigershark 9y ago
To create the connections you have to consciously think and recall not only the topics, but also understand how they are connected and practice them. Seriously, I thought this was the last place on earth were I would have found people saying that to learn something the best way is to read a book 5 times. Because if you want to learn Java obviously the best way is to read a Java book 5 times, instead of reading one concept at a time, understanding it, recalling it, putting it in practice with exercises without looking at the book and connecting all the concepts. I will continue learning in my way that for you is for some reason so alien, good luck in learning reading 5 times.
- adamnemecek 9y ago
  You are misunderstanding what I'm saying.

pdog 9y ago

Sorry, but you're wrong. You're not reading a book five times, cover to cover. That's not a productive use of your time. Instead, you should breeze through the table of contents. Skim the first chapter. Still interested? Skip to the last chapter and read that. Jump around to the parts that interest you. Read through it again with a broad outline of what you're reading. Encounter a boring section? Skip ahead by twenty pages or drop the book altogether. This is the best strategy for reading books for knowledge, and not just to say you've read a certain book.

laythea 9y ago
I agree that this scatter based approach to learning works very well for me, mainly because I am always interested in what I am learning. This approach also works for narrow scope based topics, by "flitting" between resources (internet links etc) rather than obsess about a single (possibly badly worded) article/tutorial.
awa 9y ago
I am reading "How to read a book" and the process you described is akin to inspectional reading. The book goes in great detail how to utilize the inspectional reading process and improve it. It also describes the next step "analytical reading" which comprises of mostly asking questions about the topic in general and about the author's intent.
tigershark 9y ago
I'm sorry, but I don't think you have much experience in learning. In this way you will only remember a fraction compared to focusing step by step on the different topics and purposefully recall all the concepts, ideally putting them to practice starting from scratch without looking at all at the book. Source: pretty much every research about learning agrees that the conscious efforts of recalling, especially with spaced repetition is the best way to learn something. Plus anecdotally decades of experience in learning a huge amount of topics, programming languages, human languages and whatever. If you want to learn something useful I think that it may be helpful for you the course "learning how to learn", already cited by someone else here, in coursera that explains quite well why just skimming and reading a book is a very inefficient way of learning something. Accordingly to that course and a lot of the current learning research I'm not the one that is wrong.