Learning How to Learn: Powerful mental tools to help you master tough subjects
University of California, San Diego
Dr. Barbara Oakley and Dr. Terrence Sejnowski
About the course
This course gives you easy access to the invaluable learning techniques used by experts in art, music, literature, math, science, sports, and many other disciplines. We’ll learn about the how the brain uses two very different learning modes and how it encapsulates (“chunks”) information. We’ll also cover illusions of learning, memory techniques, dealing with procrastination, and best practices shown by research to be most effective in helping you master tough subjects. Using these approaches, no matter what your skill levels in topics you would like to master, you can change your thinking and change your life. If you’re already an expert, this peep under the mental hood will give you ideas for: turbocharging successful learning, including counter-intuitive test-taking tips and insights that will help you make the best use of your time on homework and problem sets. If you’re struggling, you’ll see a structured treasure trove of practical techniques that walk you through what you need to do to get on track. If you’ve ever wanted to become better at anything, this course will help serve as your guide.
English Version:
Learning How to Learn: Powerful mental tools to help you master tough subjects
Chinese Version:
About the Instructors
Barbara Oakley
Barbara Oakley, PhD, PE, is a professor of engineering in the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan, and writer of national acclaim. Her research focuses on the complex relationship between neuroscience and social behavior. Dr. Oakley’s research has been described as “revolutionary” in the Wall Street Journal—she has published in outlets as varied as the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and The New York Times.
Barb’s books have been praised by many leading researchers and writers, including Harvard’s Steven Pinker and E. O. Wilson, and National Book Award winner Joyce Carol Oates. Her book A Mind for Numbers: How to Excel at Math and Science (Even If You Flunked Algebra), (Penguin, 2014) is a New York Times best-selling science book.
Barb has won numerous teaching awards, including the American Society of Engineering Education’s Chester F. Carlson Award for technical innovation in engineering education. Barb was designated as an NSF New Century Scholar—she is also a recipient of the Oakland University Teaching Excellence Award (2013) and the National Science Foundation’s Frontiers in Engineering New Faculty Fellow Award, and she is Coursera’s inaugural “Innovation Instructor. She is an elected Fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering.
Dr. Oakley has adventured widely through her lifetime. She rose from the ranks of Private to Captain in the U.S. Army, during which time she was recognized as a Distinguished Military Scholar. She also worked as a communications expert at the South Pole Station in Antarctica, and has served as a Russian translator on board Soviet trawlers on the Bering Sea. Dr. Oakley is an elected Fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering.
For more information about Barb, go to www.barbaraoakley.com.
Terrence Sejnowski
Dr. Terrence Sejnowski is an Investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and is also the Francis Crick Professor at The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, where he directs the Computational Neurobiology Laboratory. The goal of Dr. Sejnowski’s research is to discover the principles linking brain mechanisms and behavior. Terry’s laboratory uses both experimental and modeling techniques to study the biophysical properties of synapses and neurons and the population dynamics of large networks of neurons. New computational models and new analytical tools have been developed to understand how the brain represents the world and how new representations are formed through learning algorithms for changing the synaptic strengths of connections between neurons.
A multidisciplinary expert, Dr. Sejnowski received his B.S. in physics in 1968 from the Case Western Reserve University, an M.A. in physics from Princeton University with John Archibald Wheeler, and a Ph.D. in physics from Princeton University in 1978 with John Hopfield. Dr. Sejnowski presently also holds appointments as Professor of Biological Sciences and Adjunct Professor in the Departments of Neurosciences, Psychology, Cognitive Science, and Computer Science and Engineering at the University of California, San Diego, where he is Director of the Institute for Neural Computation.
Terry is in a group of only ten living scientists to have been elected to all three of the national academies: the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies. In 2013 he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
For more information about Terry , go to http://cnl.salk.edu/ GoogleScholar