The BOLD (This learning isn’t going to just take care of itself, you know)
Our culture values learning and
Once we leave school, however, most of us have a haphazard relationship with learning. Today, we will explore three keys to deeper learning–cultivating a beginner’s mindset, choosing to build capacity and setting a deliberate learning plan.
The Whisper (Love learning like a toddler in a pile of colorful paper scraps)
Can you remember a time when you embraced learning with joyous abandon? Perhaps it
What happened, then, to this joyful learning? Dry books and grueling tests and demanding credentials and boring lectures and cruel corrections and relentless red lines probably happened. We lost the joy that is evident on the face of our dancing toddler in the photo. We learned that learning is hard work.
Learning is also critically important. There can be no growth without learning. Without growth, we stagnate. How can we bring the joy back to learning and partner with our brain to explore and grow? Let’s look at three critical aspects of learning–three keys to deeper learning.
KEY 1: DEVELOP A BEGINNER’S MINDSET
Ok, Grasshopper, it’s time to develop the beginner’s mindset. One of the biggest obstacles to learning is believing that we have nothing to learn.
Traditional education methods emphasize the value of answers. Did you ever get great marks on a test for having a good question? No, you did not. You were evaluated on the speed and assurance with which you could deliver an approved answer. This emphasis taught you to hide the gaps in your knowledge.
I have a friend, who shall remain nameless, who has a reflex answer to everything. I suspect she has developed this reflex to protect herself from ridicule and disapproval.
“I know that,” she says, even when she was the one asking the question.
“I know that, ” she says, even when the information being presented is novel and challenging and valuable.
“I know that,” she says, and everyone stops bringing her anything interes
Her reflex does protect her. It protects her from learning.
The truely wise master brings a beginners mind to the path of learning. By nurturing our curiosity, we bring a powerful learning tool to places where growth and
When faced with a growth potential situation, ask yourself one of these questions:
- “What if I didn’t know?”
- “What would a new learner want to know in this situation?”
- “What is new here?”
- “What is peaking my curiosity at the moment? Where can I invest my curiosity in this situation?”
By cultivating a beginner’s mindset, we allow ourselves to discover the sometimes hidden learning in situations that may be familiar. Never assume there is nothing to learn.
KEY 2: CHOOSE TO BUILD CAPACITY
Travel back in your mind to Algebra class. Or American History 101. Remember the exams that you dutifully completed, pouring out the facts that you had learned?
Now, think back to a test that challenged you to demonstrate that you had mastered a skill and built capacity. One example would be the dreaded driving test.
Inside the virtually windowless DMV building, you demonstrated your knowledge on the written exam by identifying traffic signs and parroting back rules about stopping distance and turn signals.
Then, with some amount of trepidation, you stepped out of the DMV into the blinding sunshine and slid into the seat of your Father’s Buick beside the stoic testing official and proceeded to demonstrate that you had developed the skill of driving.
When we set out to learn, we can focus on learning knowledge or on building capacity. Which will serve us the most?
We live in the internet age on a planet full of books. Google estimates that 129.8 million titles have been published in the modern era. Imagine that each of those books averages at least 3000 copies (that accounts for the many rare books with only one copy remaining and the Bible which has an estimated 5 billion copies in circulation–so I have a lot of
And don’t even get me started on eBooks.
Given that calculation, there are approximately 389.4 billion books on the planet. What, you ask, is the point of this dizzying and somewhat silly calculation? It illustrates that you have access to your own personal stack of at least 55 books. And so do each of the 7 billion other people on the planet (another disclaimer–I know that there are people with no books and people with massive libraries. I would highly recommend a discussion about what to do with that knowledge inequity at another time).
Knowledge is great. Having facts in your head can be very helpful. However, learning a skill and building capacity is a powerful learning objective. Learning the skill of how to learn, for instance, opens up all the other knowledge. Learning to creatively research information on the internet provides access to almost limitless resources of knowledge. Learning to verify the value of a factoid mined from the internet ensures that you are operating on reliable data.
Give a man a factoid, and he will have knowledge for today. Teach him to Google…something like that.
When you set out to learn something new, ask yourself, “What capacity can I build that will help me to develop a skill rather than just rack up some
KEY 3: DESIGN A DELIBERATE LEARNING PLAN
In school, the teacher worked from a syllabus. Those sheets of paper laid out learning objectives, lesson plans,
In life, we learn by hard knocks, accidental
Do you have a syllabus for your learning right now? What would you like to be able to do that you can’t do right now? Do you want to play the violin, recite Shakespeare, become a scratch golfer, master archery? Perhaps you would like to grow your emotional intelligence, develop your leadership skills, foster a more innovative mindset, ignite your creativity.
Like any goal, a compelling learning objective should have the following:
- A stated, desired outcome: Write out what you want to be different becuase you learned something new. How will you know you’ve achieved mastery? What is your motivation for learning this?
- A plan for reaching the outcome: Create a starting point. Identify a teacher, a resource, a coach, an experience, a question to research that can help you begin to learn your desired skill. My son and I are currently taking Steve Martin’s Masterclass on comedy. We found a platform that would deliver content and access to a masterful teacher. One caveat–be gentle here. Don’t dictate too many of the details and squelch the wonderful seredipity of learning what you didn’t even know it was possible to learn.
- A time frame: The element of time and the accountibility of a deadline can add just the right amount of friction to deliver traction and get you moving.
SET OUT TO LEARN ALL THERE IS TO LEARN
What would you like to learn this week? Bring the curiosity of your beginner’s mind, set your sights on building capacity and lay out your learning plan. Fall in love with questions and let the answers sort themselves out. Ready, set…grow.