January 2, 2023

Slow and steady

Over the last few year my gray hair on my right side of the head has grown strong and sturdy.  It was the dream I had for the rest of my hair (the strong and sturdy, not he gray), but rest assured, I still have hope! 😅 I am not sure if its stress, genetics or just growing old.  With work, school and less time for creativity. I wonder if I am using more of my left brain and not my right brain is weakening. Welp, I’ll save that research for another day.

Learning a new STEM topic like Data Science has been challenging for me. I feel like I’m not learning as fast or retaining information like I had hoped. Because of Dr. Barbara Oakley (author of Learning how to Learn), I have a realistic hope in changing my mind and growing in my learning ability. It just sucks when I feel deeply stuck 🥺.

My program is 5 phases, this last phase of my program was heavy into statistics .  It was like my undergrad and graduate boogie monster 😈 came back for me in my 30s! It took me a long time to work through some of the topics. I needed about 5 videos to understand the basics and nuances of the “p-value”. Some days I just kind of gave up. Because of Dr. Dweck and her research (author of Mindset), I know I can face it and learn it, even if I won’t become an an expert.  My initial approach was scouring youtube, reading old text books and Google. It definitely helped, but I found other areas where my learning approach could be better suited for me.

Learning a bit better…

Learning Topic Modules

As I worked my way through the modules I became keenly aware of some of my shortfalls and challenges. From there, I figured out some tools that help align to my learning style and push through. Below I listed a few:

• Personal Learning Style
  • Take time to reflect on the times where learning was challenging and easy. What was the topic, environment, approach and outcome?
  • The data science curriculum was presented with an outline of learning topics in a particular order (lectures, labs and videos). Sometimes that order or way it was explain suit me. I immediately watch short videos of overviews and then dive into the lectures and labs. When doing the lectures, I listen to “lofi music” or low key R&B. I find watching movies or series slows me down and distracts me when I’m learning a new topic.
• Timer/Pomodoro
  • Set focused learning and break time limits.
  • I first read of this method from Dr. Barbara Oakley in her Learning How to Learn curriculum. I’ve learned that if I don’t intentionally set a limit in learning I can spend hours on topics without a real focus. Not until recently, I noticed I held a belief “learning new topics will always take me a long time”. This is a limiting belief for all of my STEM learning approaches, which should not be the case. Some topics may take longer, but that should not be my base thought.
  • Time limits provide tangible goals, boundaries and accountability for myself. It helps give me small breaks, that allow me to reenergize. The time limits are traditionally for structure and focus, but as a competitive person I try to set learning goals with them too. Most of the time I don’t finished a task or learning a topic within the given time I set for myself, but I find I am much more focused and retain the information better.
• Note Taking Variations
  • Use variation of colors, fonts and other techniques to support memorization and learning.
  • I realized it was easier to learn, memorize and reference notes when I used several different pen colors (blue, black, purple and green) mixed with different highlighters (yellow and orange). I learn a lot by association ;writing with different color approaches helps me in that.
  • I also found taking time to format and write neatly helped me when referencing my notes. When I come back to reference my notes, I spend a lot less time deciphering and just reading.
• New Notebooks
  • Use fresh and clean writing areas.
  • Using new writing notebooks for my school phases and new sheets of paper for each lecture helps me feel like i have a fresh start.
• Whiteboard Teaching Sessions
  • Use a whiteboard to write for understanding and self teaching.
  • I use the whiteboard to work out concepts that are hard for me. I take on the role of student and teacher. I write down what I know and teach and ask question to myself ( while iterating between lectures, websites and youtube). The whiteboard offers an easy and big writing surface quick erase and the ability to use multiple colors.
• Video Learning
  • There are a lot of data science topics on youtube. I found the most helpful for me are brief ones that are clear coherent and visually simple.
  • I’ve spent many nights watching several youtube videos to understand the significance of the “p-value” or “linear regression”. With limited time, and low energy night studying ,I don’t have patience to watch hour long videos with bad hand writing and eye hurting colors.
  • My approach was to find a few short videos to understand the concept of the topic I am learning. This also allows me to hear people explain the same topic in different ways in a short period time. The redundancy helps when I am confused.
  • I also look for visually appealing videos that have clear handwriting, and animations which are consistent and explained by the narrator.
  • I found StatQuest to be one of my go to youtube videos for Data Science topics for the reasons above.

Conclusion

Over the years my learning style has shifted. Depending on the topic I am learning, evaluating my current situations and environment helped me uncover several tools for my learning toolbox. I am still working to apply them consistently. I know this will be a lifelong journey.