Psychology of Learning: Learn like a traveller and not like a tourist

Part of series a about process of learning and learners

There is always a discomfort when learning something new. This might be the sole reason for so many of us starting something and then leaving things when they get a bit uncomfortable. For instance, massive open online course (MOOC) platforms have 5% - 15% completion (ref). In order to understand what happened with the remaining learners who did not finish, let’s understand the psychology of learner.

To Learn is to Survive

We learn so many things since the time we are born, but forget to give credit to ourselves. For example, take something as simple as walking, scientists took decades to make a machine which can walk on 2 legs while you took just 1-2 years.

Back in the cave-dwelling days, learning wasn't a hobby; it was a 'stay alive or become dinner' kind of deal. If you didn't learn how to hunt, you'd find yourself on the menu, and failing to grasp the secrets of fire-making meant you were a potential midnight snack for hungry predators. But hey, we've come a long way since then. Nowadays, we don't face the same 'stay alive or be a snack' dilemmas. Our world has evolved, and our needs have expanded from basic survival to Netflix subscriptions and avocado toast cravings. Thankfully, we're still wired to use our ultimate superpower: learning.

Many of you are likely familiar with Malcolm Gladwell's idea that it takes 10,000 hours to become an expert in something. While I agree that expertise often requires a significant amount of time, it's important to note that not everything demands expert-level knowledge. Nevertheless, gaining a meaningful understanding of a subject does require an investment of time—it's a journey. This journey begins the moment you decide to learn something new, and the way you approach learning evolves as you gain a deeper understanding. The aim of this article is to provide a high-level overview of how the process of learning changes as you progress.

Understanding how you Learn, can not only make learning a joyful journey but can make you better at it.

Let’s start with a simple model where we divide the learners in 3 parts. Beginners, Proficient and Master. There are no particular definitions available for these bifurcations, but as we progress in this article, it will get clearer. It’s safe to say that the biggest set of learners would fall in Beginners, since that’s where you start. It’s the largest category and rest are going to be a subset of this. So let’s start there.

Beginners at the gates

When learning something new, picture yourself in a brand-new city. You stand at the city limits eager to explore the city, understand the people and culture. However you lack knowledge of the city’s roads and transportations. In case there is no help, you would already be thinking of turning back. But you do. Let’s assume that you have a phone and internet. While this would surely be a lot of help, this experience would still be highly uncomfortable. Finding places to stay, to eat, to roam around, everything would be hard. Simply because the city is unfamiliar to you.

The experience is similar for a beginner as well.

Try this: Pick an unfamiliar topic and search on youtube “<topic> for beginners”, and see the results.

If you have tried the above, you will notice how hard it is to pick one and get started. Not knowing where to start keeps so many great folks away from starting. The learners don’t know what they don’t know. This unfamiliarity with the topic creates a persistent state of discomfort, either preventing them from starting at all or making them more susceptible to losing their way. But obstacles are not limited to unfamiliarity.

Now, imagine adding one more layer of complexity: language. Inhabitants of the city speak a different language than yours. This creates another barrier between people and you. Crippling you from taking help.

Many topics you wish to learn come with their own unique language. They have specific sets of instructions, terminology, and nomenclature that are often unfamiliar to beginners. Even when you start to become somewhat acquainted with them, they may seem less meaningful initially. For instance, children are taught the names of objects around them, guitar instructors introduce the names of strings, and science teachers begin with units and measurements. Similarly, when a new employee joins a company, they can become overwhelmed by the internal jargon and acronyms unique to that organisation.

When the majority of your questions start with "What," it's a sign that you're in the process of learning the language associated with the topic. Although learning this specialised language can be seen as tedious, it holds the key to unlocking numerous opportunities, even as you become more proficient

Imagine every topic as a city. It has its own set of roads (concept network), culture(rules) and language(nomenclatures).

This is why there is huge discomfort for beginners, and they skip or lose motivation. Today there is immense knowledge available for free on the internet. While it helps a minority set of highly motivated learners, it’s not best for most of the beginners. It’s also the reason why under supervision of a teacher, the learner pushes through. Schools, Ed-tech companies and Educators help learners by giving them a structured plan. Almost like a detailed itinerary which you would enjoy when entering a new city.

While structured learning programs make the first step easier, maintaining consistency is still hard. I will write on this in my next article.

The Intermediates: Building Confidence and Familiarity

In my view, once you've moved past the beginner's stage, the toughest part is usually done. That's why they say, 'The first step is the hardest'.

After spending some time in the new city, you get comfortable with the most important routes and main train/tram stations. This knowledge gives you the confidence of not getting lost, and makes you explore the city freely. Similar events happen with the learners as well. Important routes and stations of the city are similar to fundamental principles of a Topic. Once there is some proficiency in the learners, confidence is built and discomfort slowly disappears.

You also build some familiarity with the topic’s language. Which eases out discomfort further. Even if you don't fully grasp it, it becomes less daunting when you encounter it again. This familiarity helps absorb the learning behind topics instructions, which felt like gibberish sometime back. Similar comfort is found when the foreign language of the new city doesn’t feel much foreign after staying there for sometime. This also enables you to communicate with inhabitants of the city, who know so much more than you about the city. You have so much help now, simply because you can ask questions in their language and understand what they are saying.

Consider StackOverflow, almost no one asks (What is <something>?), instead most of the queries are, “I am trying to do this but failing”, or “How can i do this?”. Their queries are more precise and are written in the language of the topic. This is where internet (inhabitant of the city) has been most useful. For right information to reach your doorstep, queries need to be as precise as possible. Our search engines are great at finding things given the question has enough details.

So for intermediate learners things get better and better. This is the phase which requires a lot of practice and patience. As a learner you are in a state where You know what you don’t know as well as You don’t know what you don’t know. You know the major concepts and now all those major concepts will have their own branches. While the major concepts are getting deeply rooted in your Mental Models, a wide new range of related concepts come at your doorsteps. At this point, in general the right thing to do is to work on a basic project, so that your focus is little narrow and concepts to be explored are not overwhelming.

Advanced Learners: On the road least travelled

Extending the analogy of new comer in a city, once you have spent some time in the city, you are more comfortable wandering around. You know how to get to anywhere, even if you haven’t been there before. Advanced learners understand what they don’t know. But are confident that when needed they can comfortably get there. They also build huge respect for the Topic and understand how little they know.

The problems which Advanced learners face are very specific and chances are that only a few people have encountered them. They will often try to find someone well versed with the topic to learn, discuss and debate. As advanced learners progress, the internet is also not very useful from learning POV. Most productive ways of adding more to your knowledge becomes Application, Experimentation and Collaboration. These are rather slower methods. That’s why a handful of such learners spend years in research or building next generation applications .

Higher is the expertise in a certain field, lesser would be the available knowledge and higher would be the unknown. But by now, learners build a curious and comfortable attitudes towards unknowns. These are the folks who would add to available knowledge of humankind.

Drawing conclusions

It has always given me great comfort knowing which state I am in while learning. Especially when I am a beginner. Recently I started to play with 3D printing. I have had a 3D printer for more than a year now, however I printed the first object, not more than 4 months ago. The discomfort of not knowing what all will be needed to print first thing, had kept me at bay. Sometimes, even a slight discomfort can deter you from pursuing optional tasks. Whatever was the push, after the first print, my printer has worked a lot harder than me.

For Educators

Since this post is long already, I will write about this separately in my upcoming post. Please subscribe so that you don’t miss it.

For Learners

“Learn like a traveller and not like a tourist.”

In learning you have to embrace unknowns. Just like travellers, who would enter a city, knowing they know very little and it will be uncomfortable, new and sometimes disappointing. They will start somewhere and make their way through one obstacle at a time. While tourists might get agitated sooner if things were not up to expectations. While in leisure both attitudes have their own charm, in Learning, first one would be more fun.

If you too wanted to learn something and haven’t been able to start, below inputs might help

1. There will always be initial discomfort in learning something new. This may last days to months. But it will pass.

2. Learn the language of the topic. It may be boring, but next comes a lot of Joy.

3. When you are a beginner, don’t get lost in the internet. You need a focused direction (course). Don’t spend a lot of time finding the best one to start. This just delays the starting and takes away the momentum. Just start with something, you will know when you’ll need a better one.

4. Be kind to yourself and be self-aware when things get frustrating; it’s all part of the process. The moment you cross the first threshold, you already surpassed 90% of the folks.

That’s all for now. This article is based on my understanding I have gathered over the last 12 years building learning products, and might have made mistakes or have over simplified. Looking forward to your feedback and suggestions.

Credits:
1. Image by Rochak Shukla
2. Image by veraholera