7 Best Self-Learning Strategies to Help You Master Any Skill

Self-Learning is the process of independently taking the initiative to study a subject on your own.

This means that a Self-Learner chooses their subject of study, the learning resources, the mode of learning as well as the evaluation of their learning outcomes.

We are living in an era of bliss when it comes to information. There has been no time in history where we have all the learning materials necessary to learn just about anything with a few clicks.

Self-learning can be an effective & convenient way of learning in the times that we are living in.

This opens up many opportunities for self-learners who are aware enough to know how big of an impact this can have on bringing a change to their lives.

However, most people are spending time online mostly scrolling down their social media feed and watching entertaining videos.

So, if you have stumbled upon this article, you’re probably among the minority of self-learners who see the potential and want to make the most of it.

In this article, I have synthesized the insights from my research on the best self-learning strategies that you can incorporate in order to master any skill.

This is because Technology can be leveraged to learn any skill if you incorporate the best self-learning strategies.

If we look back at some of the most prominent people we look up to even today such as Benjamin Franklin, Leonardo da Vinci and Mark Twain, all of them were self-learned personalities.

Ask yourself, if Benjamin Franklin were sitting beside you, how would he utilize the internet?

Would he be mindlessly scrolling through social media for hours or would he be utilizing the resources available for his own growth?

Why Self-Learning matters more than ever

With the rapid technological change, it is crucial to have the ability to continuously learn in order to stay relevant in the market.

Be it new skills or new subjects, the ability to adapt to the changing & unpredictable environment means you stand apart from the competition.

The lifespan of the value of your expertise is getting shorter than ever.

We Forum addressed the importance of learning new skills showing the insights about how every five years, the skill you possess becomes half as valuable as it was before.

Where we want to be is always ahead of the curve of massive change. Self-Learning has become more convenient than ever with the rise of Massive Open Online Courses(MOOCs) and the democratization of information on the internet.

On the other hand, there is the question of whether the traditional educational system is even worth it anymore. In the U.S., the average student loan debt per graduating student was a staggering $29,800 in 2018.

Furthermore, close to 50% of the millennials who went to college believe that college wasn’t worth it at all.

This combination of the democratization of education via the internet and the current broken educational system has made self-learning more relevant than ever.

Self-Learning can be amazing but it must be done right

One aspect of the current educational system which has been working is that it does keep the students accountable.

Formal Education is built on the system of providing grades, assignments with deadlines, and other criteria that incentivize a student to complete their studies. Like it or not, this gets students to study.

Now, the concern with self-learning is that most of us have a problem keeping ourselves disciplined.

We might start but we have a hard time sticking to a program because of the lack of a system to keep us accountable.

This is shown by data gathered from EdX which is a MOOC platform co-created by MIT and Harvard University. The study gave insight on how only 6 out of every 100 people who enroll in a course actually complete it.

That’s a disappointing 6% completion rate. This is probably the area of self-learning that is of most concern.

The point is that most of us are lazy on our own.

Therefore, in order to reap the rewards of self-learning, you must find a way to keep yourself accountable and disciplined.

The way ahead

It is clear that Self-Learning is a demonstrated pathway to learning anything and mastering any skill.

Yet, at the same time, the reality check is also there that most people lack the self-discipline and commitment towards self-learning.

This is why a person who wants to be self-learner must pursue it with the best strategies that are available.

The people we look up to today had the commitment and the right set of strategies in their self-learning journeys. If we are able to follow them ourselves, we too can make something significant out of our lives.

7 Best Self-Learning Strategies to Master Any Skill

Below you will find 7 best self-learning strategies to help you master any skill. Let’s get started!

Feynman Technique

Let me first introduce you to the Learning Pyramid which was developed in the 1960s by the NTL Institute for Applied Behavioral Science.

The pyramid below provides insights about the average learning retention rates we have according to the mode of learning.

If you look at the very bottom of the pyramid, you will notice that “‘Teaching Others” leads to the highest rate of learning retention at 90%.

This has been further demonstrated with research done by scientists who have come up with the “The Protégé Effect”.

Their research found out that students who were assigned to tutor others worked harder to understand the material, were able to recall it a lot more accurately and were more effective in it’s application.

Furthermore, these student teachers were also able to score higher on tests in comparison with their colleagues.

This is the reason why the Feynman Technique is among the best self-learning strategies you can add to your arsenal.

The technique was developed by Richard Feynman who was one of the greatest physicists of the 20th century.

This is the same technique Feynman used to understand anything he studied better and became a Nobel prize-winning physicist for his understanding of quantum mechanics. He even pioneered an entire field called quantum electrodynamics (QED).

The technique is based on the premise that:

If you want to understand something well, try to explain it simply.

Here are the steps involved to practice the Feynman Technique:

1. Choose the concept you want to learn
2. Grab a notebook and write the name of the concept at the top.
3. Explain the concept in your own words focusing on simple language. Assume that you are explaining the concept to a kid or someone who’s an absolute noob in the chosen topic.
4. Review your explanation. There might be areas where you weren’t able to explain in the simplest of ways. This signals that it’s an area you can improve upon. Go back to your study material to re-learn such areas.
5. Re-write the areas where you believe a kid would not be able to understand.

If you want a visual demonstration, this quick 4-minute video by learning expert Scott Young provides a step to step process to use the Feynman Technique.

This is such an excellent technique because by attempting to explain what you are learning in simple words, it shows you the areas you understand well. At the same time, it also helps you pinpoint areas where there might be gaps in knowledge.

All of this leads to more effective learning.

Feynman was known to carry a notebook titled “NOTEBOOK OF THINGS I DON’T KNOW ABOUT”. This is one way he’d practice the Feynman technique.

You can take the Feynman technique and use it in other ways as well.

You can choose to explain a concept by speaking about it in front of a mirror. Feynman was known to use speaking too for a better understanding of concepts. After all, he was a renowned professor.

Though not always practical, it’s even better if you can actually find someone to explain the concept to.

I once tried explaining to two of my friends why I decided to use social media only on Saturdays. I had learned about Dopamine and how dopamine is affected when using social media causing us to be heavily distracted.

Even till today, I have retained an understanding of how dopamine works in our brain as I had explained it to my friends.

Can you recall a similar situation where you explained a concept to others? You would have retained most of such information according to the Learning Pyramid.

You can also use platforms such as Quora and answer questions of fellow human beings from around the world relevant to your subject of study trying to explain concepts in simple language.

The way in which you can implement the Feynman technique is numerous yet the steps to follow are universal.

Project-Based Learning

“Tell me and I forget. Show me and I remember. Involve me and I understand.”

Chinese Proverb

Here is how the majority of the world is learning right now.

I’ll take the example of learning to ride a bicycle.

In the current mainstream form of learning, the way to learn to ride a bicycle is to read 3 books on how to ride a bicycle, memorize the theory on the ways to ride a bicycle, and take tests on riding a bicycle.

Finally, you go and ride a bicycle at the very end.

But, how did you actually learn to ride a bicycle?

Probably by trying and failing. Maybe even falling down a couple of times. But, the main thing is that you were actually DOING THE THING.

Why has the world been convinced that learning anything else shouldn’t be approached the same way? That really pisses me off. The research below might piss you off too.

Enter the “Forgetting Curve”.

This is a mathematical formula that was developed by a German psychologist named Hermann Ebbinghaus which described the rate at which we forgot something after initially learning it.

After several experiments, Ebbbinghaus found out that the speed in which we forget is very quick.

Within an hour, we tend to forget around 50% of what is presented. By the end of the week, we forget an average of 90% of what we learned.

Just reflect back on your days of school. How much of it do you actually remember?

How about last week? Recall the content you consumed last week and figure out how much you remember?

Most probably, the percentage would be somewhere around 10%.

On the flip side, if we are to revisit the learning pyramid above, we retain 75% of what we practice.

This is probably why we learn to ride a bicycle faster by practice than reading a bunch of books first.

This means that let’s say if you are learning a new language, rather than studying all the fancy words, your focus should be on learning the language the way it’s used in real life.

What you should be doing is to go and practice speaking with a French person if your goal is to be a fluent conversationalist in French.

Learning by doing isn’t the most comfortable thing to do.

If you’re learning public speaking, there might be the instinct to read a ton of articles and watch videos by experts one after another whilst not actually practicing to speak in front of people.

However, though it might be uncomfortable, this is the mode of learning that is proven to be more effective.

In a nutshell, project-based learning is all about spending a lot of the time practicing and actually doing what you want to master.

Rather than spending the major chunk of our time on input, which we now know isn’t as effective because of the forgetting curve, project-based learning emphasizes output through practice where retention is an incredible 75%.

A practical approach you could take is to do side projects as you go along with your studies.

For example, if you are learning about app development, rather than opting for studying all the theories for 6 months straight(mostly input), focus on building a small app as a side project as you go along with your studies.

It doesn’t have to be the next Facebook but it can act as the medium for you to practice project-based learning and master the skill a lot faster.

For any lesson that you learn, embracing project based learning means to become habituated to applying the knowledge you learned immediately.

I am currently taking the Entrepreneurship Specialization in Coursera which is taught by professors from Wharton. I have made it a part of my learning to implement the actionable areas immediately upon learning a lesson.

For example, this week we had a lesson on naming a company where the professor gave us a framework for coming up with a name of your brand or a product.

After the class was over, I applied this knowledge for choosing the domain name for a website I’m creating as a side project. I went through the entire process of how to choose a name and implemented it IMMEDIATELY.

Adding this element of application in your self-learning strategy alone can catapult your learning to the next level.

Spaced Repetition

Still remember Mr. Ebbinghaus and the forgetting curve?

Well, after discovering the forgetting curve, Ebbinghaus was able to gain further insights that we could retain more information by repeating what we learned at different intervals.

This has given light to the learning strategy called Spaced Repetition.

Image via Quartz

You don’t go to the gym for 6 hours straight hoping to gain 2 weeks worth of muscle in 1 day, do you?

Ebbinghaus found out that this was also the case with learning & memory.

Cramming information for hours doesn’t help to retain information in the long-term. This is probably why you remember so little of the heap loads of information you learn right before a test.

Sadly, we forget it fast, really fast. As you might have faced just like me, even during the test!

Therefore our memory has to be strengthened just like a muscle.

This can be done by reviewing the information initially learned at several intervals.

Practical examples of how you can use spaced repetition:

• Rather than trying to learn a subject for 10 hours straight, distribute an hour a day and spread it over the span of 10 days for retaining information better. Remember, our brain needs time to process information.
• In order to store information in your long-term memory we must review the same content multiple times. For example, if you have just read a wonderful book that has taught you how to beat procrastination, don’t just put it away. Review the important learnings from the book again after 2 days, 1 week, 2 weeks, and 1 month from now. With every review, your memory of this information should get stronger.

In order to remind yourself of such review sessions, you can simply set up a specific time period in your calendar about when you want to do the review session.

Simply setting a specific time & date on your calendar for a note review session can be a great practice for spaced repetition. (Just like the blue lines mentioned in the calendar above)

If you want to really be scientific & exact, there are also apps such as Supermemo which can help you to embrace spacing repetition.

However, doing it the old school way with a calendar is equally effective. But, the main thing is that you have to deliberately be aware to review what you learned in fixed intervals.

Multiple Coding

This strategy is all about creating more neural pathways of the lessons you learn. This can be used as an addition to the spaced repetition technique.

Multiple Coding means to store the same piece of information in different ways. As a rule of thumb, storing important information in 3 ways would be ideal.

These ways can be

• drawing a sketch of the information
• creating a mind map
• telling a story about the concept
• creating a poem
• writing a summary
• writing probable counter-arguments
• creating metaphors, etc.

There is no rule regarding the ways to do it and there are probably more ways than I have mentioned above. You can get creative here and choose 3 ways that you like the most.

For example, I recently finished the book 4-hour workweek by Tim Ferriss. Though the book has become a bit outdated for current times, I found some great snippets of wisdom.

One of them was a story about a Mexican Fisherman and an American Businessman on vacation.

I did multiple coding for this in 3 ways:

1. I thought about the probable counter-arguments of the story. This is all about thinking the opposite of what the lessons the story is preaching and what you could argue against it. This will help you provide a more whole perspective about a concept.
2. I sketched a comic of what I understood the story to be(though the drawings & handwritings are pretty shitty). It’s a mixture of drawing and writing a summary.

3. I created a mind map of lessons I learned from this story

Doing this for everything that you learn would be impractical. However, practicing multiple coding for the important learning points can help you retain a lot more of that information.

Just the way that the more ways you know to reach your home, the better decision you can make on the best route, the more ways you store a piece of information, the better you can retain this information.

Reflection

We do not learn from experience alone, we learn from reflecting on the experience.

John Dewey, American philosopher & Educational reformer

Reflection is powerful because it makes your experiences stored & retrievable in your mental models more strongly. It is through the art of reflection that experience turns into learning.

By studying your own experiences, you will be able to have the ability to create meaning out of your experiences.

It is about slowing down to speed up. Reflection can be taken with the analogy of a Central Processing Unit(CPU) of a computer.

As you would have learned in school, a CPU consists of Input, Processing, & Output.

Most of us are immersed so much into our day to day life that we are completely inhibiting the processing aspect of our experiences.

Therefore, you can view reflection as the processing element of your mind which will help for effective output, i.e. learnings.

Reflective practice has demonstrated to help you improve your work performance.

A study done by researchers from Harvard Business School, Bocconi University, & the University of North Carolina showed that employees at a call center who spent 15 minutes at the end of the day reflecting the lessons learned for the day were able to perform 23% better after only 10 days in comparison with their peers.

Reflection can be done in several ways. Many people prefer to write a journal as their reflective practice. But, even a walk where you are asking the right questions can be an effective reflective practice.

The framework below can especially be helpful for reflecting on your experiences and learning sessions.

For example, you might be an aspiring Executive who wants to hone your negotiation skills. You decide to research a best-selling book on negotiation such as The Secrets of Power Negotiating and decide to read it’s audiobook.

Right after listening to a session of the audiobook, you can pick up your notebook and write your reflection using the above framework.

Not only will it help you reflect on the best ideas but it is also actionable since you mention how you can apply the learnings right away.

Formulate a Curriculum to follow

This is a strategy that should not be underestimated if you seriously want to pursue self-learning. This is one area in which the traditional educational system has got it right.

Having a curriculum that you follow step by step is crucial to reach your goal of mastering a skill as it gives you the roadmap to take action.

Most people do not have such a roadmap on their own and as a result, do not complete the journey.

But, if the directions are clear, the journey becomes a lot more enticing to complete.

If you want a pre-made curriculum, you can opt to study with the help of MOOCs as these are well-structured courses.

But if you believe that your journey to mastering a skill will require different resources such as books, blog posts, and videos, you’ll have to plan on your own.

Here your experience of being in school or college for years will help.

Just like your days in school, your job is to organize weekly plans and schedules for what you want to learn.

For example, in order to start this blog, I needed to have knowledge regarding Search Engine Optimization(SEO).

I first researched different resources that were available on the internet. After looking at multiple resources, I found a Youtube Channel called Income School which talked about the subject in great detail. I also really liked the people who were behind the channel as they provided the most genuine information.

I then came up with the schedule that I will watch 2 videos of these guys every day for the next one month. Since I had already started the blog, the videos turned out to be like guides providing insights that helped me apply the knowledge immediately.

This turned into my own personal curriculum for SEO.

A few but quality resources would be best and it’s even better if you can focus on one resource at a time and then absorb what you can learn from them.

Another aspect to absorb from formal education is that your school got you to complete lengthy assignments within a fixed amount of time. That’s the power of deadlines.

Set a clear timeline on when you want to complete your learnings and decide on a schedule that you will follow every week.

One caveat to developing your own curriculum is that it is very easy to get distracted from your original plan. You can definitely get knowledge from different resources but keep in mind about the roadmap we talked about. Without it, you might just go on detours without reaching your end goal of mastering a skill.

Be Clear on the “Why” of your self-learning goal

As we’ve gone through at the beginning of this article, a bane of self-learning for most people is that it is hard for them to stay disciplined enough to complete what they started.

One reason for this is that people are not clear on the reason why they want to pursue a learning goal.

Setting goals of “Well, I just want to learn this skill” is too vague, and setting such goals is the reason why people don’t achieve them.

A lack of clarity could put the brakes on any journey to success.

Steve Maraboli

If you cannot be clear on the “Why”’ of your pursuit to master a skill, the other strategies you’ll probably not cross the finish line. Even if you complete a course on it, you might never actually apply what was learned which equals a waste of time.

Therefore, the question you should be asking yourself is “‘What outcome will I achieve by mastering this skill? Try to be as specific as possible.

You might have the goal of learning to invest in the stock market. Consider the outcome of you in a position where you have gained expertise in this subject.

The outcome might be that learning to invest in stocks will enable me to make the right investments now which will help me buy my dream house once my investments mature.

It should be something that gets you excited or determined when you visualize it.

Once the clarity is there in your head, write your learning goal and the outcome that will happen once you achieve it. The simple act of writing your goals down will make you 42% more likely to achieve them.

Conclusion

The internet is full of all the resources needed to master any skill you want.

Now, you also have the best self-learning strategies to help you master any skill.

This is one lengthy post and you will probably forget a major chunk of it immediately as we’ve learned above through the forgetting curve and the learning pyramid.

How can you retain most of this article?

Well, implement these 7 self-learning strategies!

This article was originally published in a blog I’d started called Knackbee which isn’t active anymore.