Episode 24
How do we learn and absorb new information? What are learning strategies that actually work — as opposed to strategies that are myths or which are not backed by research?
We had the pleasure to speak to Dr. Mark A. McDaniel, the co-author of Make it Stick: The Science of Successful Learning, published by Harvard University Press in 2014.
Dr. McDaniel is a Professor of Psychology and the Director of the Center for Integrative Research on Cognition, Learning, and Education at Washington University in St. Louis. His research is in the general area of human learning and memory, with an emphasis on prospective memory, encoding and retrieval process in episodic memory and applications to educational contexts.
Drawing on research performed over several years by a team of cognitive psychologists, including Dr. McDaniel, the book shares effective, evidence-based strategies about learning to replace less effective but widely accepted practices that are rooted in theory, lore, and intuition. Translating cognitive science into educational science, the book is about (to quote from its introduction) “what people can do for themselves right now in order to learn better and remember longer”.