In the last post I promised to write an update on how I am progressing with my learning goal for 2019. In this post I want to give an update on my learning goal and also write about what my learning process looks like on a day to day basis.
I completed the ‘Learning How to Learn’ course on Coursera and got my lovely new certificate. However as with all courses they are of no use unless we actually implement what we have learned. The danger is that we park our new knowledge on the shelf and move on with our busy lives and nothing changes. Unless we put our new knowledge into practice then we don’t really know what we think we know. We just know in theory. We must be able to apply new knowledge. That is a challenge that I need to reflect on.
Just to recap my goal is to spend an hour per day learning in 2019. Learning is key to success in a fast changing world. If we don’t keep learning we become outdated very fast. We are in an age where life long learning is a must. My problem is how to get an hour of learning in each day. We all have busy lives and can easily be distracted. What I am doing is using my smartphone to learn and making use of whatever scraps of time I can during my day.
- I am learning Portuguese on Duolingo. I will be spending a week on holiday in Portugal this summer so I want to refresh my Portuguese. This takes me about 5-10 minutes per day. The interesting thing is that I can do my Portuguese in the car as I wait for my son to drop him to school. My son is 15 so it is his responsibility to get to the car on time. In the meantime I am busy learning Portuguese. What I learned from my learning how to learn course is that bit by bit every day I can build up my knowledge and that is true. Learning Portuguese takes me little effort and I am using a chunk of time that I would have spent waiting in the car.
- I read a book in bed. When I get to bed every evening I read for 15-20 minutes. This helps me to switch off an feel sleepy. Using a smartphone in bed is a bad idea because the light generated from the phone can keep you awake instead of helping to make me feel sleepy.
- I am currently working on an online course which I will be launching in the next few months. The course will be about new technology and the skills needed to survive and thrive in the coming years of the 4th Industrial Revolution. I will be launching the course on Udemy where I already have 2 other courses. As part of developing the new course I am building additional skills on course creation, making videos, editing videos etc. I am currently taking a course on editing videos using PowerDirector also on Udemy. This makes sense because what I am learning I applying immediately to making my courses better. Again I use chunks of time to learn which would otherwise be wasted. While waiting to collect my family members from the bus/train I spend my waiting time taking a course lesson on my smartphone.
- While driving alone in the car and also while exercising I listen to educational podcasts. Again I use my phone to access these podcasts. The podcasts are on topics that interest me and I want learn more about such as business and personal development. I enjoy listening to podcasters such as James Altucher and Tim Ferris and their guests. There is a wealth of podcasts and audio books that you can listen to on your smartphone. The app. that I use is Castbox but there are many others as well. I also listen to audio books on Audible. Here is a link to my own book on Audible.
Generally I do the above Monday to Friday. On Saturday I might do some of them and on Sundays I take the day off and don’t feel under pressure to anything. The most important point of all is that if I miss a day here or there there is no problem. If I miss a day so what? I just start again. We all fall off the wagon from time to time but it is a mistake to feel guilty and beat ourselves up. Just move on and begin again. I love the quote below from St. Francis de Sales:
In summary learning is key in today’s fast changing world. I think we all can find time to learn. We all have scraps of time that we can put to good use. Our smartphones are powerful learning tools. What bit of wasted time can you put to good use learning, today and everyday?
Best wishes,
Tom
