Six Ways to Keep Learning
Rachel Wu
Developmental Cognitive Neuroscientist, Mother, Professor, Lifelong Learner
What’s the weirdest thing in your bag?
I haven't actually had to use my purse in a while, but I have a pack of Band-Aids, because it's always been useful—not just to use as regular Band-Aids, but also as tape.
Best gift you gave or received?
I had just moved back from London. I was in the US as a postdoc, and I needed a cell phone because I had a UK phone, not a US one. My sister put me on her plan, and she was also eligible for a phone upgrade. She ended up giving me her upgraded phone and keeping her old phone. It was really sweet because normal people would just be like, "Well here's my old phone." And they would keep the new one for themselves, right? But no, she selflessly gave me her new, upgraded one, and I will always remember that.
What’s something you are learning?
I'm currently trying to learn German, and I just bought a ukulele a couple of days ago. I feel like learning German is a lot harder than learning the ukulele given my musical background. So I consider learning German to be a continued challenge.
Rachel Wu has learnings about learning (so meta).
You study how infants and children learn, and whether these insights can be applied to adult learning to maximize cognitive growth during adulthood. How did you get interested in learning?
I guess I've always been one of those people who is always on the go. I'm never satisfied with having a plan A; I always need a plan B, C and then maybe C prime or something. My parents also put me in a lot of extracurricular activities growing up, so I always felt like I was learning something. Being a kid from an immigrant household, you're always learning: different languages, different cultures, etc.
Usually in adulthood, learning new skills peters out a little bit. But I would see something and think, "I want to do that myself." And then I’d want to learn it. There's also this other piece of needing to overcome self-confidence issues, like if you see a painting and think "I want to be able to do that, but I can't do that." I had those thoughts too that I had to overcome by taking art classes.
What are the biggest differences between child and adult learners?
For adults and for me personally, it's often the amount of time we can dedicate to learning. WE have responsibilities for jobs and family, and if learning a new skill is not part of a job that pays you to learn (which is relatively rare) then you're going to have to pursue learning new skills outside of your normal working hours. So then you ask, do you have enough time and energy? Are you spending enough time with your family, or whatever might be pulling you from learning a new skill?
If you want a positive learning environment for yourself, you need to create it. Children have school and learn at home; the learning environments are usually just present for them. But if we want to learn, say, Italian as adults, we have to find a teacher and create that learning environment. You might not even know where to start. Then, there are a lot of stereotypes floating around: You're better at learning as a kid, so why bother as an adult? We start being embarrassed about mistakes when we get older because we don't want to seem like losers. Kids don't really get that embarrassed until about five or six years old, when they start having more fixed mindset issues, but in those cases, parents often step in and say, "No, you can do it." Or, "Let's just try it for a year and see what happens." Adults need someone to do that for us, too.
What can we do to push through that frustration as grown-up learners?
One thing we can do is to balance out the time we’re learning with time spent mentoring. That way you can really show yourself that you do know quite a lot, and hear people say, “Oh wow, you're amazing.” You can then bring that confidence right over to the learning side.
Also, surround yourself with a bunch of people who encourage you the whole time. Not just lip service, but real reminders that you’re doing well. Teachers can do this, too. They can point out: "Remember how you struggled in this one section and now you're great at it?" Those of us who are parents do the same to encourage kids who lose motivation. We put them in situations where they feel good about themselves, and then put them in situations where they have to learn a bit more. And don’t forget to track your progress, because it’s really easy to forget how far you've come in terms of learning. If you're painting, take progress pictures so you can refer back and see how far you’ve come.
Why is this all so important? We're living in a world that is rapidly changing for many reasons— and a pandemic that expedited that change. So at some point, we have to choose, do I learn this thing or do I become dependent on somebody else to do it? Do I learn how to access my medical records online? Or do I depend on somebody to do it? Do I learn how to use Uber or do I always depend on somebody to give me a ride? The older you get, the more these things stack up. We can find ourselves limited by the inability to adapt when our environment changes.
What can we learn from children about learning (there’s a meta in there somewhere)?
I developed a theory that includes six key things:
1. Keep your mind open.
We should avoid simply dismissing something that might seem irrelevant. This is really critical, because the older we get, the more we rely on what we already know in terms of determining what's relevant to learn (or not). So we think that if something like learning languages has been irrelevant for us in the past then it's going to be irrelevant for us in the future. But the world is changing so fast, we might need to learn things we’re otherwise inclined to deem irrelevant. And if we don’t, we’re going to have to depend on someone else to do things for us.
2. Make it bite size.
This means having instructors that tailor things to make them piecemeal for you, especially for the really challenging things to learn. Even if it's not that difficult, you still need to know how to take stuff in, in smaller chunks. If you're trying to learn something all at once, it's going to be very difficult.
3. Grow your mindset.
Make sure you have a growth mindset throughout the process and that you *deeply* believe you can learn new things (don’t just give yourself lip service). It takes time and effort, as opposed to just saying, "I can't do it" or, "I wasn't born with this talent…."
4. Forgive and forget.
Having a forgiving environment kind of goes hand-in-hand with a growth mindset. That means forgiving yourself, forgiving others for making mistakes, not defining yourself by your failures or things that you're not good at. It’s about redefining yourself as a learner and then getting rid of stereotypes.
5. Leave the commitment issues.
Make a serious commitment to learning. When we learn as adults, it can often feel less critical in the short term. Babies and kids need to learn how to walk or crawl to survive, right? It’s not often so similar when we learn as adults; it can feel like it’s more for fun. But whatever your reason—for a job or just for personal benefit—if you're spending more time and effort on learning, you have the commitment to it. Learn things as if your survival or livelihood depended on it.
6. DO multitask.
The last thing I recommend is to learn multiple things simultaneously—it’s something I’m researching right now, the idea that it may be beneficial to learn more things simultaneously than sequentially. Most adults tend to learn one skill at a time, then quit after a couple of months. But, if you're learning three things at the same time, you're more likely to define yourself as a learner. It’s kind of like taking five subjects in school; if kids only learned one subject at a time and decided they were no good at math, they might just quit learning. Similarly, we might see how being a beginner is in general, and then be less likely to quit if something gets frustrating—and maybe we even discover some connections that exist among the things we’re learning.
