I write things down here to learn them properly. If I can explain something so a child gets it, I know I really understand it. If I can't, I go back and learn the bit I missed.
This site is how I learn. I pick a topic I need to know for my work, explain it in plain words, notice where my explanation falls apart, then go back to the sources and try again. Teaching something is one of the best ways to find out whether you actually understand it.
The site is a public study notebook built on the Feynman Technique. Each page is an attempt to explain a concept I need for my work in plain language. The three reading levels, the audio summaries, the "coming" lists and the research notes are each one step of that loop, done in the open so the gaps are visible.
I use this site to collect my thoughts and to teach myself the things I need to know for my work. Writing each idea out in plain words, for someone who has never met it, is how I find out whether I really understand it. If you learn something here too, that's a bonus I'm glad of.
Why explaining something works
Explaining a concept simply is one of the best tests of understanding I know, for three reasons.
- It shows up the gaps. When I try to explain something, I quickly notice the parts I've only memorised. The sentence that won't come out plainly is usually the part I don't understand yet.
- It forces me to simplify. Taking the jargon out shows whether I've got hold of the core idea or just the vocabulary around it.
- It sticks. Pulling an idea back out of my own head, and saying it out loud, fixes it in memory far better than reading it again. Psychologists call this retrieval practice, and there's good research behind it.
The Feynman Technique
The method I follow is usually called the Feynman Technique. It's named after the physicist Richard Feynman, who was famous for explaining hard physics in plain language. The tidy four-step version came later, from other people describing how he worked, so it's a popular summary of his approach rather than something he wrote down himself.
- Choose a concept. Pick one thing you want to understand.
- Teach it to a beginner. Explain it in plain language, as if to someone new to the subject.
- Find where you get stuck. Mark the places where the explanation goes vague, leans on jargon or simply stops.
- Go back and simplify again. Return to the sources, fill the gaps, and rewrite until the explanation is clear.
How the site follows the method
- Three reading levels. Most pages open with the same idea explained three ways: like I'm 5, like I'm 15, and for pros. That's step two done three times. The five-year-old version is the hardest to write, and it's where my gaps show first.
- Audio summaries and the podcast. Hearing an explanation read aloud is a quick test of whether it makes sense outside my head. If it sounds muddled, it goes back to step four. The voices are synthetic and are made from the text on each page.
- The "coming" titles. Each grey title marked "coming" is a concept I still need to learn properly. The list is step one, written down in public, and it's honest about how much is left.
- Research notes. Some notes are me going back to the sources: reading the papers and documentation, then checking my explanation against them. That's step four, and I keep it separate from the finished pages.
- Corrections. When someone tells me I've got something wrong, that's the most useful step three there is.
Where to start
If you want to see the method at work, Decisions is the most complete section. If something here is unclear or wrong, tell me on LinkedIn. It means I've found the next gap to fill.
Sources
- Roediger, H. L. and Karpicke, J. D. (2006). Test-enhanced learning: taking memory tests improves long-term retention. Psychological Science, 17(3), 249 to 255. The study behind retrieval practice: recalling material helped students remember it a week later better than restudying it.
- Fiorella, L. and Mayer, R. E. (2013). The relative benefits of learning by teaching and teaching expectancy. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 38(4), 281 to 288. Students who actually taught a lesson understood it better on a delayed test than those who only studied it.