Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning

by Peter C. Brown

He experimented with alternatives, finally hitting on the idea of outlining his speech in a series of crude pencil sketches.

Marlys’s psychology teacher at Bellerbys College is none other than James Paterson, the boyish-looking Welshman who just happens to be a rising figure in world memory competitions.24 When teachers at Bellerbys fill out the paperwork to take students on field trips, it’s typically to a lecture at the Saïd Business School, or perhaps to the Ashmolean Museum or Bodleian Library in Oxford.

Michela says that the idea of skipping a bullet point that she cannot remember but will fill in later would have been completely alien to her before learning to use mnemonics, but the techniques have given her the confidence to do this, knowing that the content will come to mind momentarily.

It comes down to the simple but no less profound truth that effortful learning changes the brain, building new connections and capability.