CHAPTER 12
12. Check Yourself
“You can fool yourself, you know.
You’d think it’s impossible, but it turns out it’s the easiest thing of all.”
—Jodi Picoult, Vanishing Acts
Often in life, we lie to ourselves more than anyone else. We tell ourselves that we’ll wake up early and go to the gym—knowing full well that it’s probably not going to happen. For the most part, these little “white lies” are not only normal, they are a valuable skill to have. Being able to “lie” to ourselves that everything is going to be okay, that things happen for a reason, or that some seemingly bad occurrence will turn out for the best is a huge part of emotional resilience. Psychologists call this “cognitive reframing,” and it’s one of the best techniques out there for being a happier, more grounded person.
When it comes to learning, though, this ability to lie to ourselves can hinder our progress. In many cases, we believe that we have learned something, but in fact, we haven’t—at least not to the level we would like.
In the 1940s, educational psychologist Benjamin Bloom and his team began developing a hierarchy of learning. They knew that simply remembering something was very different from actually understanding it. And of course, being able to think critically about it was something very different still. Over the next sixteen years, Bloom and his colleagues revised and refined the framework. In 1956, they published Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, better known as Bloom’s Taxonomy.
Since then, Bloom’s Taxonomy has served as the backbone of many different philosophies of education. In fact, researchers and students of Bloom’s have continued refining the theory, with an updated edition published in 2001.
At its basic level, Bloom’s Taxonomy looks like this:
At the base of the pyramid, we start with “remember,” the ability to recall something from memory at a basic level. Take note, though, of what is not at the base of this pyramid: “recognize.” You know that feeling when something is on the tip of your tongue and you aren’t able to recall it till someone gives you the answer? “Yes! That’s the one!” you say. This is recognition. But recognition is quite different from recall. To actually know something, we have to be able not just to recognize it, but to apply higher-level thinking towards it. One can only assume that for this reason, “recognize” didn’t make the cut.
As you move up the pyramid, you’ll find increasingly complex levels of thinking. Once we remember a piece of information, the next step is to actually understand it. Can we classify the type of knowledge it represents, or explain it in our own words? Can we discuss it with others?
Once we can, the step after that is to actually apply it. We all know a lot of very “book smart” people who can tell you all the facts and figures. But when it comes time to get their hands dirty, they’re more talk than anything. That’s because to actually apply something takes an even higher level of knowledge. It takes knowing when and how it can be used. This also marks an important transition between theoretical and applied knowledge. Hopefully, it’s the latter that we aspire to.
Here’s where things get really advanced. Next up on the taxonomy is “analyze.” Can we look critically at this piece of information, comparing and contrasting it to other information or ideas? Can we examine it in enough depth to break it down to its essential parts and come up with unique ways of thinking about it?
At this point, we thoroughly understand the material both as a whole and in its individual components. Now, we must ask: Are we able to evaluate it? Are we competent enough to actually critique it, weigh its validity, support its arguments, or dismiss it altogether?
The utmost level in Bloom’s Taxonomy, and the reason for the big shakeup in 2001, is “create.” It’s one thing to understand the thinking or ideas of another, or even to criticize and evaluate them. It’s an entirely different thing to create your own original thoughts. In this stage, we know enough about a topic to develop our own related works. At the most basic level, this is the difference between being a music aficionado and composing your own music. At the highest levels, it’s the difference between a master’s degree and a PhD. One demands only the study and analysis of other people’s ideas, while the other requires you to contribute original thinking of your own.
Bloom’s Taxonomy is a helpful reminder that the words “learning,” “knowing,” and “understanding” greatly oversimplify what’s really going on. In fact, it’s reminiscent of an apocryphal story about theoretical physicist Max Planck. After winning the Nobel Prize, Planck toured Germany, giving the same standard lecture on the new quantum mechanics. After a while, his chauffeur had memorized the lecture and asked Planck if they could switch places for a day. On the big day, Planck sat in the audience in a chauffeur’s cap, and his driver delivered the lecture flawlessly on stage. After the lecture, however, a physics professor stood up and asked a detailed, complex question. The chauffeur’s response? “I’m surprised to receive such an elementary question in an advanced city like Munich. I’m going to let my chauffeur reply!”
But how do we actually determine how far along we are in any given subject? How do we know if we have Planck-level knowledge or just chauffeur-level memory? In other words, how can we avoid the traps of believing we’ve mastered a subject, only to realize we’re in the early stages of our understanding?
The answer, of course, is to test ourselves, in a variety of practical ways.
Testing gets a really bad rap—and it probably should, given the way it’s conducted in most schools today. Students study only what’s on the exam, forgetting it almost immediately thereafter. Worse yet, exams are often multiple-choice format, which requires only recognizing the correct answer. And in all but a few subjects, it’s rare that an exam requires original or creative thinking.
In reality, certain types of testing can be extremely powerful tools in your learning tool kit. Plenty of research has demonstrated that self-quizzing and collaborative group quizzes significantly improve learning.14 One study at Purdue University found that tests requiring inference and high-level comprehension were even more effective than continued study!15 In fact, in 2008, another group of researchers compared two different strategies for learning new vocabulary. One group was instructed to quiz themselves, while the other was told to continue studying and reviewing. The results were pretty astonishing: the students who quizzed themselves remembered up to 80 percent more words!16
Of course, nobody expects you to spend half of your learning time developing quizzes to test your own knowledge. Doing so would be impractical—and really boring. Furthermore, the types of “basic” tests that you’d develop would likely be no better than simply testing yourself using flashcards. Alternatively, you could probably find ready-made quizzes online. You might just be able to find some publicly-available university exams or even free quizzes on learning websites. Without a doubt, this is one of the best ways you can improve your learning using testing.
But let’s be honest: How likely are you to actually sit and take an exam that you don’t have to?
Yeah. I don’t blame you.
How, then, can we leverage the advantages of testing without reliving the trauma of our high school or university days?
I’d like to once again remind you of our dear old friend, Dr. Malcolm Knowles. As Knowles discovered, adults learn much more effectively when we have an immediate application and a pressing need for whatever it is we’re learning. This, more than the actual format of the test, is probably why studies show testing to be such a boon to learning. After all, as the saying goes, “Learning is not a spectator sport.” So why not develop our own “tests” in ways that are fast, fun, and effective?
Let’s say you’re learning a musical instrument, and you wish to improve by a certain amount. You could always hire a private tutor to “test” your knowledge of the piano. But in reality, this will be much less rigorous than a form of testing that requires analysis, critical thinking, or even your own creation. What if you instead committed to testing your skills by learning a friend’s favorite song for their birthday? Better yet, what if you committed to composing an original piece for them? Now that would be a powerful test of everything you’ve learned, from key signatures to tempo, and it’s bound to be more rewarding than some boring online quiz.
Years ago, I interviewed famed Irish polyglot Benny Lewis, author of the book Fluent in 3 Months. When asked for some of his best language learning hacks, Benny shared a technique that has stuck with me to this day. In his method, Benny advocates speaking a language from day one—even if you only know a few words. Forget studying and studying until you are “ready” to debut your language skills. Benny advises that you get out there and test yourself immediately by speaking to native speakers in an ongoing loop of learn, test, learn, test.
I love this idea.
First of all, it really raises the stakes. When you speak from day one, you feel constantly tested by your conversation partners. This, in turn, provides a huge amount of near-instant feedback in a way that you can remember. Think about it this way. If you wanted to get better at bowling but were forced to bowl in the dark, which would you prefer: Bowling an entire game blindly, and reviewing your results at the end, or switching on the lights after each round to course correct as you go? Most likely, you’d opt to get more frequent feedback as soon as possible. So why don’t we make the same decision when learning new material?
Whereas I accidentally spent months learning unnecessary words in Russian, Benny Lewis was able to immediately assess which words he was missing via real-world interactions. Whereas I unknowingly overlooked a major aspect of Russian grammar, Benny discovered it in an early conversation. Each time Benny “tests” himself in this way, he notes the words or grammatical structures he’s lacking. This is a lot like a student studying their own mistakes on a practice exam—if there were an exam to study from every day. This dramatically accelerates Benny’s progress and ensures that every minute he spends actually studying is well spent.
Done this way, “testing” yourself can not only be fast but also fun. It need not feel like a “waste” of time; it can be practical and useful. Sure, subjecting yourself to a more traditional form of “testing” is certainly advisable and is definitely worth doing, if you can bear it. With that said, I encourage you to take a broader view of what “testing” means. If you’re learning a programming language, test yourself by actually building something with the new concepts you’re learning. If you’re learning a new instrument, test yourself by performing for others. There are so many ways to engineer self-testing into your learning routine. You just have to be creative and opportunistic. Even a conversation among friends can be a powerful way to test your knowledge.
If you’re hoping to learn a subject, another great way to “test” yourself is to write—and publish—a blog post about it. For that matter, there’s one form of self-testing that goes above and beyond the benefits of any other: teaching others.
14 Mario Vázquez-García, “Collaborative-Group Testing Improves Learning and Knowledge Retention of Human Physiology Topics in Second-Year Medical Students,” Advances in Physiology Education 42, no. 2 (June 1, 2018): 232–239, http://dx.doi.org/10.1152/advan.00113.2017.
15 Jeffrey D. Karpickea and Janell R. Blunt, “Retrieval Practice Produces More Learning than Elaborative Studying with Concept Mapping,” Science 331, no. 6018 (February 11, 2011): 772–775, http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1199327.
16 Jeffrey D. Karpicke and Henry L. Roediger III, “The Critical Importance of Retrieval for Learning,” Science 319, no. 5865 (February 15, 2008): 966–968, http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1152408.