The Independent Student
An explanatory of my own intuitions woven with scientific research of learning. A guide rope of how one can best tread the process of learning, and approach the ideal nature of the learner.
I have never stopped being a student. Even when I left high school years ago, disillusioned with the poor state of American education, convinced I knew better than everybody else, I kept learning. From my being of the perpetual student I regained an appreciation for education itself; I even learned that despite the failings of the American system, it contemporarily finds itself outperforming the average foreign institution in a majority subjects, compared to recent history (OECD). But more importantly than any fact, philosophy, or accrual of knowledge, I learned how to learn. I not only devised by own metacognitive framework, but learned of others with backing within the empirical sciences. Throughout this article it is hoped that enough fibers of learning—that is, threads of philosophical, psychological, sociological, and individualist origin—are provided such that readers can weave their own fabric of knowledge, such that the emperor may sew his own clothes.
It’s worth stating, however, that independent learning does not replace instructed learning. A pedagogue will always be invaluable in the pursuit of knowledge, but none are so valuable as to replace the learners themselves. A brilliant academic student, at any level of institution, must additionally be a brilliant independent student; if they fail to learn on their own, precluding all thought not espoused by an instructor, then they will never be capable of embodying the knowledge that instructor illuminates. In the words of Bloom’s Taxonomy, they will be relegated to the bottom level of knowledge: Recollection of facts, without comprehension, without the application intrinsic to properly learned knowledge. No, for a student to truly succeed in learning, they must recognize their own agency; the instructor, then, becomes a guide and a friend in the pursuit of learning. A friend not in the sense of sycophancy, but in the sense of a learned individual to rely upon to be trustworthy, wise, and above all correct and pressure the learner into the accrual of true knowledge.
Before we continue, it should be said that all writing here falls within a framework espoused here, and a general reluctance and skepticism towards technology explained here.
The Power of Deep Attention
Attention is a contentious issue in the era of smart phones, short form content, and other control systems maintained by the current corporate oligarchy. This contentiousness is not without purpose, as attention itself has been shown to be one of the most important measurements in learning outcomes: Around 60% of learning differences have been correlated to attention differences (Unsworth). For the educator, this leads towards important conclusions in instruction design, but for the individual, the way this study opens is much more personal. If one is to become an independent student, one of the first and foremost pathways of the mind to explore is one’s own attention. Best working with your attention, and cultivating it, is the first step in any meaningful approach to learning.
One of the first steps into the way of attention is recognizing your current attention proficiency, and deficiency. Attentional control, and attention generally, is trainable; Multiple different approaches have been shown to have positive correlations to one’s attention (Tang & Posner). Therefore, before one can start the process of attention training, one must recognize where they hold the greatest failings within this cognitive ability. One may already be aware of their own attention deficit, but if not: Try to do something mundane, or trite, without any additional stimulation. No phone, no music, simply the activity. Monitor yourself while doing so, and check for moments where your attention slips beyond the task at hand. Do not try to focus, just do and observe. Afterwards return to this article, which will follow the two training methods I personally follow: That of moving among nature, and of mindfulness meditation, both of which are shown to have positive outcomes as purported by Tang and Posner.
Firstly, exposure to nature is a phenomenal way to cultivate one’s attention. Continual exposure to nature is, additionally, not a new recommendation: Preston W. Search makes a direct endorsement of nature schools in his endorsement of ideal schooling environments. Gardening, foraging, hiking, playing, all importantly among the natural world, the true home of the human animal. Interacting with nature helps mental recuperation and increases executive attention, leading to a mental state more prepared to focus. Additionally, walking itself has been discussed as a form of gestalt thinking, leading to a better interplay between cognitive and physical processes of the body, and can improve creative thinking (Keinänen, Thabane). Walking among nature, with a focus upon one’s own thoughts and attention, is therefore an excellent and easy starting point to attention cultivation. It should be noted as well: Such activities should preclude phones, music, or notable self-perpetuated distractions. Be among nature, not among technology.
Secondly, mindfulness meditations can be of substantial use on both recuperating, and growing, attention and beyond. The exercise espoused earlier can be seen as a passive form of mindfulness, simply watching your cognition move from one topic to another, or to objects, entities, or addictive outlets. Allowing yourself to contemplate your own mind in such a way can be relaxing, and it can also expose aspects of your cognition that may make you uncomfortable. Such meditative activities are what led me down my now well tread path of skeptical technological use. I found myself over-reliant upon technology, in a way that was deeply disturbing: A lack of knowledge retention, a need for GPS, the list goes on. This approach to mindfulness is not a pursuit of inner peace: It is to be truly self-aware, of one’s limits, of one’s deficiencies, in the name of bettering yourself. Peace is merely an effect, not a goal. Although it must be said, any meditations of this sort must also bestow grace upon yourself, an understanding that these are not permanent or innate failings. Bring forward these deficiencies, as awareness is the first step to improvement.
The cultivation of attention will never reach a conclusion: It must be continual, constructive, and routine. Especially in the modern era—the age of the attention economy—where the attention of the individual is being sold to the highest bidder. Additionally, be calm in the face of the circularity innate in many of these processes: As one comes to peace with certain aspects of the self, the cycle of mindfulness, of attention cultivation, starts anew among new ideas. The closure of a way opens others anew, and what is important is that one forges onward aware that this is a life long journey. Know, additionally, how the time that passes over us is an active participant in these cycles; One cannot skip over processes in the name of saving time, but instead one must accept time’s help as it enables the growth of attention, and the self. Time, in this way, is not a resource to be saved: It is a friend to develop a relationship with.
Retrieval and Note Taking
Beyond the realm of attention is the flowing currents of knowledge, a river so wide, contents that will slip through the sieve of an untrained mind. Every human is capable of the accrual of residual knowledge, of the collection of everyday information that relates back to them. It takes a notable and important journey to develop a mind robust enough to collect it meaningfully. Akin towards the way towards attention, cultivating this sort of mental framework is a lifelong journey—all ways towards truth are. But in order to properly approach truth during the course of our journeys through life, we must develop ways to meaningfully drink from the river of knowledge. Here, then, pertains to three important stepping stones along this path, three that must be taken before any further mileage can be attained: Knowledge collection, categorization, and retrieval.
Firstly, it must be established whether any habits, methodologies, or processes of note taking corresponds to knowledge retention. This is where two important characteristics of active human learning become extremely important: Neurological differences in activities, and learning motivation. The most important aspect of the first point is found in the process of note taking itself, and whether handwriting or digital typing is preferable in the process of collecting knowledge. What is seen is that the former, handwriting, activates a broader network of neurons, and correlates more strongly to retention than typing (Marano et al.). In fact, Marano et al. continues how handwriting additionally benefits the learner through development of fine motor control and other neurological developments, as well as how the longer and deeper attention required leads to greater learning. In short: Notes should be handwriting if the student is to maximize their own knowledge collection.
The next logical question is then how a student should format or structure their notes. Within the space of physical note taking, the two that will be discussed is Sentence note taking, and the Cornell method. The former is the traditional method that all students have likely engaged with at some point or another: Writing down the important aspects of a lecture into a sequence of sentences, usually in chronological order. The Cornell method, meanwhile, adds steps more than it revolutionizes. Important components of the content are still written, however the page is divided into three sections: Sentence notes; cues, which include questions, keywords, and other thoughts on the content; and finally a summary of the lecture at the end of the notes. This more involved method of note taking is the author’s choice, and one that is experimentally shown to garner better retention compared to Sentence note taking (Mesut). Importantly, however, is that the principle measurement is motivation, and commencing in any note taking will be superior to avoiding it.
Beyond the mere collection of knowledge in the form of taking notes, comes the acts of categorization and retrieval. The former is fairly simple—and somewhat solved in note taking—but the latter is subject to much more detailed discussion. Another way of framing it is that categorization is the bridge, or glue, that combines the act of collecting knowledge, and the ability to retrieve it from one’s own mind. This is where the creation of quizzes for oneself—such as flashcards, short answer questioning, or discussion with another—comes into view. These forms of active study have been shown to greatly improve knowledge retrieval, and experimentally has shown that the knowledge learned will remain accessible and available to the student for longer (Brown et al.). Simple memorization can still be useful, such as for physiological activities, but for more cognitive knowledge retrieval practice must be utilized.
The active practice of knowledge collection and retrieval, with categorization as a natural byproduct, leads towards one of the most important avenues in this journey: reflection. This path is what, at last, extends the human mind beyond what can be done through the dead world—that of books, computers, and other knowledge holders. To relate knowledge across domains, to meaningfully assess the knowledge one has come to attain, and to use it towards new ends. Reflection is the true purpose of knowledge; Otherwise, we remain mere automata, systems that are easily subsumed into the greater social organism. This is not to say that we must become antisocial, but that we must remain individuals first: A society of individuals, as was constructed as an ideal during the age of enlightenment, requires those individuals to be reflective, thoughtful participants within the society itself. This prosocial, individualistic tendency towards meaningful learning, leads towards the next step on this life-way: Synthesis.
Fail Forward Synthesis
Now we leave the realm of interwoven science and experience, and move into the fabric of experience and reason. Synthesis itself, the ability to craft new knowledge out of existing pieces, clearly relies upon the aforementioned collection, categorization, retrieval, and practiced aspects of learning. However, all of those practices are simple fuel to the great pyre of a learned mind: Without the ability to use that fuel, through the method of synthesis, there is little truth in keeping it around cognitively. Any student, any person who holds in them the pursuit of knowledge, must be capable of using that knowledge to craft new ideas, to stroke the internal flame that is lit in all of us. For no matter how much water is poured over that flame—be it from the modern schooling institution, economic downturns, personal relationships, or otherwise—the flame will always be smouldering, waiting to be born anew.
If the fire is always ready to be lit, how can it be given the best fuel? This article defines a form of of fuel dispensing labeled Fail Forward Synthesis, that relies upon a few presuppositions that need be accepted for it to reasonably follow. The presupposes are: Synthesis must follow a reasoned way through the psyche; A reasoned way is one in which maintains its own homeostasis from irrationality, where the way must be maintained and held true; and finally, reasoned ways between ideas within one’s psyche can take hold despite seemingly irrational principal relations. The last point is, importantly, the most pivotal towards meaningful synthesis, and the construction of new ideas. Synthesis of ideas can easily follow existing reasoned ways, something analogous to near transfer, but far transference of knowledge is something that requires reason to be suspended and reattained as part of the wayfaring.
This irrational rationality, if such a contradiction can be used, is derived from the argument that true reason—that is, objective or absolute reason—is not something well grasp by the human mind. In consequence comes the psychic nature of subjective reason, and how this nature within the psyche is held partially to the perspectives and phenomenon experienced by it. In simpler terms, holding oneself to pure reason portends the end of one’s own thinking, as new ways of truth cannot be traveled if they appear irrational at onset. For this reason irrationality must be utilized for the creative synthesizer, such that from humble and irrational beginnings forms new lines of rational thinking. This form of relational thinking is a skill to be nurtured, and as such mistakes will be made frequently, hence the given name. Failure to find a rational way from one’s irrational relational thinking is part of the journey of synthesis, and must be encouraged.
This encouragement should not include the blind support of any and all attempts to lay a line of reason between two points. The new way must be challenged stiffly such that it will either achieve homeostasis, or succumb back to irrationality. This is part of the learning and skill acquisition of synthesis itself, and the requirement that true synthesis remain beholden to reason despite its origins. A failure to do this, and the acceptance of irrationality as one’s wayfaring practice, can expediently lead the learner down conspiratorial thinking, dogma, and the same halting of thinking that an overwhelming dependence upon reason will. In this way fail forward synthesis is, itself, a combination of complements: rationality and irrationality, reason and creativity. A form of thinking that will afford the fire of knowledge a constant source of irrational fuel, and a structure of reason that will direct it into meaningful new ideas.
The Illuminary that is Knowledge
By this stage I hope that you, the reader, have a better grasp of the varied aspects and strata that constitute learning. Additionally, I hope that through this article it is seen how even if one becomes the strongest individual learner there is, there remains a strong benefit to remaining under a true teacher. In fact, the truest teachers of all are students themselves, merely further along the ways they themselves have forged. Through these ways all students come to accrue, categorize, relate, and synthesis knowledge, springing forth with a fire that allows us to perpetuate the learning self into all forays of our own lives. But as described in the aspects of synthesis, a strong flame of knowledge is not the same without a powerful reasoning structure, and we as learners and beings within this universe must make effort to direct ourselves through these rational structures, else the flame becomes an inferno of senselessness.
I want to also describe a consequence of such a learning spirit, which is that of illuminated melancholy. In the modern dichotomy between hedonistic utilitarianism and dogmatic traditionalism it is frequently espoused, from both sides, that knowledge leads not only to an illumination of the world, but of the soul. I have not found this to be the case. I have certainly found an inner peace, a self–actualized beauty that allows me to see parts of the physical and the transcendental in all their brilliance. These brilliant phenomena throughout the world of ideas, of nature, and of humanity must not be overlooked. But I have also felt the weight of knowledge, how it leads towards a sadness that arises from a deep confidence in one’s own ego, the belief that due to this knowledge one knows better.
There is some truth in this: The human world is a descendant of human ideals, an invention that reflects our collective soul. It is therefore natural to believe that one’s own psyche is reflected in the whole, that our ideas of utopia come not only from ourselves, but are repressed within collective humanity. However, for all the togetherness expressed through the human soul, it is important to recognize the fractal nature of it. We are all fettered by individuality, splintered from the whole through our own phenomenological complexes. Absolute truth, or utopia, in such a state is either a fractal unto itself, or beyond the impassable barriers of the transcendental altogether. So take onto oneself the piece of utopia perceived, but do not be so arrogant as to believe it is unto itself a whole. For no matter how knowledge arrives, it is itself chained by the nature of phenomenon.
Despite this, do not take this melancholy as a justification to eschew learning, or avoid being a permanent student. Take it instead as a friend, one that will lead you towards greater reflection, and introspection, of not only one’s knowledge of phenomenon, but also of the self. To be in the presence of knowledge, to embolden the fire with further accrual, is to look towards oneself in the great pursuit of truth. Externally stands the pedagogue—the librarian, teacher, tutor, or professor—but internally stands one’s own psyche and the flame it must care for. The responsibility to tend that fire, to grow and direct the flame of knowledge in oneself, remains a deep truth of the human nature of Being: The desire to learn, to know, to create, and to reflect. To foster that desire, and grow the self, is what it means to be an independent student.
Works Cited
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