What Matters/Exploration, discovery, learning

Exploration, discovery, learning

A visual light image of Andromeda Galaxy engages our curiosity.

There is much more out there than in here so venture out, discover new things, and continue to learn. A Buddhist proverb assures us “When the student is ready, the teacher will appear”. Stay ready.

Essential foundations of learning include:

• Humility, an acknowledgement of your ignorance, is the essential prerequisite for learning.
• Curiosity – Wanting to know more, wanting to understand, wanting to learn.
• Memory – Your ability to store, retain, and recall information and experiences.
• Language Proficiency – able to communicate fluently in a language. Establishing a basis for inquiry, dialogue, and discourse.
  • Visual Communications - conveying ideas using diagrams and other visual forms.
  • Collaboration - working with others to achieve a goal.
• Literacy – able to read for comprehension and write with coherence and clarity.
• Numeracy – able to reason with numbers and comprehend quantitative concepts.
  • Set theory - able to reason about collections of objects.
  • Statistics - collection, organization, analysis, and interpretation of data.
  • Stochastic processes - randomly determined events.
• An understanding of Big History.
• Knowing how you know – having a well-founded basis for deciding what to believe.
  • Formal logic - The rules of valid reasoning.
  • Critical thinking - What are the premises? Are they true? Does the conclusion logically follow from those premises?
  • Congruence - an integration forming a coherent whole.
  • The Wikiversity course Knowing How You Know.
  • The Wikiversity course Socratic Methods.
• Primary, secondary, and tertiary research skills.
• Problem formulation and problem solving - improving human welfare by applying learning, experience, analysis, and creativity to move from a given state to a desired goal state.
  • Creativity - Generating new and valuable ideas.
• Play provides a safe, enjoyable, and mentally engaging environment for trying out new skills, exploring ideas, and getting rapid feedback. It is an important learning mode. Play to learn and learn to play.
• Knowledge of our world that provide fundamentals for living.
• The Virtues.
• Your True Self.

In addition to these general learning skills, become expert in the domain knowledge that best enables your strengths. Explore and develop your multiple intelligences.

Adopt an engaging learning model that increases well-being.

Assignment:

• Based on your own goals, assess your competency in each of the learning skills listed above. Perhaps you can grade yourself (A–F) for each skill.
• Learn the skills you need to close those gaps.
• Continue to explore, discover, and learn.
  • Ask "why" and continue asking "why" until you find coherent answers that form a coherent worldview that corresponds with reality and provides a global perspective.
• Complete the Wikiversity course on Knowing How You Know.
• Complete the Wikiversity course on Socratic Methods.

Suggestions for further reading:

• Carey, Benedict (September 2014). How We Learn: The Surprising Truth About When, Where, and Why It Happens. Random House. pp. 272. ISBN 978-0812993882. 
• Evaluate: The Art of Learning: An Inner Journey to Optimal Performance
• Evaluate: Colvin, Geoff (2010). Talent Is Overrated: What Really Separates World-Class Performers from Everybody Else. Portfolio Trade. pp. 240. ISBN 978-1591842941. 
• Evaluate: How Learning Works: Seven Research-Based Principles for Smart Teaching
• Evaluate: Mind in the Making: The Essential Life Skills Every Child Needs
• Evaluate: From Knowledge to Wisdom: A Revolution for Science and the Humanities
• Evaluate: Learning, Teaching and Education Research in the 21st Century: An Evolutionary Analysis of the Role of Teachers
• Evaluate: Imagining the University, By Ronald Barnett