如何“留住”你所学的东西

Most people forget what theyve just learnt within 12 and 24 hours. If you are reading this article now， chances are that tomorrow youll not even remember it. Our brain works like a big search engine， when you insert a new piece of information， it goes on a big stack called short term memory. When you want to remember that information， your brain will try to search inside that stack for the information you requested. This process happens asynchrony thats why you often remember a title of a song after many hours from your first attempt.

If you are trying to recall something after a long time （it can be even 1 hour for useless information）， your brain will have an hard time finding it， as its more likely you have forget it. Knowing this， we can try to understand why we forget what weve learnt just a few hours ago. When a new piece of information enters your brain， it is stored as a volatile information， because your brain doesnt know if its useful or not. For example you dont need to remember every car youve seen in your daily commute to work.

But what happens when you try to recall something youve previously learnt？ Most times you simply cant. If I would tell you now that to find the sum of the number from 1 to n you have to calculate （n+1） × n / 2， chances are that within one hour itll be already hard for you to recall the correct formula， although its pretty easy. This happens because （if you are not good at math） your brain does not find similar information already stored in your brain， so its hard for it to reinforce that information alone. And by now youve probably forget it. As youve just read， the major difficult for your brain is to reinforce and create consistency， and the best way to help your brain doing it is by recalling what youve just learnt multiple times. What does this mean in practice？

Knowing this， you can probably understand why your life doesnt change even after reading the best how to book youve ever read. Even if I was telling you the perfect formula for solving all your problems， and that formula would make perfect sense to you， you would forget it after a few hours， and your life would remain the same. Unless， of course， you deliberately reinforce your new knowledge and make it part of your life （also known as taking action）.

How do you keep track of new stuff？

Depending on the nature of the information youve just acquired， there are many ways to keep track of what youve learnt. If you want to master a new technique on your sport， the best way is to repeat it as many times as possible until it becomes second nature for you. If you are following a history class at school， it may be a good idea to create a mind map with the fundamental concepts and dates， and repeat it every day.

Enter the learning log

Given that I spend most of my learning time in front of a monitor， or reading a book， what I needed was something where I can store information very quickly. I used to have a personal wiki， but it didnt quite work for me. Instead I am now using a learning log， which is something extremely simple that can be done both in your computer and also in a simple notebook. The idea is to create a new entry every time you learn something new （assuming you want to remember it）. If you are doing this on paper， you can just write the date on the top of your sheet and then make an incremental bullet list. If you are doing this in your computer， you can do the same thing， but you also need to keep track of your files in an efficient way where its easy for you to switch from one day to another. With this simple method， it will be extremely easy to keep track of the new concepts you want to grasp. And if your system is not available at any time， you can make a note elsewhere， and merge it with your original file at the end of the day.

How often should you recall？

How often you need to recall depends on the mole of information youve stored and how important it is for you. As a general rule you should recall at the end of the day， after 24 hours， after 1 week， after 1 month， after 6 months， and after one year. This should be simple to do if your system is in order， as on a typical day you only have to recall 6 files. I tend to do a quick review at the end of the week for old files， but thats a personal choice and you have to try what works for yourself. If theres something that I absolutely want to master and remember well， I copy it on new days until necessary.

Will your brain ever become full？

If you are worried that your brain will become full one day with a method like this， you have to know that its basically impossible to happen. So dont worry and enjoy learning new stuff.

What to do now？

If what youve just read makes sense to you， the best thing you can do now is creating your learning log. It doesnt need to be perfect， as long as you get started you can always improve it.

大多数人在12到24小时内会把他们刚学到的东西给忘记。如果你正在阅读这篇文章，很有可能明天你就会忘掉它。我们的大脑运行起来就象一个大的搜索引擎，当你输入一条新信息，它就会存留在一个叫做短期记忆的大存储栈中。你想要回忆起这条信息时，你的大脑会尝试从存储栈中搜寻你要的信息。但这个过程并不是同时发生的，这也就是为什么你经常会在首次尝试时记不住一首歌的歌名而很多小时后却会记起它。

如果你在很长时间之后试图重新回忆起某些东西（对于无用信息，哪怕仅有1小时之久），你的大脑也会很难找到它，因为很有可能你已经忘记它了。明白这点，我们就可以理解为什么我们会忘记刚刚在数小时前学会的东西。当一条新信息进入你的大脑时，由于大脑不知道它是否有用，因此它会被当作一条易失信息被存储下来，正如你没有必要记住你每天上下班所看到的每辆车一样。

但当你试图回忆起你以前学过的某些东西时会怎么样呢？大多数时候你会想不起来。如果我现在告诉你计算1到n的总和可以如此计算：（n+1） × n / 2，很有可能哪怕不超过一小时，但要你再回忆起正确的公式都会很难，虽然它其实很简单。这是因为（如果你数学不太好）你的大脑没有找到已存储的类似信息，所以对它来说很难单独强化这条信息，所以到现在你很有可能已经忘记这公式了。正像你刚刚读到的，大脑的主要困难是强化和创造信息的相容性，所以把刚刚学到的东西多回忆几次是帮助大脑解决这个问题的最好方法。

实践中这意味着什么？

明白这点，你也许就能理解为什么即便在你阅读了最好的如何预约的指南之后，你的生活还是没有改变。就算我告诉了你能解决你所有问题的最好方法，并且这方法对你极有意义，你也会在数小时后忘记它，你的生活也还是一样。当然，除非你刻意要强化这个新知识，并使之成为你生活的一部分（也就是采取行动）。

如何留住新知识？

根据你刚刚获取的信息的性质，有很多方法可以保留住它们。如果你想掌握你这项运动的一样新技巧，最好的方法是尽可能地重复多次直到它成为你的第二天性。如果你在学校里正修着历史课，用基本概念和日期在头脑里创建起一个图像，然后每天重复，这可是一个好主意。

建立学习日志

假定我大部份的学习时间都花在显示器前，要么阅读，要么别的，我需要的是一些能快速存储信息的东西。我以前用个人网站，但对我作用不大。现在我代之以学习日志，这是很简单，用你的电脑或者一个简单的笔记本就可以搞定。这个方法是每次你了解了一些新的东西，而且你想记住它，就可以创建一个新条目。如果你在纸上做，你可以在该页上方写上日期，然后做一个增加条目列表。如果你在电脑上操作，你也可以这样做，但你也需要用有效的方法来保存文档，使你能方便地从某一天切换到另一天的记录。使用这个简单的方法，就很容易记住你想掌握的新概念。并且如果你在某个时候不能使用你的电脑，你也可以在别的电脑上做笔记，最后把它合并到你的原始文件中。

你应该多久回忆一次？

你需要多久回忆一次取决于你存储的信息量及其对你的重要程度。通常你应该在晚上，24小时后，一个星期后，一个月后，6个月后以及一年之后进行回忆。如果你的文档系统井然有序，这应该容易做到，因为每一天你只需要回忆6个文件。我趋向于在周末快速回顾旧文件，但这只是我个人的选择，你必须尝试适合你自己的方式。如果有我绝对要掌握并熟记的东西，到必要时我会将它拷贝到新的日期。

你的大脑会被装满吗？

如果你担心这样有朝一日你的大脑会被装满，那就有必要知道这是根本不可能发生的。所以别担心，开开心心学东西吧。

现在怎么做？

如果刚才所说的对你有意义，你现在能做的最好的事情就是建立你的学习日志。它不需要做得很完美，只要你开始了，你总会完善它的。