Learning Resources

Now that you have read this book, I hope you have been inspired to take control of your own learning. The following books and online tools are just a fraction of the resources that exist, but these tools can get you started.

Online Tools

Khan Academy, https://www.khanacademy.org/. Now a household name, Khan Academy might already be integrated into your school curriculum. However, you can use it on your own. If you are having trouble with a topic or skill and you want to seek out a different viewpoint or method of teaching, Khan Academy is the place to go.

Coursera, https://www.coursera.org/. Coursera is another online learning platform with courses on an enormous range of topics. This website includes courses that go beyond K–12 academics; it includes business skills and has a particular strength in courses in computer science and coding languages. It is not 100 percent free, but many of its resources are. Make sure your search terms are very specific on this website!

Online University Lecture Courses. Many of the world’s top research institutions have been making some full university courses available online for years. These schools include Harvard University, Yale University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Princeton University, Stanford University, the University of California, Berkeley, the University of Arizona, Sapienza University of Rome, the University of Pennsylvania, the Ohio State University, Oxford University, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid— the list is almost endless. A Google search for online university courses will lead you to many web pages with lists of available courses. These are completely free and will give you access to some of the most cutting-edge scholarship in the world. Don’t be intimidated by the college level—you won’t be tested or assessed on what you learn! You can just listen to the videos and learn what the professor has to offer.

If you watch a series of lectures and deeply engage with the content, you may want to see if you can find the professor’s email listed on the university or departmental website. A short, respectful email with a question about something from the lecture may even result in a valuable opportunity to learn even more if the professor is able to respond. (But don’t be offended if you do not get a reply. Professors are extremely overworked and often are not able to respond to every email they receive.)

Students LEAD, Friday Institute for Innovative Education, https://studentslead.fi.ncsu.edu. If you have ever been frustrated with yourself and wondered why you were putting in enormous amounts of time and effort and still not succeeding, you might want to check this site out. Different people learn in different ways, and the assessment offered will help you learn about yourself and the way you take in and process information. The tools and resources are completely free! You can use what you learn from LEAD and apply it to your own studying, or you can reach out to your teachers and share your results—they may be able to teach you more effectively if they know.

Books on Learning

Check out your school and local library for any of these books on learning. Not only can you learn material better, but you can teach yourself how to be better at learning itself! Some of these books are written for students, and some are written for teachers. Although you are a student, all of these books can be valuable to you—you can still learn the techniques.

How We Learn: The Surprising Truth about When, Where, and Why It Happens by Benedict Carey

Learning How to Learn: How to Succeed in School without Spending All Your Time Studying; A Guide for Kids and Teens by Barbara Oakley and Terrence Sejnowski, with Alistair McConville

Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning by Peter C. Brown, Henry L. Roediger III, and Mark A. McDaniel

Mindshift: Break through Obstacles to Learning and Discover Your Hidden Potential by Barbara Oakley

Powerful Teaching: Unleash the Science of Learning by Pooja K. Agarwal and Patrice M. Bain

Understanding How We Learn: A Visual Guide by Yana Weinstein and Megan Sumeracki, with Oliver Caviglioli