MODULE 1

VIDEO 1
●​ Your brain has two different ways of learning! One is the “focused mode.” That’s when you’re
paying close attention to something.
●​ The other is the diffuse mode. That’s when you don’t seem to be thinking about anything in
particular! Learning involves going back and forth between focused and diffuse modes.
●​ To play pinball, you pull out on the plunger, like this, and a ball goes out bouncing on the
rubber bumpers. That's how you earn points. The pinball machine works a lot like your brain!
This machine is like your thinking when you’re in focused mode. The bumpers here are very
close to one another. See this fuzzy pattern here towards the top? It represents familiar
thinking patterns. Maybe involving something that you already know, like how to multiply
numbers. The ball is like a thought. You think a thought, like “I want to multiply 2 times 3.” The
thought takes off, moving smoothly along. As it's bouncing around on the bumpers, you're able
to solve a simple, familiar problem.
●​ But what if the problem you're working on needs new ideas or approaches? Ideas you haven't
learned or thought of before? For example, let’s say you know how to multiply, but you don’t
know how to divide. The new thought pattern you want to develop is symbolized here towards
the bottom of the pinball-brain. If you haven't thought that thought before, you don't even know
how to put that pattern there. And see all the tightly-spaced rubber bumpers that are blocking
your thinking? To get to this new thought pattern, you need a different way of thinking. And
that's represented here, by the diffuse mode. Look at how widely spaced the rubber bumpers
are. A thought takes off, look at how it moves widely, bounces around. It can travel a long way
before hitting a bumper. In the diffuse mode of thinking, you can look at things broadly in a very
different, big picture way.
●​ Your thoughts can make new connections traveling along new pathways. You can't focus
tightly to figure out a problem or understand the details of a concept, like you can in the
focused mode. But you can at least get to the new place you need to be in to solve a hard
problem or understand a new concept.
●​ When you’re learning, you're either in the focused mode or the diffuse mode. You can't be in
both modes at the same time. It's kind of like a coin. We can see either one side or the other
side of the coin. But not both sides at the same time. Being in one mode prevents you from
being in the other mode.
●​ When you’ve been focusing for a while, and you get stuck, that’s perfectly normal! “Being
stuck” is a signal for you to step back from the focused mode for a little while, to let your brain’s
diffuse mode go to work. To do that, turn to something different. Or just take a break! When
you come back later, things will make more sense.
VIDEO 2:
●​ Procrastination means putting things off until later. Like when you know you have a big test
on Friday, but you procrastinate all week and don’t study for it until Thursday night.
●​ Why do you procrastinate? When I procrastinate it feels like something is hanging over my
head. It's actually in my head. When something really bad happens to you, a part of your brain
called the insular cortex fires up. Tucked away, under your skull around here (point), the insula
is activated when you're feeling pain and when you’re emotionally hurting.
●​ The insula is closely connected to your body—that's why it's a gut feeling. Guess what? The
insula also fires up when you’re just thinking about something you don't want to do. But it
happily settles down once you get to work on the task you were avoiding. And you will feel a lot
better, as your insula gives up its grip on you.
●​ So, one of the best tips to becoming a great learner is to just get going. Don’t put your work off.
You’re thinking, “But how can I settle down and just get working?” The solution…….yes, it’s a
tomato!
●​ In the 1980s, Italian Francesco Cirillo devised the Pomodoro Technique to help
procrastinators. Pomodoro means “tomato” in Italian. Cirillo developed a tomato-shaped timer,
like this one. Cirillo’s technique is very simple—all it needs is a timer. A tomato-shaped timer
like Cirillo’s is really nice, but any timer will do. I often use a digital timer that I’ve downloaded
to my computer.
●​ There are also Pomodoro apps that people like to use—the “Forest” app is especially popular.
Here’s how to do a “Pomodoro”:
○​ 1. First, as much as you can, shut off all distractions—the television, your phone, your
little brother. You want to be able to focus as intently as you can without being
interrupted.
○​ 2. Set your Pomodoro timer for 25 minutes.
○​ 3. Start working—focus as intently as you can. 25 minutes of focus is doable!
○​ 4. When the 25 minutes is done, reward yourself. How? You can listen to your favorite
song—even move to it! Or play a video game. Maybe hug your dog. Or talk with friends.
Five or ten minutes is a good amount of time for a reward—many people find it helpful
to set a timer for their reward period.
●​ The reward is the most important part of the whole Pomodoro process. Why? It gives your
diffuse mode a chance to work on what you are learning. Remember, you don’t just learn when
you are focusing—you learn through a combination of focusing and relaxing. Even when your
brain is relaxing, it’s still working quietly, figuring things out.
 ●​ When you are focusing while you’re doing a Pomodoro, your thoughts can wander off—you
lose focus. That’s perfectly normal. All you have to do is bring your thoughts back as soon as
you catch them wandering off.
●​ Here’s how. Putting your studies off for a little while longer doesn’t seem like it will hurt
anything. But as you get used to procrastinating, it makes learning harder. You’ll get stressed
because you have less time to learn. You can become a less effective student. Remember, you
can make short periods of focused concentration into a healthy habit. So learn to love the
Pomodoro app on your phone.

Test:
1.​ False
2.​ True
3.​ False
4.​ True
5.​ True
6.​ False
7.​ False
8.​ False

●​ When you successfully complete a Pomodoro instead of procrastinating, how will you reward
yourself?

VIDEO 3
●​ Of all the different careers that people can pursue, why are those involving math and science
sometimes more challenging? Part of the reason is the ideas are more abstract. Let's take a
cow, for example, out standing in a field. If you have the word cow, you can point right to a cow
to learn what that word means.
●​ But for mathematical ideas, there's often nothing similar you can point to. There are no plus
signs standing out in a field so that you can point and instantly know what the plus symbol
stands for. Multiplication or division or other types of mathematical or scientific symbols aren’t
instantly understandable, either. All of these terms are also abstract. This means that it is
important to practice the ideas or concepts you're learning in math and science. Just like
anything else you're learning.
●​ Practice helps make the changes in your brain — it helps make abstract ideas more real.
Just like everything else you're learning, it's really important to practice the ideas or concepts
you're learning in math and science. Practice helps make the changes in your brain last longer
— it can even make abstract ideas become as natural as real things.
●​ Not only is practice important for learning, how you practice can make a big difference in how
well you will remember a new concept. Don't cram your practice the day before a big test. You
will forget most of it after the test.
●​ if you review the concept at spaced intervals, even if briefly, you will remember the concept for
a long time. This works for any concept, whether it is a vocabulary word, an event in history or
a problem in math. Practice is right.

VIDEO 4
 ●​ Your brain has a lot of tiny neurons in it. But even though they are tiny, neurons are the
building blocks of our brain. To help you understand neurons, let’s think of them as tiny aliens
from outer space. Here’s the eye of the neuron-alien. Here’s the neuron-alien’s arm. You can
see the neuron-alien’s three legs down below. Here are the neuron’s “legs.” They’re called
dendrites. And here’s the neuron’s “arm.” It is called an axon. The “eye” is the main part of the
neuron. (In reality, the eye is called the “nucleus.”) Real neurons can actually have more than
three “legs.” Many more!
●​ Neurons come in all sorts of shapes and sizes. Look at those little knobs. They are called
dendritic spines. You can think of them as being like toes that are scattered all over the space
alien’s legs. Kind of creepy, but hey, if the neurons didn't have so many toes, they wouldn't be
able to get their jobs done.
●​ Dendritic spines may be small, but they are also important. The spines help neurons receive
signals from other neurons. When a neuron-alien wants to “talk” to the next alien, its arm gives
a tiny shock to the toe of the next alien. (Neuron-aliens show friendship by giving tiny shocks to
one another. Just one of those strange things!)
●​ But it’s surprisingly similar for real neurons. An axon ripples a signal along its arm. When the
signal gets to the end of the arm, it causes a shock to jump across a special, narrow gap to the
dendritic spine of the next neuron. The gap, incidentally, is called a synapse. If the signal
travels through a neuron all the way to the end of the axon, it can cause a spark to go across
the synapse gap to the next neuron. And the next. It can just keep going. These flowing signals
are your thoughts. You can also think of them as being like the trails on your mental pinball
table. Incidentally, synapses are the only place where neurons are close enough, and set up
just right, so so that signals can cross from one neuron to the next. And there are a lot of them
in your brain. A million billion synapses.
●​ More often a neuron shocks the next neuron, the stronger the synapse connection. It’s like
friends who become better friends because they talk a lot. Neuroscientists have a saying:
"Neurons that fire together, wire together." "Wiring together" means that a brain-link is being
created. Learning means creating new, or stronger, brain-links.
●​ At the beginning, when you’re first beginning to learn something, the brain-link is weak. There
may only be a few neurons linked together, and the spark between the neurons isn’t very big.
As you practice a new idea, the synaptic links get stronger. This means the sparks get bigger.
You can get more neurons, with stronger synapses—the brain-links get bigger and better!
More complicated ideas can make longer brain-links. People sometimes think of brain-links as
if they were mouse paths in a forest. The more the mouse runs along the path, the wider the
path gets. The easier it is to follow the path! The fact that paths in your brain change and grow
is called neuroplasticity. This fancy word just means that your neurons can change. That’s why
you can change!

VIDEO 5
●​ When you learn something new during the day, the buds of tiny new dendritic spines begin to
peek out of your dendrites. They really bust loose and grow, though, when you’re asleep.
These new “grown up” dendritic spines form connections with the axons of other neurons
through the synapses.
●​ This means that brain-links come together when you are sleeping! When you are sleeping,
your brain practices what it has learned during the day. We can see the electrical signals
 traveling again and again through the same sets of neurons. It’s as if, while we’re dreaming,
the space aliens have a chance to pass along some friendly, reassuring shocks over and over
again. Another way to think of it is that during the night, your little mental mouse has a chance
to run again and again along the neural pathway. (Mice like to run around at night, remember!)
It’s the “nighttime practice” during sleep that allows the dendritic spines to get bigger.
●​ When the dendritic spine grows big, the synapse gets stronger. That is, the space alien can
send a more powerful shock. Your brain-links get a tiny bit stronger. This makes it easier to
think about what you are learning. It’s like walking on a nice, wide, smooth path instead of
trying to push your way through the weeds and bushes.
●​ Your brain changes when you learn! Dendritic spines are a little like lie detectors. The new
spines and their synapses only begin growing if you’re really focusing on the new information
you want to learn.
●​ But it’s important to realize that even after you pull new dendritic spines to life because you’re
started to learn something, the spines will wilt and disappear if you don’t practice with them.
Your “synaptic janitor” removes the dendritic spines because they’re not being used. Use them
or lose them!
●​ Have you ever understood something in class, but a few days later, when you looked again at
your notes, found yourself lost? This happens because your synaptic janitors cleaned away the
budding dendritic spines—after all, they weren’t being used. To prevent this from happening,
look over your notes soon after you’ve made them. Explain the ideas to a friend. Make
flash-cards. Remember—brief practice sessions over several days are better than one long
practice session.
●​ Learning grows in your brain sort of like brick walls—gradual layers, day by day. Learn and
sleep, learn and sleep. Practicing over several days allows for new synaptic links to get
stronger and helps the new learning to really take hold. If you try to cram, your neural “mortar”
doesn’t have a chance to dry! It’s a poor foundation for learning. Practice helps make
permanent—or at least a lot stronger.
MODULE 2
VIDEO 6
●​ A metaphor is a comparison between two things. One thing is something you are familiar with,
like an ocean wave. The other thing is something you may not be familiar with, like an
electrical wave. Metaphors allow you to connect what you already know to the new concept
you’re learning. This helps you learn faster. Obviously, an electric wave is not the same as an
ocean wave. We also know a neuron is not a space alien, and a dendritic spine is not a toe.
They just share some similarities that make it easier for you to understand certain ideas.
●​ Technically, though, I’m sometimes using an analogy or simile. Coming up with a creative
metaphor is one of the best ways to learn a new concept or share an important idea
●​ When you think of a metaphor for a concept, a pre-existing set of brain-links is activated. This
older set of brain-links allows you to more easily think about the new concept using ideas you
already understand.
●​ Ultimately, this means that, just by thinking of a good metaphor, you’ve already started
understanding aspects of the new concept! Metaphors help you to get key ideas faster.
●​ (This is related to something called “neural re-use” theory. A metaphor allows you to re-use an
idea you have already learned to help you learn a new idea.)
●​ At some level, metaphors stop working. For example, our metaphor of a space alien sending a
shock to the next space alien doesn’t explain synapses well if you look closely. That’s okay,
though, because whenever a metaphor stops working, you can just throw it away and get a
new one.
●​ Sometimes it’s nice to have several different metaphors to help you understand a single idea.
We used three different metaphors to help us understand how neurons connect together. We
said it could be like a brain-links, like space aliens shocking one another, or like a mouse path
in a forest.
VIDEO 7
●​ In developing brains, synapses form rapidly, and they continue to change their strengths as
you learn new things. Learning makes us smarter. And learning about how to learn is one of
the best things you can do to make your learning more successful!
●​ So, let’s explore a powerful technique to help you learn. This technique is called “recall.”
Recall means bringing an idea back to mind. Actively recalling key ideas you are learning has
been shown to be a great way to help you understand those ideas.
●​ For example, let’s say you are trying to learn something from a book or from your notes. Here’s
how to use recall to help you. First, carefully read the page. If you need to, underline a key
word or two, but not too many. This is the important part. Look away from the page and see if
you can recall the key idea or ideas on the page. Play them back in your mind. Or say them
out loud to yourself. Do not simply re-read the page over and over again. And don’t underline
or highlight big amounts of text (Suriii, me na naging coloring book ang reviewer✌✌)—that
doesn’t help put anything in your mind (dammit!).
●​ Pulling the key idea from your own mind is the critical idea behind recall. Recall is what makes
the dendritic spines start to sprout! Just passively reading or rereading a page, or underlining
parts of the page, doesn’t make those dendritic spines start to pop—it doesn’t help you form
those all-important new brain-links. Greg: Try recall on a few key pages of what you are trying
to learn in your studies. You’ll be surprised at how this can help.
●​ Research has shown that if you use recall when you are studying, you will also do much better
on tests. Recall doesn’t just put information into your memory—it also helps you to understand
what you’re learning. It’s a good idea to recall information at different times and places. You
can use recall while waiting for a bus, going to sleep, or taking a bath.
●​ I want to point out one more important idea. Some people need more practice and repetition
than others to get a concept and create brain-links. That’s perfectly okay! For example, I often
have to practice, practice, practice recalling information much more than other people—I learn
very slowly. Yet by practicing, I eventually became a professor of engineering.
●​ Even though each of us learns in different ways and at different speeds, each of us can learn.
So don’t feel bad if it takes you longer to learn things than your friends. You can still learn the
information just as well—sometimes even better!

VIDEO 8
●​ Your brain uses two different systems: Working memory and long-term memory. Your
working memory is small and can’t hold much—like your school bag. But it’s very handy. It
holds whatever you’re working on at the moment—that’s why it’s called “working memory.”
●​ Your long-term memory is like a locker. It’s usually not very handy. You have to walk down the
hallway—or travel further on your mental pathways—to get to it. But you can put more stuff in
a locker than in the school bag.
●​ Metaphorically speaking, it’s like you have a friendly little octopus that lives in your mental
school bag. This is your “attentional octopus.” It allows you to hold ideas in mind. Whenever it
wants to, your attentional octopus can spark a tiny little bit of electricity at the end of its arms.
These sparks help it to “speak” to neurons.
●​ Your working memory, (that is, your attentional octopus), lives in your prefrontal cortex. Your
attentional octopus helps you to hold information temporarily in working memory. Let’s say you
are introduced to three people. Adam, Omar, and Sarah. You hold those names in mind with
 the arms of your attentional octopus. Wait. Was her name Sarah? Or was it Laura? Your
octopus’s arms can be slippery. Information can slip away. That’s why you often find yourself
repeating something you want to temporarily remember. Like a name: “Sarah, Sarah, Sarah.”
Or a number. Or the chores your mom just told you to do. You’re helping your octopus to hold
onto the ideas.
●​ Your attentional octopus isn’t like ordinary octopuses. For one thing, it’s electric. And it only
has four arms. This means it can only hold four things at one time. Here’s an example of a
mental list. “Clean my room, do my homework, brush my teeth, tease my brother.” Try to add
anything else to your mind and it’s easy to forget.
●​ How do you put your attentional octopus to work? By focusing on information. Ever forgotten a
name right after you heard it? You weren’t focusing. Your attentional octopus was asleep. It
couldn’t grab the information. When you learn something new, you focus hard. Your attentional
octopus is busy, arms all entangled with each other.
●​ Everybody has an attentional octopus—but they’re all a little different. Most have four arms.
But some people’s octopuses can have five or even more arms. These octopuses can hold
more information than usual. But some octopuses have only three arms—they can’t hold as
much information. Some octopuses can easily stick their tentacles onto information and hold it
firmly. Other octopuses have slippery tentacles that have trouble holding onto information.
Incidentally, don’t worry if your octopus has fewer arms, or slippery tentacles. As you will soon
discover, these seeming drawbacks can give you unexpected advantages.
●​ Your attentional octopus can hold onto information for just a little while—maybe ten to fifteen
seconds. Then the information can slide away unless you concentrate or repeat it. If you want
to remember information for a long time, it needs to go somewhere else.
●​ Fortunately, your brain has another memory system: Long-term memory. That’s like your
“locker.” You can store a lot of information in your long-term locker memory. You can never fill
it—which means you never have to worry about overloading it. You can recognize your friends’
faces. Your favorite jokes are in there, too. So is the route you take to school. And lots of facts
and concepts you’ve learned.
●​ Your long-term memory isn’t in the prefrontal cortex, like your working memory. Long-term
memory is much more spread out. Each piece of information you store in long term memory is
a set of brain-links. Simple information makes small brain-links. More complicated information
makes longer, more complex sets of links.

VIDEO 9
●​ Your long-term memory has two parts in it—a toothpaste tube sitting in the wall locker, and the
rest of the wall locker. I know what you’re thinking—“Huh?” These are our metaphors for the
two parts of long-term memory. The key idea is this: It’s hard to put stuff into a toothpaste tube.
But it’s easy to tape a picture to the wall of a locker.
●​ We already know that your attentional octopus can take information out of long-term memory. It
just reaches out to zap and make a connection to a set of brain links. But your attentional
octopus also puts information into long-term memory. The octopus first looks at the information
to decide where it belongs. Pictures go into one part of your cortex and facts go into some
other part. To your octopus, facts are like toothpaste—they're hard to handle. Your octopus
struggles to squeeze facts into a toothpaste tube. But, if the information is a picture, your
octopus is much happier. It just sticks the picture to the wall of the locker.
 ●​ What do we mean by a fact? Facts like this are abstract—they’re hard to see in your mind’s
eye. That’s what makes facts harder to store—like putting toothpaste back in the toothpaste
tube. But information that is in pictures is much easier to remember. Do you get the idea? If
you convert a fact into an unusual picture, it’s a lot easier to remember. If the picture somehow
involves movement, it will stick even more strongly.

VIDEO 10
●​ “memory palace technique.” Modern research has shown that using this technique changes
your brain and helps you to start improving your memory.
●​ Think about a place you know really well, like your home. You can use your mental map of
your home as a sort of note pad to remember items on a list. All you do is take whatever you
want to remember, and then mentally put funny versions of those items in the rooms of your
home as you walk through it. Revisiting memory palaces strengthens those brain-links!
●​ Here are some other ideas to help you remember: Make up rhymes about what you are trying
to remember. Sometimes there are already funny rhymes that other people have made up—try
Googling “reactivity series rhymes”! Make up a metaphor for a concept you’re trying to
understand and remember—the sillier, the better! Take good notes, and write them by
hand—don’t type them.
MODULE 3
VIDEO 11
●​ Building strong sets of brain links is even more important than you think. Why? Because sets
of brain links help you to easily handle complex information. Now remember, a brain link is
made when axons and dendritic spines link together through synapses. You make a strong
brain link when you learn the concept well. Your attentional octopus can easily zap and make a
connection with a solid brain link.
●​ We are first trying to figure something out you're attentional octopus, that is your working
memory, is busy. All four arms of your octopus are juggling information. They're trying to put
the ideas together so they're connected and make sense. In other words, your working
memory is helping you to create a new set of brain links. Exactly. Now, the set of brain links is
created gradually. First, your working memory starts to put together and understand the new
concept. After some practice, the new concept begins to feel natural and even easy, that's
because you've created a new set of brain links that nicely connects pathways in your
long-term memory. The axons of your brain links have linked across the synapses to dendritic
spines, each friendly neuron reaches out to zap the next. Your attentional octopus can easily
connect to a set of brain links. To make the connection, your octopus slips an arm out of your
mental school bag, your working memory. The arm slithers through your brain's hallways all
the way over to your long-term memory locker. There, the arm gives an electrical zap to the set
of links it needs.
●​ The set of brain links is activated. Now, you can use the information. All the octopus needs to
use is one arm. The other three arms of the attentional octopus are free. If you want, you can
grab onto other sets of brain links with those other arms. You can connect complicated ideas or
actions. This explains how experts can think about very complicated ideas and process very
difficult questions even with only four arms of working memory.
 ●​ Experts can use their attentional octopuses is to easily connect to large amounts of
information. Here though, is one important point, just understanding a concept does not create
a set of brain links. If you watch someone to understand how to backup a car, could you really
learn how to backup a car or understand how to play tennis just by watching a tennis game on
TV. If it was that easy, all of us can be top tennis players.
●​ But the way you practice is important. When you got an idea well linked, it feels good to
practice because it's so easy but this can turn into lazy learning. Practice of the easy stuff you
already know. The best way to learn more rapidly is to avoid lazy learning the easy stuff.
Instead, focus on what you find more difficult.

VIDEO 12
●​ If you're working memory has too much to hold, it becomes difficult to figure things out. This
relates to your cognitive load. That is, the amount of minor effort your working memory is
making. If your working memory is already putting in a lot of effort, you can't easily add more to
its load. Your octopus is already too busy. Basically, your working memory can only hold so
much information in mind at once.
●​ But, brain links can make things easier. This is because your working memory can pass off the
routine parts of your mental processing to the brain links. The kind of like mental helpers or like
subroutines in a computer program. Brain links help free up your working memory for the
harder things that you're focusing on. So, we've learned two important traits of your attentional
octopus. It only wakes up and goes to work when you focus, and it only has a limited number
of arms, which means it can only hold so much information at once. Distraction makes things
more difficult for your octopus. It's like putting one of its arms in a sling.
●​ Attention switching makes your octopus tire. Here's an example. Let's say you're writing a
report about chili peppers. Your friend walks in and starts talking about last night's party. Your
attentional octopus let's go the chili pepper set of brain links to grab on to what your friend is
saying. So, the lesson is, avoid distractions and interruptions when you're focusing on your
studies, it drains part of your brain's learning power. Before you begin to create brain links,
what you're learning can often seem difficult and not very fun? the important point here is that
sometimes you don't enjoy what you're learning when you're still in the early stages. It will get
easier, and more fun. You may think there's too much. How can I ever make brain links out of it
all. Keep in mind what we call the law of serendipity. Lady luck favors the one who tries. Don't
think about everything you're trying to learn. Just focus on whatever section you're studying,
your intuition will give you hints about the information that's most important to link. Once you
create a new set of brain links for the first problem or concept, whatever it is, the second one
will go in a bit more easily, and the third more easily still. It doesn't get all super easy, but it
does get easier. Creating good brain links is like creating good luck.
VIDEO 13
●​ Exercise helps new neurons grow. That's because when you exercise, your brain makes a
chemical called BDNF. That's short for our Brains Definitely Need Food, actually BDNF stands
for Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor. But that's not as catchy.
●​ Trophic is a word that means growth, BDNF is like a food for your neurons. It makes them
strong and healthy. It also helps them to connect more easily with other neurons.
●​ Exercise is healthy not only for your body but also for your brain. Exercise can help you make
better brain links. Not only does exercise boost learning, a healthy diet can also help with
learning. Eating healthy means adding a variety of fruits and vegetables to your diet.
Vegetables from the onion and cabbage family contain chemicals that keep away all sorts of
diseases from diabetes to cancer. Fruits of all colors are also great. Dark chocolate is very
good for you, but choose chocolate with low sugar and avoid eating chocolate later in the day
because it can interfere with your sleep. Nuts are also great, a handful of nuts today can nicely
round out your diet.
●​ Avoid fake foods. These include; highly processed foods like French fries, chips, chicken
nuggets, and anything with lots of sugar or white flour in it, like doughnuts. I gave up soft drinks
along time ago and I especially avoid high fructose corn syrup which is the main ingredient and
sweetener in soft drinks and many other processed foods. Fruit juices are much better for your
brain.

VIDEO 14
●​ If you learn more slowly than others, I’ve got a nice surprise for you—you can do just as well,
and sometimes even better than fast learners. Research shows that action video games can
build your ability to focus. When you play an action video game, your mental mouse runs up
and down an important central brain path. It’s the “focus” path in your brain, and it gets wider
as you use it more. It’s not only action video games that are helpful. Games like Tetris can
build your spatial ability. That means you can
●​ And if you’re into action style games, introduce them to your parents and grandparents! Yes,
research shows that action style video games can help improve people’s ability to focus and
concentrate, even while they’re older. I’ll give you another learning surprise. Students who
write their notes out by hand do better than those who type them. (Alex thingz, dammit!
mag write na den aq)
●​ Why? Handwriting is slower than typing. Because it’s slower, handwriting forces you to try to
catch the key ideas. The process of figuring out key ideas starts to pull out dendritic
spines—which helps you start a set of brainlinks. If you review your notes one last time not
long before you go to sleep, you can nudge your dendritic spines grow even better!
(Remember, just before you go to sleep is time to take a glance to get the ideas back in
mind—not a time to actually do the studying!)
●​ some people have fantastic octopuses, with eight or even more arms, and incredibly sticky
tentacles. People like this can easily hold a lot in their working memory. Nice. But a smaller
working memory can also give advantages. People with only three arms on their attentional
octopus can’t hold a lot in mind very easily. To think about complex ideas, they have to create
helpful brainlinks. These brainlinks help them to see elegant shortcuts that wouldn’t occur to
the person with a strong working memory!
 ●​ This is why a hardworking person with a limited working memory can be valuable to study with,
or to have on a team. They can hit upon simple but elegant insights that others miss. They can
also be great at explaining complex ideas in simple ways.
●​ More than that, people with poor working memories can be very creative. Research shows that
when one thought slips from mind, another pops in. People with challenges to their ability to
focus, like those with ADHD, can be particularly creative. You can think about it this way. Both
a race car driver and the hiker get to the finish line—they just do it at different speeds. For the
race car brain person, the scenery passes in a blur as they speed through their thinking. The
“hiker brain” person, on the other hand, can reach out and touch the leaves on the trees, hear
the birds singing, smell the pine in the air, and see the little rabbit trails. Oddly enough, this
means that in some ways, the hiker brain can see more deeply than the race car brain!
●​ People can have hiker brains in some subjects, and race car brains in other subjects. That’s
perfectly normal. Whenever you find yourself showing a hiker brain and taking more time to
learn, be happy. You can still get to the finish line. In some ways you can learn more deeply
and see more creatively, precisely because it takes you longer to learn. On the other hand, if
you have a race car brain about a subject, you can also be happy, because learning will go
swiftly for you. But, you’ll also need to be careful not jump to conclusions and to avoid being
overconfident.

VIDEO 15
●​ All you need to do is whatever it takes to be able to answer yes to most of these questions. Did
you get a good sleep the night before the test? If not, then your answers to the rest of the
questions may not matter. Did you review your notes from class, not long after you took them?
Did you use recall during your review? Did you study some on most days instead of waiting
until the last minute? Did you do your best to avoid distractions during your studies except
when you were taking a break? Did you avoid too much underlining and highlighting of your
textbook or notes? Did you create a set of brain links of important concepts and problems by
actively practicing them and recalling them? Did you get help when necessary by talking to
your teachers or other students when you were having trouble? Did you avoid lazy learning?
That is, did you spend some of your study time focusing on material you've found to be
harder? Did you explain key ideas to yourself and to others using funny metaphors and
images? Did you study in different places? Did you take occasional breaks from your studies
that included some physical activity? The more yes you responded, the better your preparation
for the test.
●​ What about during the test itself? Are there techniques that can help? Yes. One of the best is
the hard start approach.
●​ To use this technique, you begin the test by quickly looking it over, make a little tick mark by
the hardest problems. Next, pick one of those hard problems and get to work on it. Yes, a hard
problem. But only work on this problem a minute or two just until you begin to feel you're
getting stuck. At that point, stop. Then, look for an easier problem. The easier problem will help
re-boost your confidence. If you want, you can do yet another easy problem. Now, it's time to
go back to the hard problem. You'll be surprised you can often make progress on it. The hard
start technique works because it allows you to use your brain in two different ways at the same
time. The kind of dual core processor. When your focus mode is working on an easier problem,
your diffuse mode is working in the background on others; the harder problems. Once you get
 used to the hard start technique, you'll find that you can sometimes have several hard test
questions going at the same time simmering in the background while you work on the easier
problem. You can use the hard start technique for both tests, and homework. One of the most
valuable aspects of this technique is that it helps you to practice disconnecting, and then,
moving on to the problems you can solve. Disconnecting can be one of students biggest
challenges on tests. You can run out of time even though there were other easier problems you
could have solved. Test can be stressful.
●​ When you feel anxious, try to shift your perspective. Instead of thinking, "This test makes me
nervous", substitute the thought, "This test has me excited to do my best." A last word of
advice. When you get nervous, you can end up breathing from the upper part of your chest.
This is shallow breathing and it doesn't give you enough oxygen. You can end up panicking not
because of the test, but because you aren't getting enough oxygen. Deep breathing can
prevent this problem. To do deep breathing, put one hand on your belly. Your hand should
move when you breathe. In the days before a test, stand sideways in front of a mirror, try deep
breathing out for 30 seconds or so, so you get used to it.

VIDEO 16
●​ How did you become a successful learner? There are three keys. First, Santiago kept his
options open. Originally art was his passion, but he realized he had boxed himself in by
thinking he could only do one thing. He expanded his passion to include Math and Science. So
be like Santiago as you grow up. You don't want your options to be too narrow. The world has
become more complicated. We need people with broad skills and interests. If you like Math,
learn to paint or play a musical instrument. If you like Psychology, learn some Physics. It's
great to learn one topic really well, but you also want to broaden your passions.
●​ Second, Santiago was persistent. When he decided to learn math he went back to the basics.
Slowly, he worked his way upwards. It was hard, but he just kept at it. Persistence is key in
learning, but remember that persistence doesn't mean working away without stopping. It
means that after you've taken diffuse mode breaks, you keep returning to your work.
●​ Third, Cajal was flexible (me too🫦🫦 ). Race car brain learners can be right more often than
others, but this also creates a trap. Some super smart learners can end up jumping to
conclusions, when they've made an incorrect conclusion, it can be hard for them to admit it and
to correct it, because they're not used to making mistakes. Since Cajal wasn't a genius, he got
a lot of practice correcting mistakes. When Cajal became a scientist, he actually looked for
ways to find out whether he was right or wrong. When he was wrong, he changed his mind. A
flexible approach that allows you to admit and correct your errors, is a proof that can allow you
to do great work of any kind. It can also help you lead a successful happy life at work with your
colleagues, and at home with your friends and family.