Learning Styles

[fuzzyred]

I'm not really sure what my learning style is, if we're referring to the nine such as visual or kinesthetic (and I've misplaced the link to check it), but that isn't really my main point anyway.

Some people learn by doing, some people learn by watching, some people want a detailed run down of all the steps and theories before they try something themselves. Today at work, I had to set up a machine that I wasn't overly familiar with, and the learning style was way out of whack for me. Is there anyone here who learns best by being thrown into something with just a quick explanation and a "It's all yours, figure it out"? Because that is definitely NOT me, and that's what happened today.

I prefer someone showing me the steps as we go, explaining why things are being done, and showing me how to do it before doing it myself. I find if I get just the instructions or just the demo, it doesn't work as well, and I need a little bit of patience while I get over the instinctive "But I don't get iiiittttt" that my brain does anytime it's learning something new and gets frustrated. Today, I pretty much had to guess as I went and I consequently spent most of the day feeling like I was in about 6 feet over my head and ended up stressed and overwhelmed.

After a shower, I feel much better now, and I know the set up will be easier next time, because I can learn by being thrown in, but it's much more stressful than my preferred style, and I think it stresses me out more than it does most people. Possibly because it's so far from my normal.

How do you learn best? Do you ever get stuck having to make do with a sub-par method? How do you handle it if/when that happens?

Comments

[mdlbear]

I seem to learn best by reading and doing things. Attending lectures is useless, and video clips lose me after five or ten minutes. I have to be able to go back to the documentation, re-read parts, and experiment. (This applies mainly to programming languages; it's also how I learned to play guitar. Human languages--forget it. I acquired a mediocre reading knowledge of French; never really learned to speak it.)

[fuzzyred]

Thinking back to university, I didn't learn much from the lectures. I don't usually seek out videos so I'm not sure of their effectiveness for me, but if it's a follow along with clear explanations as well as the visual, I think they'd work fine.

Programming languages are far above my head; I have a bit more luck with human languages, though I've had a bit more luck learning those online than in school. Learning flute for me was a combination of instruction and reading the music; then getting comfortavle enough to try new pieces on my own, or just mess around with it.

[technoshaman]

Give me a few examples and a good reference manual, and a concrete task to do. When I finish that, give me another one. Boom, done. (I know I've got it when I start putting pieces together on my own... but still. point me at the docs, and a bit of working code, and _then_ throw me in the deep end.)

[fuzzyred]

That sounds pretty close to my style. But, training at work sucks. We really don't have comprehensive manuals (for anything), amount and quality of training varies wildly, and while you can ask for help, you usually have to track someone down while they are doing something else, unless you need a trades person. So, *waves at the deep end* I hope you can swim, or have a life preserver.