2-1: The Second Tenet

We've arrived at the second Tenet. This one is a bit counter-intuitive, but crucial for our next task: building a learning plan.

Tenet 2: Learning is inductive before it is deductive

A simpler version of this would be "Learning doesn't happen in a straight line." The human mind does not explore the world the way it organizes it after it's been learned. As a result, many formal structures like textbooks and course syllabi are poor fits for self-directed learners. Or at the very least, they are poor fits by themselves.

Knowledge Schemas

Jean Piaget, a foundational education theorist, proposed knowledge schemas—distinct collections of knowledge around a topic or concept, that we develop as we learn. Schemas are organized around a concept or action. There are schemas for things like eating (what is food, what is not), writing (letters, how to dot and cross letters), and everything in between.

Remember that Piaget studied learning in children. We're not helping you learn how to eat solids, but we can take some of these concepts and apply them to adult learning.

The schemas we build do not happen in sequence, or in isolation. We bounce from area to area, sort of like a Roomba vacuuming a room. Over time, a lot of area gets covered. But at any given moment, your path may seem chaotic. Ever lost a night on Wikipedia, clicking link after link? Was there any rhyme or reason to the connections, or were you simply following your curiosity?

Wikipedia mirrors life in microcosm. The curious mind explores many subjects, finding relationships between them, describing new ideas through similarities and differences with prior knowledge.

This is inductive learning.

Once enough of a subject has been covered, one can deduce within that domain of knowledge based on prior experience. Going back to Bloom's, deduction lies somewhere between Analyze and Evaluate.

So we're about to wander through some knowledge. But that doesn't mean we go without a map. In this section, we are going to build our Learning Plan and Study Map, which will guide and track our progress toward our learning goals.