Teaching Institute: Learning to Learn: Evidence-Informed Learning Strategies

When students face a learning challenge, they prepare for it in ways that seem most appropriate to them, based on their beliefs about how memory and learning work and on their self-concept as learners. However, research in cognitive science over the past decades has shown that certain actions and conditions can make students’ learning efforts more effective, even when they appear counterintuitive. These evidence-informed learning strategies are aligned with the underlying mechanisms of learning and can benefit students who understand and apply them in their study practices. In this sense, “learning to learn” refers to acquiring these approaches to learning, which can make the effort invested in studying more productive.