How We Learn

Forgetting, sleep and daydreaming are valuable learning tools that formal study tends to ignore, according to award-winning science reporter Benedict Carey. He reviews decades of studies and education research on how the brain takes in and keeps information, and finds that people learn quickly and automatically from birth. Carey questions habits drilled into students early: the single quiet study area, the strict ritual, the music switched off. He road tests many counterintuitive techniques and explains why teachers might give a final exam on the first day of class, why interleaving subjects helps when learning a new skill, and when staying up late to prepare beats rising early to cram. It became a New York Times best seller.

UberVU founder Vladimir Oane said Carey shows that common thinking about learning owes more to superstition than to science, and noted that the book is packed with studies on memorization, forgetting and perception.