A review by colin_cox
How We Learn: The Surprising Truth about When, Where, and Why It Happens by Benedict Carey
4.0
Carey argues that what we think we know about learning and educational habits (a draconian emphasis on focus, eschewing distractions, etc.) may, in fact, be false. Therefore, Carey encourages his reader to embrace the myriad of bad habits that traditional thinking has taught us to correct (and by extension feel guilty for).
Suffice it to say, I enjoyed this book. I am a nervous, fidgety reader, writer, and worker. I frequently enjoy standing and walking while reading, I interrupt myself during writing sessions to talk to myself, and I work on assignments piecemeal, instinctually rejecting the culturally-imposed impulse to finish as quickly as possible. This book spoke to and affirmed those habits.
However, there are some moments from this book that irk me. Have I mentioned how much I hate endnotes? Publishers, please, stop with the endnotes. They incentivize and encourage readers to ignore them. Footnotes are a better option, but I recognize that will probably increase prices because of an increase in pages. In addition, Carey's attempts at humor simply don't work. This is a genre convention to be sure, but when did it become a requirement for non-fiction writers to be entertaining as well?
Suffice it to say, I enjoyed this book. I am a nervous, fidgety reader, writer, and worker. I frequently enjoy standing and walking while reading, I interrupt myself during writing sessions to talk to myself, and I work on assignments piecemeal, instinctually rejecting the culturally-imposed impulse to finish as quickly as possible. This book spoke to and affirmed those habits.
However, there are some moments from this book that irk me. Have I mentioned how much I hate endnotes? Publishers, please, stop with the endnotes. They incentivize and encourage readers to ignore them. Footnotes are a better option, but I recognize that will probably increase prices because of an increase in pages. In addition, Carey's attempts at humor simply don't work. This is a genre convention to be sure, but when did it become a requirement for non-fiction writers to be entertaining as well?