In the 1490s, Leonardo da Vinci wrote one of the weirdest to-do lists in history. Walter Isaacson describes its items:
‘The measurement of Milan and its suburbs,’ is the first entry. This has a practical purpose, as revealed by an item later in the list: ‘Draw Milan.’ Others show him relentlessly seeking out people whose brains he could pick: ‘Get the master of arithmetic to show you how to square a triangle. . . . Ask Giannino the Bombardier about how the tower of Ferrara is walled. . . . Ask Benedetto Protinari by what means they walk on ice in Flanders. . . . Get a master of hydraulics to tell you how to repair a lock, canal, and mill in the Lombard manner. . . . Get the measurement of the sun promised me by Maestro Giovanni Francese, the Frenchman.’ He is insatiable.
Genuine curiosity, like Leonardo’s, isn’t just an admirable trait. It’s also a powerful force you can tap into to become a more effective learner. When you ask something you don’t know the answer to, it opens a loop in your brain–and your brain hates open loops. So it keeps wrestling with them, aggressively trying to process new information that may help solve the problem at hand.
This is what inquiry-based learning, the new study system I’m using, is all about. The idea is simple: build your curiosity by asking questions and finding problems on what you’re learning and do so in a way that makes your mind absorb relevant information like a sponge.
How to use it:
Before reading/studying:
Step 1: Create questions and problems. Write down questions the book, course or lecture might help you answer. Avoid basic prompts asking you to spit back facts. Instead, use deeper questions that truly dissect the material: What are the causes of X? How do X and Y relate to one another? What would happen to X if Z were the case? Also create a list of problems the material might help you solve. Feel free to think of issues you’re facing in your personal or work life, as well as more academic problems if you’re so inclined. The key is to think of potential applications of the content.
Step 2: Hypothesize answers and solutions. This is essential. Just jotting down questions and problems isn’t enough. You need to try to answer and solve them using what you already know so you truly open up loops in your mind. This also gives your brain something to relate new information to, making it more likely you remember the correct answer.
While reading/studying:
Step 3: Create even more questions and problems. As you go through the book or course, you’ll have more detailed context of the information covered. Reverse engineer the ideas into questions and problems. The goal is to have a succinct list that, if answered, would mean you know everything you need to know about what you’re learning.
After reading/studying:
Step 4: Answer the questions and solve the problems. The key is to do this without any help from external sources, so that you’re actively retrieving the information you learned. Only after should you check your answers using your books, lecture slides, and notes. If you want to take things to the next level, repeat this step multiple times in the long-term so you reap the benefits of spacing out your reviews.
It’s unlikely we’ll ever have the same intense curiosity as Leonardo (I don’t think I’ll ever truly wonder how canals are repaired, at least not in the Lombard manner in particular).
But that doesn’t mean we can’t take steps in the right direction, perhaps to the point where his weird to-do lists don’t seem so weird after all.
Notes:
The Leonardo da Vinci quote: “Leonardo da Vinci” by Walter Isaacson
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