M A K E I T S T I C K

make it stick

The Science of Successful Learning Peter C. Brown

Henry L. Roediger III

Mark A. McDaniel

T H E B E L K N A P P R E S S of H A R VA R D U N I V E R S I T Y P R E S S

Cambridge, Massachusetts

London, En gland

2014

Copyright © 2014 by Peter C. Brown, Henry L. Roediger III, Mark A. McDaniel

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data Brown, Peter C.

Make it stick : the science of successful learning / Peter C. Brown, Henry L. Roediger, Mark A. McDaniel.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978- 0- 674- 72901- 8

1. Learning—

Research. 2.

Cognition—

Research. 3.

Study

skills.

I. Title.

LB1060.B768 2014

370.15'23—dc23

2013038420

Memory is the mother of all wisdom.

Aeschylus

Prometheus Bound

Contents

Preface ix

1 Learning Is Misunderstood 1

2 To Learn, Retrieve 23

3 Mix Up Your Practice 46

4 Embrace

Diffi culties 67

5 Avoid Illusions of Knowing 102

6 Get Beyond Learning Styles 131

7 Increase Your Abilities 162

8 Make It Stick 200

Notes 257

Suggested Reading 285

Ac know ledg ments 289

Index 295

Preface

People generally are going about learning in the wrong ways. Empirical research into how we learn and remember shows that much of what we take for gospel about how to learn turns out to be largely wasted effort. Even college and medical students— whose main job is learning—

rely on study techniques that are far from optimal. At the same time, this fi eld of research, which goes back 125 years but has been particularly fruitful in recent years, has yielded a body of insights that constitute a growing science of learning: highly effective, evidence- based strategies to replace less effective but widely accepted practices that are rooted in theory, lore, and intuition. But there’s a catch: the most effective learning strategies are not intuitive.

Two of us, Henry Roediger and Mark McDaniel, are cognitive scientists who have dedicated our careers to the study of learning and memory. Peter Brown is a storyteller. We have ix

Preface ê x teamed up to explain how learning and memory work, and we do this less by reciting the research than by telling stories of people who have found their way to mastery of complex knowledge and skills. Through these examples we illuminate the principles of learning that the research shows are highly effective. This book arose in part from a collaboration among eleven cognitive psychologists. In 2002, the James S.