More often than not, I have discovered that a book finds its reader as opposed to vise versa. Make it Stick certainly falls into that category. Learning is a life long endeavor and whether you are on the path to a GED, a PhD, or an apprenticeship, learning is something no one can escape. Perhaps, the way many of us have been taught to go about learning is wrong. If not wrong then perhaps less effective and thus consuming of our precious time. Peter Brown, Henry Roediger, and Mark McDaniel did not generate a self-help book, rather a perspective and challenge to the way traditional learning takes place.
Too often the the end of the semester final, the midterm exam or the annual check ride rides shotgun on our daily learning journey. As a passenger the test before you brings with it anxiety, stress, apprehension and the consumption of time. At the end of the experience, many have passed with varying degrees of success and some have failed, regardless of the time put into preparation. Are these topics so difficult that only a chosen few can excel or are we simply preparing ourselves wrong. Moreover, in six months or a years time, how many can remember the content for which they studied do diligently? If time was spent and the knowledge that important, where did it all go? These topics and more are discussed in this simple yet profound text.
Whether you are preparing for the MCATs, studying for the BAR, preparing for an aviation maintenance certification of just wanting to learn a new language, how we study and how we learn are vital to prolonged success.