Cómo estudiar para exámenes según la ciencia | Mejores notas con Active Recall — Transcript

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1. 0:00Hi everyone, I'm Carlos Reyes and in
2. 0:02this video I'm going to tell you about
3. 0:04one of the best study techniques to
4. 0:06learn better, remember in the long term
5. 0:08and yes, get better grades on exams.
6. 0:10There are two of the most important
7. 0:11techniques: active recall and spaced
8. 0:13repetition. Today I'm going to focus
9. 0:15specifically on Active Recall, but in
10. 0:17order to show you the evidence behind
11. 0:19its effectiveness and also show you how
12. 0:21to apply it practically, I had to
13. 0:23separate this video into two parts. So
14. 0:25in this video I'm going to focus on the
15. 0:27evidence, the science that shows that
16. 0:29active recall is superior. But what is
17. 0:30Active Recall? In Spanish it's called
18. 0:32memoriacion activa, so since it sounds
19. 0:34so weird I'm going to refer to it as
20. 0:36active recall in English for the rest
21. 0:37of the video. Active recall consists of
22. 0:40asking yourself questions while
23. 0:42studying. We usually think that asking
24. 0:44ourselves questions or taking tests is
25. 0:46useful to see if we already know what
26. 0:47we're learning after we've finished
27. 0:49studying. But evidence suggests that
28. 0:51there are even benefits to using these
29. 0:53tests or self-questions during studying
30. 0:55to learn better, not just at the end.
31. 0:57I'm going to mention several studies in
32. 0:59this video, so I'll leave all the
33. 1:00references down in the description in
34. 1:01case you want to check them out. It's a
35. 1:03very popular saying that everyone has
36. 1:05their own way of studying or that
37. 1:07different study methods work for
38. 1:09everyone. You've probably heard it, and
39. 1:12that's why every time I want to talk to
40. 1:14someone about active recall I get
41. 1:16responses like, "I find it better to
42. 1:18make concept maps or I often learn
43. 1:20better when I read a book, and things
44. 1:23like that." However, evidence shows
45. 1:25that Active Recall is a superior method
46. 1:27because it produces better results and
47. 1:30in the same or less time. In other
48. 1:32words, it's much more efficient. I've
49. 1:34divided this video into two parts.
50. 1:36First, I'm going to talk about the most
51. 1:38popular techniques like highlighting,
52. 1:40underlining, and summarizing, which
53. 1:42despite being so popular, all share a
54. 1:44major flaw. And second, I'm going to
55. 1:46talk about Active Recall, which has
56. 1:47been shown to be superior to all other
57. 1:49methods. Just one thing before we start
58. 1:51, this video is part of a series of
59. 1:53videos about the best study techniques.
60. 1:55So if you haven't seen the previous one
61. 1:57, I'll leave it in the description. If
62. 1:58you don't want to miss the next video,
63. 2:00subscribe because I'm going to talk
64. 2:02about how to put Active Rec into
65. 2:04practice, ways you can adapt methods
66. 2:05that you already use, and also about
67. 2:07the tools that I've tried for Active
68. 2:09Rec, its disadvantages and advantages.
69. 2:14A review of many studies on the most
70. 2:16popular study techniques such as
71. 2:18highlighting, rereading, and
72. 2:20summarizing determined that all of
73. 2:22these are of low utility based on the
74. 2:24benefit we get versus the time we have
75. 2:26to dedicate to them. However, Active
76. 2:29Recall emerged as a highly useful
77. 2:31technique for a great benefit in less
78. 2:33time invested. I think showing you the
79. 2:35evidence of why the other techniques
80. 2:37are not as useful is important, because
81. 2:39as I said before, whenever I try to
82. 2:41tell someone this, they tell me that
83. 2:42everyone has their own way of studying
84. 2:44and that summarizing and whatever works
85. 2:46better for them. I'm going to
86. 2:48illustrate what I want to say through a
87. 2:50concept that is the illusion of
88. 2:52competence. As Biork says in one of
89. 2:54those studies, the illusion of
90. 2:55competence occurs when we overestimate
91. 2:57what we know. We believe that we know
92. 3:00more than we actually do. The same
93. 3:02author, along with another,
94. 3:04experimentally tested this effect and
95. 3:06determined that it may be something
96. 3:08that occurs when we see a sheet of
97. 3:10paper with information and we believe
98. 3:12that our brains are also familiar with
99. 3:14the information, but it is just an
100. 3:16illusion. And when the test comes, we
101. 3:18remember where in the book the answer
102. 3:19is, even what color the page or text is
103. 3:21, and we don't remember what it says
104. 3:23because it was actually an illusion. We
105. 3:25never learned the content, it just
106. 3:26seemed like we did. Another study
107. 3:28evaluated this effect with anagrams. An
108. 3:30anagram is a word or a group of words
109. 3:32whose letters, if we rearrange the
110. 3:34letters in a certain way, form another
111. 3:36different word. For example, if I give
112. 3:38you these three words my, radium, and
113. 3:40ace, and I tell you that if you
114. 3:42rearrange the letters they form the
115. 3:44name of a famous scientist, what name
116. 3:46do you think it forms? If I gave you
117. 3:48the answer right now, you would
118. 3:49probably think, "Oh, it wasn't that
119. 3:51hard." But if I didn't give you the
120. 3:53answer yet, was it really easy? I'm
121. 3:56going to show you the answer now. The
122. 3:57answer was Madame Kur, and I'm sure
123. 3:59that if I showed you the answer from
124. 4:01the beginning, you might have thought
125. 4:02that you were better at solving
126. 4:04anagrams than you really are. That's
127. 4:06the illusion of competence. And it's
128. 4:08the reason why after studying and
129. 4:10studying and studying, rereading,
130. 4:11highlighting, we go to the exam and
131. 4:13don't remember it because we never
132. 4:15really learned it, it was just an
133. 4:17illusion. So, that's why techniques
134. 4:19like relay, highlighting, and
135. 4:20summarizing aren't that efficient.
136. 4:22What's more, they can even be a waste
137. 4:23of time because they can make us
138. 4:25believe that we already know and then
139. 4:26in the exam they don't give us results.
140. 4:28And if on top of that you want to have
141. 4:29free time to do other things besides
142. 4:31studying, well, that's how things go a
143. 4:33bit wrong. And some of you may be
144. 4:35thinking, "But maybe this doesn't apply
145. 4:37to concept maps or summarizing because
146. 4:39in the end you're making the mental
147. 4:42effort to create a concept map or a
148. 4:44summary. There should be a positive
149. 4:45benefit, right? Well, it turns out that
150. 4:48the fact that a task is active in the
151. 4:50sense of producing a text that didn't
152. 4:51exist as a summary or a note or a
153. 4:53concept map, is not indicative of how
154. 4:55good the technique is. The problem with
155. 4:58summaries and concept maps is that most
156. 5:00of us do them with the book by our side
157. 5:02. In the end, we fall into the illusion
158. 5:04of competence because we're looking at
159. 5:06the book and we're copying almost the
160. 5:07same thing that we're seeing in the
161. 5:09book, whether in the form of a map or
162. 5:10in the form of notes, but we're copying
163. 5:12it exactly as it is. To make sure that
164. 5:14we don't miss any details, we tell
165. 5:16ourselves," But in the end, nothing is
166. 5:17left in our brain, only on paper. "We
167. 5:22tend to think that assessments and
168. 5:24quizzes are only useful at the end,
169. 5:26when we've supposedly learned
170. 5:27everything and want to see if we know
171. 5:29what we're learning. However, several
172. 5:31studies show that assessments not only
173. 5:33help with learning, but can even be
174. 5:35better than other forms of studying.
175. 5:38And it's not just for memorizing things
176. 5:40; it also seems to help us better
177. 5:42understand concepts, integrate them,
178. 5:44and remember them better over time. Now
179. 5:47, I'm not talking about what most
180. 5:48students do—I've even done it myself
181. 5:50—of finishing studying and giving
182. 5:52someone your notebook and saying," Hey,
183. 5:54take what I know. "No, that's not what
184. 5:56I mean. That's not active recall.
185. 5:57Active recall is trying to remember
186. 5:59what we learn while learning, using it
187. 6:02as another tool for studying. For
188. 6:04example, if you've just finished
189. 6:05reading a paragraph or a section in a
190. 6:07book, put the book aside and ask
191. 6:08yourself, what did I just read? What do
192. 6:10I remember about what I just read? Did
193. 6:12I really understand what I was reading
194. 6:14or did I just read it without thinking?
195. 6:15" This is especially important because
196. 6:18evidence shows that many students do
197. 6:19use practice questions to study, but
198. 6:21they don't see them as a learning tool,
199. 6:23they use them at the end, and that's
200. 6:24where the mistake lies. And in case I
201. 6:27still haven't convinced you about
202. 6:29active recall, there's a study that
203. 6:30shows something very interesting. In
204. 6:382011, Carpick and Blond did a very
205. 6:40interesting experiment. They took a
206. 6:42group of college students and divided
207. 6:43them into four groups. Each group was
208. 6:46given a different study technique to
209. 6:48learn a material and then the students
210. 6:51were given a test. The first group was
211. 6:53told to read the material once. In the
212. 6:56second group, they were told to read it
213. 6:58four times. In the third group, they
214. 7:00were told to read it and at the same
215. 7:01time, a concept map with the most
216. 7:03important topics was created. And the
217. 7:04fourth group used active recall, which
218. 7:06I've been telling you about for a while
219. 7:08now. In this fourth group, the students
220. 7:10read the topic once and assessed
221. 7:12themselves. Then they read it again and
222. 7:14assessed themselves again. After the
223. 7:17study phase, they were given a test
224. 7:18that included questions about things
225. 7:20from memory, such as dates, specific
226. 7:22data, and inference questions in which
227. 7:25they had to connect ideas and use
228. 7:26reasoning. The result was that the ACT
229. 7:29group significantly outperformed the
230. 7:31other groups, even the concept map
231. 7:33group. What's more, the concept map
232. 7:35group did just as well as the group
233. 7:37that read four times, so this gives us
234. 7:39an idea of how effective the concept
235. 7:40map really is. The authors wondered,
236. 7:42what if this advantage of active recall
237. 7:43is actually due to the fact that the
238. 7:44person studying with active recall asks
239. 7:45themselves questions and the test
240. 7:46consists of questions? So perhaps the
241. 7:47students who study with active recall
242. 7:48ask themselves questions and the test
243. 7:49consists of questions? So perhaps the
244. 7:52students who study with active recall
245. 7:52ask themselves questions and the test
246. 7:52consists of questions? Active recallers
247. 7:54are preparing better for a test, but
248. 7:56perhaps concept mapping students are
249. 7:58actually learning better. So they did a
250. 8:01second experiment. This time they had
251. 8:04two groups, one of whom studied by
252. 8:05doing concept mapping like last time,
253. 8:07and the other who did active recall.
254. 8:10Then they were given a test with
255. 8:12regular questions and another test that
256. 8:14consisted of doing a concept map of the
257. 8:16topic they had studied. So the authors
258. 8:18said, "If Active Recall is really
259. 8:20superior to concept mapping, then it
260. 8:22should beat the other group, even when
261. 8:24the test is about doing a concept map."
262. 8:27"And the result was also surprising.
263. 8:29Active Recall effectively beat the
264. 8:31concept map group, even when the test
265. 8:34was about making a concept map. This
266. 8:36shows us that Active Recall is very
267. 8:38good not only at memorizing facts, but
268. 8:40also at connecting ideas and learning
269. 8:42better. And it shows us, therefore,
270. 8:44that it is superior to other study
271. 8:46techniques, even those that are
272. 8:48considered active or elaborative, such
273. 8:50as summarizing or concept mapping. And
274. 8:52since something that surely interests
275. 8:54you, Active Recall is also directly
276. 8:56associated with a better average on
277. 8:57exams. I hope I have convinced you with
278. 9:00all this evidence, so now you can start
279. 9:01trying Active Recall in your own way.
280. 9:03Remember that the idea is to constantly
281. 9:05evaluate if we are truly internalizing
282. 9:07what we are reading and we are not
283. 9:08fooling ourselves into believing that
284. 9:10we have already learned something just
285. 9:11by reading it. In the next video I will
286. 9:13tell you about ways to put Active
287. 9:15Recall into practice, as well as
288. 9:17applications and programs that you can
289. 9:19use to help you with its advantages and
290. 9:21disadvantages, according to what I have
291. 9:23found in my experience. So if you don't
292. 9:24want to miss it, Don't forget to
293. 9:26subscribe and hit the bell. I hope you
294. 9:28enjoyed my video.