What is writing to learn?
In a writing-to-learn exercise, we will propose a topic and ask for your conclusion on it. This will help you activate your prior knowledge surrounding the topic, engage critically with the weekly resources, and formulate your initial thoughts on the subject.
You can spend as much or as little time as you like on these exercises. You’ll learn more if you engage thoughtfully for longer with the prompts.
- 30-60 minutes is sufficient in most cases, though you might generate interesting sub-questions or confusions that you wish to spend more time on or come back to later.
- If you’re in a hurry, draft at least a few bullet points summarising your initial thoughts. For the facilitated course, you'll need something written because the activities in the live discussion sessions often draw on your research from these exercises.
The result should be 0.5 to 2 pages of writing expressing your conclusions, with justifications and your reasoning. The main objective is to help you learn about the topic, rather than the content necessarily being correct or polished; we expect with the time constraints you will be able to come to a shallow conclusion, but may not feel fully satisfied with the amount of research you were able to do.
When you’ve finished, you could:
- Ask for feedback from someone you know: do they agree with your conclusion? Did you miss any big considerations?
- Dive into sub-questions that you generated and do further research.
- Do a more in-depth project investigating the question or a sub-question, which could lead to you developing a niche which others aren’t thinking about.
- Polish the draft and post it somewhere publicly, like a blog or forum.
Resources to help you get started
- This blog post provides practical tips and advice for ‘learning by writing’.
- This article from a learning nonprofit explains why writing can help us to learn.