As the title suggests, this is the topic I have been thinking about today. The inspiration came from a post I saw on the dev.to website. When it comes to learning, do you prefer reading documents or watching videos? I think this can be analyzed from multiple perspectives.
- Learning Progress, or Process
- Industry Field
- What kind of habits should be developed in the future?
1. Learning Progress#
Learning progress should be the biggest factor influencing the learning method.
In the initial stage of learning, watching videos should be the main focus. When you are not familiar with a certain field, simple operations that can be done easily by insiders may seem difficult for newcomers to understand. Therefore, it is best to rely on video tutorials in the early stages.
For example, when we were in school, teachers taught us step by step because we didn't know anything. We had to pass on knowledge through word of mouth. This is the way to treat newcomers. If you let them learn on their own, they probably won't understand much after a semester of reading. (Of course, geniuses are an exception, but they are not within the scope of this discussion. 90% of us are ordinary people.) Then, in the later stages, self-study is usually the way to go because the basics that should be taught have already been taught, and students need to explore and understand on their own, otherwise they won't be able to fully comprehend the subject matter.
From this perspective, self-study seems to be the ultimate learning method.
2. Industry Field#
Taking myself as an example, I prefer reading documents. I occasionally watch videos, but not very often. Because I find it difficult to determine whether the content I need is included in a video at a glance.
When reading documents, I can use keywords and other methods to quickly find the information I want within a controllable and short period of time. This is extremely convenient for both learning and work.
When it comes to code, documents are the clearest and most distinguishable. But when I was thinking about it, I asked someone, "What learning method do you prefer, watching videos or reading articles?"
The answer was, "Definitely watching videos. Otherwise, why would I buy so many video courses?"
It suddenly dawned on me. I added another aspect that I hadn't considered before, which is the influence of the industry on people's learning methods. My girlfriend works in video post-production and often uses software like C4D and PR. I glanced at them once and saw rows and rows of functions, which made my head spin.
I only use Photoshop to edit images, such as retouching or adding watermarks. I didn't expect video editing to be so complex. So if I didn't learn through videos, I probably wouldn't even understand the functions of the software.
This is another important factor to consider.
3. Further Discussion#
What about cultivating good learning habits?
In fact, whether it's watching videos or reading documents, our original intention is to improve our abilities and knowledge. But it seems that learning is a very boring thing. From childhood to adulthood, we have been instilled with the concept of "study hard and make progress every day." Everything is aimed at improving grades, and there is a huge difference in educational resources due to regional disparities in economic development. Because of the unavoidable imbalance in economic development, learning is the only way to escape backwardness.
I'm getting a bit off track. Let's talk about learning. There are very few people who can maintain a learning state all the time. Time and energy are one aspect, and methods are another, which is a problem that everyone often discusses. I think it's important to start with interests and hobbies. Cultivate your own interests and hobbies in the field you need to learn, and then expand in a 360-degree direction around this area. Personally, I think this is a very good approach.
When I first started making websites, I knew almost nothing, but I was quite interested in it. With just a little knowledge of front-end development, I started exploring and gradually learned about major website platforms, such as GitHub, Vercel, and Cloudflare. As I played around more, I began to understand areas like PHP and system administration. I stumbled through learning basic knowledge.
During this process, I met many friends who helped me and made progress in related technologies. At the same time, I also provide technical support in my own field to help them. This seems to be the spirit of open source, not working in isolation, but discussing various topics together.
Over time, I found that my knowledge seemed to have become richer compared to before. This is a correct way of learning. So I believe that learning through interests and hobbies is a positive and enthusiastic approach.
Let's talk about your learning method. Leave a comment or send me an email to discuss together!