As I mentioned in my study journal, I`m considering going "hardcore" on go for a month in order to learn new things about the game.

I`m interested in your opinions on these ideas for creating an ideal study regime.

A dedicated study space

I am turning my spare room into the "Go Room". There`s a lot of natural light, a goban and stones, a guitar for amusement during breaks, a low chair and cushion for sitting on, and a supply of books, nothing more. I have spent a couple of hours in my Go Room, and apart from enjoying go, I have noticed a beautiful feeling of calm and relaxation that has been missing in my life for a long time.

Not too much, not too little

In the past, I tried to learn as many things as possible, but found I could not remember anything. So, now I break the material into single units and focus on each unit for a short time, then take a break and move on to something else.

For one 40-minute session in the Go Room, I propose to do the following:

Reading Training: A Segoe/Go Seigen Tesuji problem - reading deeply and carefully, trying to push back mental horizons, trying to see everything clearly in the mind
Review by attempting to recall something I studied at an earlier time
Reading Training: Another tesuji or L&D problem - again reading deeply and carefully
Something New: read a strategy book, study a pro game or carefully study a joseki or technique
Rest and Repair: the moment brain fog or fatigue sets in, pick up the guitar or simply close my eyes and relax until ready to continue

Further:

Consolidation: Separate from studying, play often to try out and put to use what is learned. It`s like language learning - simply knowing lots of words and grammar does not make you fluent, real-world practice is where the learning is cemented.

I am basing this pattern on the things I learned about Memory and the Learning Process while preparing for the JLPT last year. Among other things, I found out that:

* working memory is limited
* rest, especially sleeping and dreaming, is crucial to transferring memories from working memory to long-term memory
* thinking is tiring, because it depletes neuro-transmitters (such chemicals as serotonin and dopamine) which are involved creating new memories. Frequent rests enable these chemicals to replenish quickly, but if you allow yourself to become drained, then it can take a long time to recover.
* variety is important, because doing too many very similar things in a short session causes interference.
* emotions are important - you`ll remember pleasant things, but hours of boredom will vanish into oblivion
* testing - actively trying to remember things strengthens your memory

Please share your own knowledge about the psychology of study and how it can be applied practically to go, and please share your experiences of study techniques that work. Also, it would be interesting to know about study methods that did not work and the reasons for those failures.

That`s it for now!

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Learn the "tea-stealing" tesuji! Cho Chikun demonstrates here:

I started something similiar a while back, but I found out that the only things I really could do while sitting in front of a Goban, were replaying professional games and solving problems, which I laid out. In fact I felt the only things which where beneficial, were those which required stones to be touched. Maybe this has something to do with how you learn best.

What I did was this:
- Replay a commented game until the start of the endgame.
- Lay down up to four problems (mostly Tsumegos/Tesujis) but try to remember the position in the book with as few glances as possible.
- Replay the previous pro game without its source and remember the important comments (if I couldn't remember I would peak but I would not replay it twice since memorizing is not my goal)
- Lay down up to four problems ...
- etc. ...

I did this up to two hours per session (replaying really takes time), when I had no other business that day. One of the main problems were to lay down problems, I had not already solved by the time they were on the board. So I generally took harder problems than I would usually solve.

I followed this for about a week, so I can't say how much impact there was. It all colapsed when other - more important - things came up and I couldn't keep my (consistent) schedule.


Some general advice for a study regime:
- Kwow exactly what you want to do before you start doing it (at least one day in advance).
- Be consistent in every way you can. Always start at the same time, always end at the same time.
- Be sure you make smaller blocks for concentration and larger one for recreation.
- [Go related] Always make one day with only playing within your schedule.

The longer I play (and study) Go the more I come to praise the last point. You have to play a lot, when you study. It does not really matter, what you study but you need the experience of incorporating everything in your game.
When I study a lot and then play a lot, I often have déjà-vus, when my brain remembers patterns I studied and that really helps me to solidify/store them. I also think it is better to play fast games (1/5*20) when studying a lot.

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My "guide" to become stronger in Go

This probably has something to do with enriching the data, thereby making it more memorable (Bjork et al, 1978 performed a classic study about how this works).

Getting stronger at go is obviously based on knowledge (just take a lesson from someone like breakfast and be astounded at the breadth and depth of his knowledge), and on practical skills such as reading, and some meta-skills, including self-control, emotional intelligence and mind-reading (seriously, you can read a person`s mind by observing them carefully, and even on the internet you can often sense a great deal from such cues as the pace of their play or the style of their avatar and personal notes).

I have wasted many years of my go time on crackpot ideas (see "force feeding" on SL for a juicy, prime example) that were based on ignorance. Despite myself, I still want to get stronger, but from now on, I`m determined to use what science says about learning as my foundation. Obviously, I am not a psychologist, but it seems to me that most people base their study habits on a mixture of common-sense and experience, which does not always work very well, particularly and ironically when they really want to get good quickly. Instead of simply exhausting oneself with ten hours of grinding a day, could it be possible that you could get better results by working smarter? I ask this if only because I once noticed that I tended to show most improvement in things that I wasn`t trying particularly hard in.

The point of the "ideal study session" is to present new information, to rehearse old information, and to work in harmony with the natural limitations of the brain.

Psyschology teaches that short term memory (STM) is quite limited, which is why a study session should not include too much new data. Neither should the data be too similar (I could learn a new star point joseki and a new 3-4 pincer line in one sitting, but not two or three new star point joseki), because the mind gets confused easily. STM is made up of quickly fading chemical traces. Review, especially at the point of forgetting, appears crucial to deepening these memory traces and turning them into new memories. Hence, a study session should include testing of things you have been working on recently, but which are not necessarily fresh in the mind. (There is a wealth of research on the Spacing Effect, but it seems good enough simply to ensure you test yourself when you feel your memory begin to fade, and eventually the memory won`t fade because it will have become LTM.)

Long term memory is probably an actual physical change in the brain, almost mechanical in nature. You can clap your hands or ride a bicycle because your brain is physically prepared for that. By some processes, what is in the STM is transferred to the LTM. Emotion appears to play a key role, as does sleeping, dreaming and simply resting. Therefore, it makes sense to rest the moment you feel that your head is full - it means that the memory buffer, the STM, is at capacity and time is required for memory transfer to begin. A good article about this is http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/biology/b1 ... arren.html

In addition, I strongly suspect that studying smart could be the key to help people of any age improve at go or chess or snooker or koto playing. The STM may decline in capacity with age, and one's concentration span may also decline, but so long as the ability to form new LTMs remains intact, progress ought still be possible by treating the brain kindly.

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Learn the "tea-stealing" tesuji! Cho Chikun demonstrates here: