Day 6 Interleaving

Interleaving is a process where learners mix multiple topics during a learning session. 


Let’s say you block thirty minutes of your time for learning. To interleave, you’d break into that between different but related topics. For example, if you want to learn the Spanish language, you could break down your learning session the following way:

Benefits


According to the University of Arizona, interleaving has been shown to:

  • be effective for developing the skills of categorization and problem solving;

  • lead to better long-term retention;

  • improve your ability to transfer learned knowledge; and

  • force your brain to continually retrieve.


Because each practice attempt is different from the last,  rote responses pulled from short-term memory won’t work.


How to get better at interleaving


Choose a few topics and disperse them throughout your learning sessions. The most efficient strategy is to use subjects that are related in some ways, like my example above.


If you’re interested in science, you could interleave by spending time in math, chemistry, biology, and physics, for example. For one learning session, you could practice in that order, but for another, you could reshuffle the order. 


Doing that helps your brain not make the assumption that the material will always come in that order. The things you’ll learn in one topic may also be strengthened by another connected topic.


Essentially, changing things up forces you to retrieve information and make new connections between the topics.


Pitfalls


Don’t try to cram too much into a single learning session! Devote enough time to each topic to ensure that a deeper understanding is achieved each time the topic is studied. If you split a thirty-minute session into three segments of ten minutes to learn Spanish, don’t end after ten minutes unless you’re at the point you understand just enough to move on.


Be careful not to use interleaving as an excuse to switch to another subject when the current subject becomes too challenging. Challenge is exactly what you’re looking for. Remember: no pain, no gain!

Also, make sure that the skills you're interleaving are at least somewhat connected. Playing the drums and calculus don't have much in common, for example. However, playing the drums and the flute does.

How to know what skills are interconnected

I like to refer to these categories of skills:

  • Introvert

  • Extrovert

  • Assertive

  • Listening

  • Right-brained

  • Left-brained

  • Doing

  • Being

  • Visionary

  • Detail-oriented

  • Rational

  • Emotional

  • Design

  • Engineering

  • Product development

  • Sales

  • Art

  • Business

  • Personal

  • Professional

  • Goal-making

  • Negative-outcome-avoiding


Another thing I like to think about is Howard Gardner's theory of nine intelligences:

Are the two skills you're trying to interleave working on the same type of intelligence? If you answer "yes", it's likely that they're interconnected enough to make it work.