Grasp

by Sanjay Sarma

How do we learn? And how can we learn better? In this groundbreaking look at the science of learning, Sanjay Sarma, head of Open Learning at MIT, shows how we can harness this knowledge to discover our true potential. Drawing from his own experience as an educator as well as the work of researchers and innovators at MIT and beyond, in Grasp , Sarma explores the history of modern education, tracing the way in which traditional classroom methods—lecture, homework, test, repeat—became the norm and showing why things needs to change. The book takes readers across multiple frontiers, from fundamental neuroscience to cognitive psychology and beyond, as it considers the future of learning. It introduces scientists who study forgetting, exposing it not as a simple failure of memory but as a critical weapon in our learning arsenal. It examines the role curiosity plays in promoting a state of “readiness to learn” in the brain (and its troublesome twin, “unreadiness to learn”). And it reveals how such ideas are being put into practice in the real world, such as at unorthodox new programs like Ad Astra, located on the SpaceX campus. Along the way, Grasp debunks long-held views such as the noxious idea of “learning styles,” equipping readers with practical tools for absorbing and retaining information across a lifetime of learning.

Genres: Education, Nonfiction, Psychology, Science, History, Social Science, Audiobook

Paperback

First published August 18, 2020

Reviews

[Amanda Z · Rating 2 out of 5]

I didn't like this one and pushed to finish it because it's on hold for another patron at the library. I think I was hoping for a different book. I was hoping to learn more about learning and didn't really get what I wanted out of it. I read this book for fun.

The book focuses more on a bunch of education researchers and their work/biographies, than what they found out in the course of that work and the impact on their students. It was a lot of names and people I didn't really care about and I'll blame the pandemic/recent head injury, but none of them stuck in my head or out stuck out to me and I didn't care to "study" this book. The neurology parts were a slog as well.

Here's what I "learned" about learning:

--Have students who just learned things explain them to other students because they better appreciate what someone might not get because of recent understanding.
--Read material/watch a lecture before class (flipped learning). If you are a problem solving class, use class time to help students with problems.
--Spaced repetition (i.e. NOT CRAMMING) like Duolingo (not mentioned in the book) tries to prove works.
--Classes that use the material directly for students to build and make stuff using what they learned are good, like “2.007”, a hands-on class profiled in the books.
--Montessori schools should be as faithful as possible to the original Maria Montessori methods and a lot of schools just call themselves Montessori schools.

If you know anything about education, none of these things should be surprising at all.

The author works on MIT's open learning and I thought the book was hagiographic about MIT to the point of barfiness. Like there were parts where I rolled my eyes and I read passages aloud to my partner for him to laugh at too. For the record I WENT to MIT (more on that later) about a decade ago (grad school) and I work there. Like how many times do you have to remind people that Harvard is “down the river”? Yeesh. Or who cares that a preschool is somewhere between MIT and the Cambridge Public Library. Like which one? The run down urban one in Central Square, the new one over in East Cambridge, or the big main branch that’s very close to Harvard? Like why mention that? Does a library 0.4 miles away and a university 1.2 miles away send psychic vibes to preschoolers? Does anyone who lives out of town care? Spending more time describing what the different types of Montessori schools are and why some might go either way would have been more interesting to me than profiling this one school’s founder and extolling the virtues of the fact that the school is in an old store.

I did find it interesting that Cambridge spends ~$29k per pupil when the state average is half that. If you are bored, got to Zillow find a property for sale in Cambridge and one of equivalent cost in nearby Somerville and/or Arlington. You’ll see that the property taxes are about double than in Cambridge. This is because MIT is the city’s largest taxpayer (MIT owns a large portion of properties in the city) and Somerville and Arlington are mostly bedroom communities and don’t have commercial taxpayers to that degree to offset the residents. Fun!

As a former grad student at MIT I had insight into some of the courses and other things

2.007. While not familiar with that particular course, I helped TA for a different, also very expensive course at MIT that also combined learning and doing in the same semester. Ours was possibly less well honed but I felt that the students who managed to produce something good came in with a background in our subject to begin with. Like everyone learned something, but it was too much information and our students were lost a lot of the time unless they already knew what they were doing. The ones who didn’t, well, their final papers showed that they didn’t really understand stuff and I felt like we failed them at some level. To back that up with an example from the book, one student who was profiled as doing well in 2.007 had spent his youth fixing stuff on the family farm. Anyway, there's a reason that Bloom's taxonomy has creating and synthesis at the top and knowledge at the bottom and it's hard to teach both of them at the same time.

TEAL and comprehension checks. TEAL is MIT’s reinvention of first year physics classes where they make students actually show up to class and do hands on lectures and have participating instead of a lecture format which involves students not going to said lecture, starting psets at 2 am before they are due, wondering why they are stuck, being too late to ask for help, getting a D and then blaming it MIT on being hard. To give the author credit here, he accurately describes the reasons the students hate TEAL before saying that everyone loves it now. I believe that the retention of physics information is way higher, but I’m curious if the students have stopped resenting the hell out of TEAL. I doubt it. Personally, as long as you can still test out of the TEAL format, you will never stop having students resent the TEAL concepts because having a test means that TEAL is for people who need more help and not for the smartest kids. Also, in my experience, intro physics teaching has been studied to death, and those methods and hands on activities don’t continue beyond that making the rest of the major pretty brutal.

MIT’s online classes. A couple years back, I completed the MITx Microeconomics class for fun and so I was very curious to glimpse behind the curtain, but again there was less information here than I would have liked beyond profiles of the student from Mongolia who go a perfect score and later MIT admissions and another woman who was really worried because she missed this one question that she might not get admitted to the micromasters program but did (no details to why she or why others may not). Learning about MIT’s online teaching was one of my primary reasons for picking up this book and I was sorely disappointed. For example, I would have LOVED to see statistics on what changes made to the format improved the number of individuals who complete a course and how the MITx and to a larger degree EdX has evolved over time.

The author points out in the beginning that a lot of education is “winnowing”, that is to say, seeing who survives the experience and having those who do survive be the “educated” ones, instead of making sure your crop of students masters what their teachers would like to. He the goes to describe the first MITx online course — where 155000 registered and 7000 completed the class — as a way for higher education not to winnow people because anyone can register. Is what you just described two paragraphs ago not winnowing? 148000 people just quit.

Equally frustrating was the example of two guys who wanted to go to this school with no admissions application except doing the intro work (whatever that involved) for 30 days and having do well on that. They didn’t meet the school’s criteria and were given a second chance that involved them having lousy sleeping arrangements. Was this a rare opportunity? Did the poor housing help? What did they do differently? What had they applied from the first admissions opportunity? It wasn’t really clear.

Ultimately, I found this book to be frustrating. It was weak on educational insights and data, heavy on bragging about MIT and dropping names.

[Alien Bookreader · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was not what I was expecting.

The ambiguous title is slightly misleading. This book is not about the science of learning, but about the history of modern education and how technology can improve it.

If you want to learn about the science of learning - I recommend you skip this book and go straight to a book written by cognitive psychologist, Richard Mayer: How to Be a Successful Student: 20 Study Habits Based on the Science of Learning Everything I hoped to get from Grasp I got from How to Be a Successful Student , which is entirely about the science of learning and practical strategies that enhance learning.

Grasp, unfortunately, is low on the science and low on the practical applications. The first 2/3 of the book are mainly fluff, which I found myself slogging through and gaining little value. It's like the author didn't want to overload the audience with information and decided to waste pages on anecdotes, non-sequiturs, and descriptions of buildings in which interviews took place (why?). The final third was more interesting and easier to get through.

The writing style was disjointed and clunky in many chapters. Dialogue in the interviews is presented word for word, sandwiched between descriptions of what the interviewee is wearing, the coffee cup in the interviewee's hand, and copious metaphors to dumb down basic science for the reader.

Why not just summarize each scientist's findings and how it applies to education? I don't care what diner the interview took place in. I don't care about the shiny hallways in the MIT building. Why go back and forth between all these streams of information? Rather than holding the reader's focus, it makes you feel like you're getting jerked back and forth by someone who can't stay on track.

The parts with overlapping dialogue were impossible to read.

“For many years those laws penalized women. If a couple went somewhere, the man got the job,” he said. “When we came to the universities here, I think we were once told we were the second or third couple in the whole—”
“System,” she said.
“UC system,” said Robert. “But then there was this period where there weren’t the nepotism laws anymore, but there were informal things like, ‘you shouldn’t publish together,’ or ‘you needed to work in different domains.’ So even though Elizabeth’s background was learning/memory, she had an era of working on—”
“I turned myself into a visual cognition person for a while,” she said.
“And did some things on children,” he said.”

This is a headache to read. A lot of this book is written like this, in the style of jumbled interjections. Who edited this? Was there no editor for this book?

Despite these annoyances there are some interesting parts which get into memory, the myth of "learning styles" and why forgetting has a functional purpose for learning.

However, if I could go back in time I would skip this and go straight to How to Be a Successful Student: 20 Study Habits Based on the Science of Learning or Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning

3 stars

[Zack Jordan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Everyone has some experience with the central concepts of Grasp, though almost certainly in a piecemeal fashion. We've had some school, read some articles, heard about Pavlov, and tried to learn Spanish that one time. What this book does is fill in the gaps with questions you didn't realize you had, plus their answers. Why do some approaches work and some don't? How does biology (or demographic, or any number of other factors) affect learning? Why are certain philosophies considered failed or revolutionary? And finally, the question promised by the book's subtitle: what are we doing here in the present that builds on what we've learned in the past?

For me, filling in gaps is always revolutionary. You don't realize how little use you were getting from out-of-context knowledge until you learn the stuff around it (which, interestingly, is a learning phenomenon explained in Grasp). So, sure: you could read independent articles about Ad Astra, MOOC, or ML-guided digital courseware, but without context there would be no way to understand their significance. If you read Grasp, you'll get to the technology, but not until you've covered neurons, curiosity, IQ, Skinner, Pavlov, Bell, Lancaster, Mann, the author's own experience on an oil rig, and far more. At first it may feel like these things are beside the point, but at the end you'll have a much better understanding of what the point is in the first place.

[Cristie Underwood · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was fascinating, especially how students can be identified as needing assistance with reading without ever having read before due to neuroimaging. I also thought the idea of flip classrooms was interesting. This book should be required reading for all educators and I will be recommending it to my principal.

[Seyed Ehsan Mirmahdi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Summary of Grasp by Sanjay Sarma: A Comprehensive Look at Learning and Thinking Better

The book Grasp by Sanjay Sarma and Luke Yoquinto is a fascinating and enlightening work on learning, how the mind works, and how to optimize the processes of thinking. In the summary of Grasp by Sanjay Sarma, the authors leverage cutting-edge knowledge in cognitive science, psychology, and educational technology to show us how we can enhance our learning methods and benefit more effectively from the process of understanding.

This book delves deeply into the concept of learning, exploring traditional techniques and modern approaches strengthened by technology and science. Sarma and Yoquinto emphasize that learning is not a static endeavor but a dynamic process that can become significantly more efficient with the right methods. From captivating stories to scientific case studies, the authors take the reader on a journey that not only explores deeper and better learning but also highlights the importance of mental flexibility and critical thinking.

This book serves as an inspiring and valuable resource for anyone interested in deeper understanding, improved learning, or effective teaching. Sarma’s Grasp lights the way for the learning journey, encouraging readers to keep seeking better ways to learn and comprehend.


خلاصه کتاب فهمیدن اثر سانجی سارما: نگاهی جامع به یادگیری و نحوه بهتر اندیشیدن

کتاب *Grasp* نوشته سانجی سارما و لوک یوکویینتو، اثری جذاب و روشنگر در مورد یادگیری، نحوه عملکرد ذهن و چگونگی بهینه‌سازی فرایندهای فکری است. در خلاصه کتاب فهمیدن اثر سانجی سارما، نویسندگان از دانش روز در زمینه علوم شناختی، روان‌شناسی، و فناوری آموزشی استفاده می‌کنند تا به ما نشان دهند چگونه می‌توانیم روش‌های یادگیری خود را بهبود ببخشیم و از فرایند فهمیدن بهره بیشتری ببریم.

این کتاب به بررسی عمیق مفهوم یادگیری می‌پردازد، از تکنیک‌های سنتی گرفته تا روش‌های مدرن که با استفاده از فناوری و علم تقویت شده‌اند. سارما و یوکویینتو نشان می‌دهند که یادگیری یک امر ثابت نیست؛ بلکه یک فرایند پویا است که می‌تواند با روش‌های صحیح بسیار کارآمدتر شود. از داستان‌های جذاب تا مطالعات موردی علمی، نویسندگان خواننده را به سفری می‌برند که در آن نه تنها به یادگیری عمیق‌تر و بهتر می‌پردازند، بلکه به اهمیت انعطاف‌پذیری ذهنی و تفکر انتقادی نیز اشاره می‌کنند.

این کتاب برای هر کسی که علاقه‌مند به فهم عمیق‌تر موضوعات، یادگیری بهتر یا آموزش موثرتر است، یک منبع الهام‌بخش و مفید خواهد بود. فهمیدن اثر سارما، چراغی است که مسیر یادگیری را روشن می‌کند و خواننده را ترغیب می‌کند تا به جستجوی بهتر برای یادگیری و فهمیدن ادامه دهد.

[Alison Rini · Rating 5 out of 5]

LOVED this book about designing courses at MIT that utilize principles of learning. I want to collaborate with Dr. Sarma to optimize my elementary program design!

[Dr. Dima · Rating 4 out of 5]

In light of how the COVID pandemic has affected education, this is a timely book about the history, psychology, and neuroscience of education, the role of modern tech-enhanced methods, as well as the future of learning. ⁣
⁣
The book is divided into 2 parts. In the first part, the author reviews the history of education, the birth of behaviourism, and the learning divide between Thorndike’s inside-out-thinking and Dewey’s outside-in-thinking. The author also delves into 4 layers of what he refers to as the “cognitive high-rise"; beginning at the molecular and cellular scale, ascending into the systems layer of brain regions, then into cognitive psychology, and finally into the upper layer of metacognition (thinking about thinking). In the second part, the author discusses applications of the science of the “cognitive high-rise” and the role of technology in education and provides extensive case studies into modern tech-enhanced approaches such as TEAL (Technology Enabled Active Learning), flipped and blended learning, 42 school of Silicon Valley, Ad Astra, AltSchool, IBM Watson, MOOCs, MITx, MicroMasters, etc. ⁣
⁣
The book offers plenty of insights into science-based approaches to learning including spacing and interleaving and their relationship with memory at all levels of the “cognitive high-rise”. It also debunks some neuromyths, examines the implications of how the brain learns on dyslexia, and explains the roles of curiosity, forgetting, and effortful retrieval in learning. ⁣
⁣
The book is rich in history and has a narrative style that blends anecdotes with personal stories and a balanced discussion of the challenges and advantages and disadvantages of the various approaches to learning. I took one star from my rating because it can sometimes be long-winded and taxing to read as the author tends to recount mundane details. Nevertheless, I highly recommend it to readers interested in learning science and the history and future of education.⁣

[Chintushig Tumenbayar · Rating 4 out of 5]

MITгаас хэрэгжүүлж эхэлж буй TIL хөтөлбөрийн шиг олон хөтөлбөрүүдийг ачаар хэрхэн боловсорлын массд үр өгөөжтэйгээр ашиглах тал дээр олон судалгаа хийсний үр дүнд бидний мэдэх мэдэхгүй BIAS-ийг нээн илрүүлж суралцах чадварыг дээшлүүлж байгаа нь гайхалтай санагдлаа.

[Kerry · Rating 5 out of 5]

While I love learning about the science of brains, I’m I’m fairly new to understanding how learning influences global educational systems. Part theory, party history lesson, part identifying how remaining the same will negatively affect our globe. That is, if we don’t consciously weigh the goal of learning vs the goal of degrees against each other. Good book that has piqued my interest in learning more about non traditional education and online learning.

[Matthew Rowley · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this book on holiday, to keep up to date with current pedagogy, and found this to be more of a scholarly read than a book grounded in day-to-day practicality: more of a spring board to think about learning rather than the application of ideas in the way writer’s like Harry Fletcher-Wood or John Hattie convey. This is not a problem, but worth knowing from the start.

The neuroscience elements are particularly interesting and I found provided a good framing point to explain why many current standard practices work. In particular, the discussion of the importance of forgetting to strengthen memory is no doubt reassuring and often overlooked.

However, I found some of the ideas - while no doubt of great scholarly interest - would be challenging to implement today.

A point I felt was conceded by the author both when explaining the difficulty university professors had in reforming their courses and radical difference in how Astra operates.

An excellent book for policy makers, or explaining the “neuro-mechanics” of learning, but maybe a bit too idealistic at times.

[Kate · Rating 3 out of 5]

This could be better subtitled, "A Summary of All MIT's Research."

[Ope Bukola · Rating 4 out of 5]

Explores the history of developments in learning science, and how that is (or mostly isn't) being applied to improve schools today. His central point is that education system is designed to sort and weed out those supposedly can't hack it. Instead, educators should be trying to design systems that are more "cognitively user friendly" and enable more people to achieve. He explores the differences between two approaches to learning (inside-out vs. outside-in), and how both have steered the education systems wrong in the past. The first half of the book, where he explores learning models, is the most interesting. The second half is a hodgepodge of commentary on MOOCs, specific edu startups, etc. and I didn't get much from it.

[Dylan · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you have ever looked at our education system and asked yourself “How in the heck did we get here?” or more importantly “Why do we do things this way??” or even more importantly still “How do we fix this???” then you’ve come to the right place.

Although the authors don’t offer a miracle cure for the ailments of our education system, I found this book to be an incredibly enjoyable guided journey through the history of how we arrived at our current system juxtaposed with accessible scientific explanations of how our brains actually learn. Alongside this intriguing historical and neurological backstory, the authors sprinkle in engaging anecdotes that exemplify how things can be done differently. Spoiler alert... our system was designed around outdated science that fails to tickle our brains the way they really deserve. Even worse, these flaws present cracks that could-be Einsteins may unnecessarily fall through. In the authors’ words, there “...still remains a system at work, hell-bent on designating students wheat or chaff based on factors that still have little to do with their potential as learners, let alone as human beings.”

Despite pointing out so many issues, the authors offer a message of hope that “...we can learn, and teach, differently. No longer beholden to a nineteenth-century idea of the learning mind, we can keep pace with science’s multiple, ever-advancing cutting edges.”

This book is a must-read for curious educators and learners alike. And I hope you are curious because when “you’re in a state of curiosity, it seems, the potential for long-term memory formation gets boosted universally...” This book is packed with more science-backed insights such as this for learners to better retain knowledge as well as a framework for educators to inspire more robust learning in their students. Your future, more pedagogically enlightened self will thank you for taking the time to enjoy this book!

[Cooper Goodman · Rating 5 out of 5]

After browsing the reviews of this book there are a couple of things I would like to address.

Firstly, there seems to be an abundance of animosity towards the author's usage of self-referential or institutionally affiliated case studies. In my opinion, while the content of the book could benefit from a more comprehensive review of modern pedagogical case studies, it should not dissuade you from engaging with the undergirding arguments, historical analysis, and illuminating content made digestible through the personalized narrative of the author. To expound the point, in perhaps an overly exuberant comparison, would the works of Fredrick Douglass be more influential if they did not center on personal experiences and observations? I think not. In summary, do not let the reactionary nay-saying prevent you from engaging with the worthwhile content that this book makes available to a broad audience. Although, perhaps I'm just more adept than most at navigating institutional cool-aid and grasping the important concepts that hide beneath.

Secondly, there appear to be accusations that perplexingly call for the simultaneous addition of academic rigor and the reduction of cognitive complexity. In my account, there are a plethora of keywords and references made available throughout the book which an interested reader could utilize to further explore the pedagogical literature. Additionally, it seems the book was written in light of the "Desirable Difficulty" concept that is explained in one of the chapters. Specifically, I believe the book's goal was to serve as a warm introduction to the key concepts, historical contingencies, and technological advancements of contemporary pedagogical practice, which is surely not an easy task to undertake. In my opinion, for those reportedly left wanting more depth, the operation of searching for a serviceable replacement would be made easier by the aforementioned broad coverage of the pedagogical history and literature.

Overall, this book introduced me to questions I didn't know I wanted the answers to and brought me incrementally "up to speed" with the history, contemporary application, and possible directions of future pedagogical practice. Admittedly, I have much more distance to go and am in no sense an expert, but my curiosity about curiosity has been inevitably piqued.


P.S. The negative example of early 20th century Urban Planning is entirely deserved, however, the author failed to make the distinction between the ontological differences of post-rational planning paradigms (advocacy and radical planning) when using the profession as an example. As such, the analogies Sarma makes using "city planning or planners" as examples of top-down administrators does not quite match the qualitative and equity-focused lense that contemporary planners utilize.

[Nola · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book because the author starts out at the very beginning with the premise that learning can feel very unfulfilling unless it leads to a feeling of competence in an area. Sanjay Sarma expresses this very well by telling of his own personal experience with it. I understand the feeling and the frustration, so this book was very meaningful to me. The book also has a huge amount of information covering a wide range of education and learning theories and history. Some of this may be more than I needed to know, especially the history of education theories, but the history is meant to illustrate how we got to where we are now in education, and it really does a pretty good job of that. Sanjay Sarma writes about what is currently the best knowledge of how people learn and the best ways to facilitate that. This is useful information for anybody. Even though I had heard of spaced repetition before, after reading this, I'm even more eager to try it. The descriptions of the different types of schools and educational opportunities available are pretty extensive and very exciting. Sanjay Sarma is also a good advocate for inclusivity and for doing away with systems that only make education available for those who pass certain types of tests. The writing is clear, friendly, engaging, and just plain fun to read.

[Adam Denevic · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book itself was interesting but I could understand why by the end readers would be frustrated by it. For one, a large majority of the book is stories from MIT and the author. While interesting, I found myself rushing through and try to get to the "science of learning." I did find the anecdotes interesting but was expecting something different from the author.

In the end, I think this was ultimately the point Sarma was making. There are no concrete, fast and easy solutions in education but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try and push the envelope and seek change in our classrooms. If that is the case then I rated it a 4 rather than a 3 because it remained consistent throughout.

One has to understand the difference in inside-outside and outside-inside learning theories to understand how to implement them into specific circumstances in the classroom. I was hoping for more concrete strategies for my own classroom, but have found myself more energized to find ways to apply the lessons from the scenarios presented.

It is a slow and dense read but I think it should be read. But keep in mind that it won't fulfill your deepest longings for what you think it might solve. It doesn't. But enjoyable nonetheless.

[Deborah Quazzo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sanjay Sarma’s Grasp about the history and importantly the future of learning and the role of digital education in that future is a must read for those who care about all people having equal access to the future. He reviews the historical roles and wins and losses of everyone from john Dewey to EL Thorndike, Piaget, Maria Montessori, Mitch Resnick and on and on. It is a rich history of mistakes related to the implementation of mass education. We know that spaced repetition works best in learning and memory repetition. We know project based learning done right enhances knowledge. We know Socratic learning is optimal. And we know that this is all about staying CURIOUS and engaged. We know so much about learning science. We now have to implement it at scale and leverage “inside-out” and “outside-in” strategies with a smart application of edtech. Elite has to mean exceptionalism at scale.

[Steve Wilhite · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a sprawling book, covering the history of modern education, the neuroscience of learning, and advancements and innovations in learning and education over the last couple of decades. Professor Sarma's commentary and exhaustive research makes it well worth the investment of time and deep contemplation. Anyone who is interested in learning science, history of education, psychology, educational technology, the future of learning, or inclusiveness in learning should absolutely read this book. As a side note, I read the majority of the book on my Kindle, but listened to a sizable portion of the audiobook which is narrated by Sarma. While the ability to reread and really digest the content is obviously better in the text-based book, I have to say that I truly enjoyed listening to Sarma read the book.

[Inês Carrapatoso]

(blinkish)

Messages i took:

Our education system is not up to date with the way our brain works.
Curiosity is extremely important for learning.
Applying the theory in pratical problems/quizzes and tasks instead of just passive learning is fundamental.
Tips for memory improving:
1) space your studying
2) intercalate subjects
3) forget something and try to remember it later

[Anita Boeira · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found the history in this fascinating, the science a bit over my head, and the classroom experiments absolutely incredible. This books also reads like an admissions brochure to MIT—and I’d known, I’ve worked in lots of admissions brochures in my career 😂

[Nelson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this because another text suggested it had cutting edge new info about how people learn. That was a bit of false advertising. Sarma's text does usefully summarize current best thinking about study practices and retention. It is also a somewhat useful history of attempts to think through (mostly on the STEM side) improving university teaching. The frequently (and misleadingly) told story that tech will save us is roundly debunked here. Tech is useful but it is not a magic bullet. As a humanities dude, it was interesting to read Sarma basically saying the idea of flipped classrooms (what he calls outside in learning) has been a standard move over on this side of the hall and STEMies ought to combine their up to the moment tech with some old fashioned flipping. If only my colleagues in the hum world would get the memo: tech (or tech alone) isn't the answer. And then, because Sarma is nothing if not a homer, the book also serves as an extended advertisement for how wonderful and quirky and transformative the author's school (MIT) is. Interleaving the story of a robotics competition throughout these competing narratives is an interesting strategy, though perhaps one doesn't learn precisely what Sarma hopes for. I remember far more about the competition than I do the potted histories of tech instruction that came in between the story of the competition. It's a brisk and reasonably clearly written narrative that promises more than it delivers (or more than what another text said it would deliver). It didn't hurt but I'm not sure how much it helped.

[Ayon Ibrahim · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book definitely had some interesting ideas about learning/teaching that I hope to learn more about through deeper study, but in the end, this was a book about the barebones science of how we acquire/remember information as well as education history. Interesting, but not what I thought the book would be about.

Well, that's 1/2 the book; the other half, sprinkled in (or shoehorned in, at times) from page 1 to 263, was the author talking about how great MIT is. Don't get me wrong - some of the stuff that's come out of MIT should rightly be celebrated. No denying the impact of many MIT professors and alumnus on education, but it felt a bit much at times. I was hoping for a deeper discussion on ideas about how to really teach students in a way that's not just having them memorize info and pass exams, and the author kept teasing at that with useful tidbits scattered throughout the book. But ultimately, it was kind of anticlimactic in that regard. Bit too much fluff.

I would give this a 7/10 but since I have to do x/5, I'll bump it up to a 4/5 because I did find the neuroscience pretty interesting.

[James Martin · Rating 3 out of 5]

It took me a while to get through this book because it's really quite a lot of books in one. It's partly a memoir of the primary author (Sanjay Sarma's) educational journey. It's partly a history of education and, in particular, of online education. It's partly a survey of some different approaches to education. It's partly a history of MIT-specific contributions to all of these things, and especially to the MIT's role in the teaching of robotics.

If you are a professional educator, particularly one involved in online education, it's certainly worth your attention. Though, like me, you might find yourself wishing it had been broken into more than one book. Sarma's journey is an interesting one and could have been fleshed out into a memoir. MIT's role in online education is important and could have been a book on its own. The educational history and competing philosophies of instruction are also worthy of book-length treatments.

That said, though the book is a lot of things, all of those things are valuable. So, while I found it a lot to get through, I also found a lot of value in it.

[Ivan Beeckmans · Rating 4 out of 5]

The aptly named title speaks to how we learn from the inside-out (neurons and synapses) to the outside-in (the approaches to learning and teaching on the learner). Ultimately, it boils down to understanding a hybrid of the best of both approaches to learning. We need some basic knowledge, skills and literacy but that must come with fundamental application that is relevant and engaging to the learner; fostering curiosity. Finally, an apprenticeship model appears to complete the cycle.

Sanjay Sarma does a wonderful job of describing how learning works with in depth research along with some interesting, personal observations. The balance helps to make his insights both credible and accessible.

Education has been ripe for change for a long, long time. Hopefully, this time, it will be within our 'grasp'. (Sorry, I couldn't help myself).

[Joe Bathelt · Rating 5 out of 5]

In “Grasp”, Prof Sanjay Sarma provides a highly engaging introduction to the science of learning and discusses the history and future of education. Prof Sarma is a professor of electrical engineering and leads the open learning efforts of MIT. He introduces the science of learning across different levels of study ranging from basic neurobiological processes to cognitive theories of memory formation. Despite the theoretical content, this discussion remains highly engaging because the relevance to learning is clearly established in each chapter and often illustrated with episodes from Prof Sarma’s personal experience. The second part provides a critical reflection on the state of education, particularly in the US. A central theme of the book is that educational practice is based on theories that assumed innate unchangeable abilities. The education system is, therefore, implicitly or explicitly designed to winnow students. According to the book’s argument, the increasing need for highly skilled professionals requires a different approach that tailors education to individual needs. Prof Sarma introduces different models of personalised education and discusses possible solutions that could make personalised education available at scale. As someone working in higher education, I found the book highly stimulating. I especially liked that Prof Sarma provides a balanced discussion of technological solutions that highlights their promise but also potential barriers and drawbacks. I thought that the reference to MIT was a bit much. At some points, I felt like I was reading a prospectus for MIT. However, this did not detract from the quality of the discussion. Overall, I would recommend this book to anyone working in secondary or higher education, or any researcher interested in education.

[Jonathan Briggs · Rating 4 out of 5]

Important exploration of outside in and inside out teaching

I liked this book despite its populist title. It’s an excellent telling of the two schools of thought and research around teaching and learning: bottom up or inside out (start with the basics and the theory) versus top down/outside in (start with problems and challenges).

I’ve been strictly in the latter (constructionist) camp and the book does not make me want to jump to the other.

I was slightly disappointed that there was not a bit more on learning in groups and on approaches to scaling online challenge based learning (such as Kaggle) but it’s a great read with lots of depth and wonderful storytelling. Recommended.

[Leah Guesman · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was extremely interesting because I could relate my own learning experiences to things he talked about, I learned specific techniques to improve my learning, and I discovered so much about education and child development. It made me even more curious about education systems and inspired me to be more deliberate in my own learning. He also references a lot of good books for further reading. This was great because he touches on a lot of different topics that it would be interesting to go deeper with. I definitely worked smarter after reading this book and had a far more productive and far less stressed semester.

[Kaylea · Rating 3 out of 5]

As an educator, this book started out hopeful for me. However, by the end it was just another book of propaganda for the elite, exclusionary education model. I was hopeful, but as he leaned into to MITx I almost didn’t finish the book. If you e ever taken a MITx class you know that they are sloggish, erudite, and inaccessible to non-traditional students. It’s not enough to throw a lecture up on the internet and call it elearning. It takes planning and intention, and the author clearly needs to revisit what those definitions are. Maybe other people will find his suggestions helpful, but as a former teacher and current instructional designer I found privileged and tone deaf.

[Katelyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

As chalk full of information as this book was, at points I found myself lost in all of it. The transitions between each subject were good, but it felt like information was moving too fast. I liked knowing the history behind why schools and universities are set up the way they are, but it felt like the book was still grasping at its own purpose. I think some graphics or illustrations of what the author was talking about would have been helpful to better depict things. Other than that, I would definitely recommend this to those who are interested in how we've learned as technology as progressed and what we can do to try and change it.

[Chris Boutté · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a great book for anyone interested in the topic of learning and how we learn. Sanjay Sarma is the head of Open Learning at MIT, which is the department that allows anyone to check out courses from MIT. The book does a fantastic job discussing the misconceptions about learning, the bad practices educators get into when it comes to teaching people, and it also discusses how the underprivileged are left behind.

The book got a little slow for me at some points, so this one took me a while to read. Overall, I learned a ton from it, and as someone who continues to try and learn new things, I definitely got some helpful tips.