How To Become More Intelligent Than You Are (Part 2)

• Learning Smarter: 

Study more effectively. If you find yourself at a loss when your teacher, lecturer or tutor puts you on the spot, or if you perform poorly on exams, you may nout be studying enough. Even if you study a lot, improving the way in which you approach the studying process can make a big difference.

• Do Your Homework: 

If you're in school and your post-lecture revision at college. The homework is there for practice, the revision is to help you to digest what you've just learned. When you do it, you'll become more confident in that subject. Mostly, homework time is not the same as study time, so you can't count homework as studying. Studying involves deeper reflection and breakthrough understandings that stick in your memory. Avoid the temptation to procrastinate, finish your homework at the last minute, or copy someone's paper to hand in. That isn't learning––it's making do and forgetting straight afterward; this is hardly useful when you're out in the work world and need to remember and use your knowledge.

• Don't learn simply to learn, it will not work. Find a way to be interested in it, make it fun and you will learn faster, and remember more.

• Read a lot: 

Just about everything that humans know can be found in print, whether in books and magazines or on the internet. Become a voracious reader, and you’ll expose yourself to more ideas and information. If you’re a slow reader, consider learning speed reading. Consider jotting down notes, and perhaps looking up a word or two in the dictionary. If you are a slow reader, you may simply need to accept this rather than trying to read faster and lose your sense of comprehension. Set aside uninterrupted time for reading, and ask that nobody disturb you. Choose quality of reading over quantity and set yourself both mini-goals and mini- rewards for completing blocks of reading. Visit the library frequently and pick up anything which looks interesting to you. The subject matter is not quite as important as is the act of reading. Always have something good to read at hand.

• Research: 

Curiosity without initiative is like having a car that’s out of gas—it won’t take you anywhere. Fortunately, when it comes to knowledge you’re never far from success. If you read a word that you don’t know, look it up in the dictionary. If you wonder how airplanes fly, read a book about it. If you want to know more about politics, pick up a newspaper. Go online and explore the world in depth.

Learn how to look things up. If you know how to use references, from an internet search engine to an encyclopedia, you’ll be able to find the information you want more quickly and effectively. Effective researching skills will nourish your curiosity because you’ll become more confident in your ability to access knowledge.
If your research skills leave something to be desired, take a class or workshop on how to research, ask a librarian or teacher, or simply practice researching. Or, just press the "help" tabs on the internet and computer programs and read.

Figure things out on your own. There’s a lot more to intelligence than “book smarts". We can all learn to perform everyday tasks at work, home, and school better and more intelligently.

If you don’t know how to do something, resist the urge to ask somebody else to do it for you or show you how. In most cases, you’ll be able to figure it out on your own, either by trial-and-error or by researching.

While it usually takes longer to figure something out than it does to ask about it, you’ll learn more about the overall process, and you’ll remember it better.

Most importantly, you’ll exercise your problem-solving skills instead of your “do as you’re told” skills.