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How to prepare anchor points

    Imagine that you have signed up for a lecture, a class, or a professional seminar. There you want to absorb new information and also learn about the experiences of the lecturer or the other seminar participants. The following learning tip will be useful to you in such situations and on many similar occasions:
    Familiarize yourself with the expected contents in good time before such an event, for example by reading the relevant specialist literature or using the special preparation materials of some seminar organizers, for example. Even if you cannot comprehend all contents thereby yet, you have already built up an additional (even if still very coarse-meshed) information net to the new learning contents.
    Since all knowledge content in our brain is interconnected in net-like structures, the new (still coarse) information network will provide you with excellent ‘anchor points’ for the additional information provided by the lecture or seminar. That is,

    • You will understand the content addressed in the lecture or seminar more easily and quickly.
    • You will perceive many information details through this in the first place.
    • Your questions to the speaker will be much more qualified.

    Conclusion: Your participation in the lecture or seminar will be much more productive for you!

    You probably already use this recommendation unconsciously in many everyday situations: If you want to buy a new technical device, for example a newer cell phone, you will have already informed yourself about the devices in question on the basis of brochures or test reports before you go to the specialty store to get detailed advice from the salesperson.
    If you are going on a trip and want to learn something about the country, its history and its people, you will have already browsed through a travel guide in preparation …