Key Topics from Week 1

 Slow learners. By using persistence and flexibility, slow learners, can

see things that geniuses miss.
 Active learning. Try to actively do whatever you are trying to learn.
 Mastery learning. Whether you learn it quickly or slowly, you can still
learn it!
 The value of your past. Seemingly unconnected knowledge from
your past can bring unexpected assets to your work in the present.
Remember— it's typical to feel incompetent when you first try to
change.
 Focused and diffuse modes of thinking bring very different
insights into your learning.
 Match passions with opportunities. It’s important to take a
strategic as well as a passion influenced approach to your learning.
Work to broaden, not just follow, your passions.
 The role of the environment around you. Who you hang out with,
and the environment you live and work in, can make a difference in
your behavior. Occasional small disruptions, as with the clinking in a
coffee shop, can sometimes enhance bigger picture learning. (Also,
complex systems shouldn't just be memorized!)

In other words, there is no statistically significant difference when it comes

to the relationship between a learning style preference and
instructional method for your ability to comprehend the materials.

o there's a big push to the idea that teaching to learning styles is important,
even if there's a lack of scientific evidence for these claims, and
even if teaching to learning styles can actually be harmful.
it seems like relying on your preferred
style weakens your ability to learn using other senses.
In other words, there is no statistically significant difference when it comes
to the relationship between a learning style preference and
instructional method for your ability to comprehend the materials.
Not only has research shown then that targeting your best learning style,
doesn't appear to help you learn better, it seems like relying on your preferred
style weakens your ability to learn using other senses.

There's one more thing with relation to procrastination.

When you're learning something, especially if it's new and difficult,
it's not a good idea to procrastinate.
Although you can sometimes really focus under the stress of impending deadline.
That stress can also be uncomfortable and
counterproductive, making it harder to learn something difficult.
More than that, it takes time to grow the new neural synapses
that form the foundation of any learning.

For a long time, emotions were considered unreliable compared with

cognition. This has all changed in the last few decades. Emotions are
important for social interactions, learning, and decision making. Emotions
are complex brain states, associated with positive and negative experiences,
and they are accompanied by facial expressions. Darwin wrote a book about
visual expression as a form of communication that is important for survival,
and natural selection. Paul Ekman is the world's leading expert on facial
expression.

There are groups of neurons very deep in the brain stem called
neuromodulatory systems that control your levels of arousal, motivation, and
attention.
we saw that one of them, the serotonin system, was important for regulating
social interactions. Another brain stem system that fans out over wide
regions of the brain, uses a chemical called noradrenaline.

Edronax is a drug that works along the lines of Prozac, except that it is a
reuptake inhibitor for noradrenaline, and it increases its activity.
It could be more effective than Prozac in helping patients who are depressed
and lack the capacity for sustained motivation. Whereas, serotonin activation
results in serenity and mellowness, noradrenaline activity is involved in
increasing drive motivation. When a closely related molecule manufactured
in your adrenal gland, called adrenaline, is released in your blood, it makes
your heart pound faster and prepares your body for vigorous physical
activity, paralleling the increase in mental activity triggered by noradrenaline
inside the brain.
Is depression caused by imbalances in serotonin or in noradrenaline? These
ancient neural systems interact with one another like players in an orchestra.
So part of a serotonergic drug's efficacy, may be indirect by altering levels of
noradrenaline. This interaction complicates the search for effective
treatments for mental disorders, and reminds us, that although we talk about
this or that chemical system, brain systems are deeply integrated. There is
another powerful motivational system in the brain that uses dopamine, and
is centered in the few groups of cells in the midbrain. This system of
dopamine neurons underlies both the motivational and the emotional facets
of extraversion.
Your reward system reduces all these dimensions down to a common
currency, the transient dopamine signal. Dopamine is a central part of
reinforcement learning, which occurs when you associate a sensory input
with a reward.
Dopamine neurons receive inputs from a part of the brain called the basal
ganglia, which evaluates cortical states and assigns value to them, and is
involved with learning sequences of motor actions to achieve a goal.
Although this form of learning might seem simple, it has now been shown
that reinforcement learning is the basis for the most powerful artificial
intelligence system ever created. It is not just your cognitive systems, but
also the impetus provided by your emotional systems that make you
intelligent.
The three neuromodulatory systems based on serotonin, noradrenaline, and
dopamine interact strongly with the emotional systems in the brain.
Without them, we would not be human.
With them, we are able to form social bonds, evaluate dangerous situations, and
learn new skills.

For a long time, emotions were considered unreliable compared with cognition.
This has all changed in the last few decades.
Emotions are important for social interactions, learning, and
decision making.
Emotions are complex brain states, associated with positive and
negative experiences, and they are accompanied by facial expressions.
Darwin wrote a book about visual expression as a form of communication that
is important for survival, and natural selection.
Paul Ekman is the world's leading expert on facial expression.
Play video starting at ::45 and follow transcript0:45
He was the real world inspiration for Cal Lightman in the TV drama series Lie to me,
Play video starting at ::51 and follow transcript0:51
although Paul is lot nicer person than Cal.
Play video starting at ::55 and follow transcript0:55
Ekman went to Papua New Guinea to find out if pre-industrial cultures
responded emotionally with the same facial expressions that we do.
He found six universal expressions of emotion
in all human societies that he studied.
Happiness, sadness, anger, surprise, fear, and disgust.
Play video starting at :1:17 and follow transcript1:17
Emotions are typically slow in onset and can last for a long time.
Can you remember the last time that you got angry?
How long did the angry mood last?
Play video starting at :1:28 and follow transcript1:28
There are groups of neurons very deep in the brain stem called neuromodulatory
systems that control your levels of arousal, motivation, and attention.
Play video starting at :1:37 and follow transcript1:37
Last week, we saw that one of them, the serotonin system, was important for
regulating social interactions.
Another brain stem system that fans out over wide regions of the brain,
uses a chemical called noradrenaline.
Play video starting at :1:51 and follow transcript1:51
Edronax is a drug that works along the lines of Prozac, except that it is
a reuptake inhibitor for noradrenaline, and it increases its activity.
Play video starting at :2:1 and follow transcript2:01
It could be more effective than Prozac in helping patients who are depressed and
lack the capacity for sustained motivation.
Whereas, serotonin activation results in serenity and
mellowness, noradrenaline activity is involved in increasing drive motivation.
When a closely related molecule manufactured in your adrenal gland, called
adrenaline, is released in your blood, it makes your heart pound faster and
prepares your body for vigorous physical activity, paralleling the increase in
mental activity triggered by noradrenaline inside the brain.
Play video starting at :2:33 and follow transcript2:33
Is depression caused by imbalances in serotonin or in noradrenaline?
These ancient neural systems interact with one another like players in an orchestra.
So part of a serotonergic drug's efficacy,
may be indirect by altering levels of noradrenaline.
This interaction complicates the search for effective treatments for
mental disorders, and reminds us, that although we talk about this or
that chemical system, brain systems are deeply integrated.
There is another powerful motivational system in the brain that uses dopamine,
and is centered in the few groups of cells in the midbrain.
This system of dopamine neurons underlies both the motivational and
the emotional facets of extraversion.
Play video starting at :3:16 and follow transcript3:16
High dopamine levels puts people in a good mood, energizes some people to seek out
new worlds, and to go boldly where no one has gone before.
But not too high a level since that leads to Tourette Syndrome,
characterized by uncontrolled ballistic movements, and
a blue streak of swear words, which you can imagine on your own.
Your dopamine neurons can be interrogated when you need to make a decision.
What should I order from the menu?
You imagine each item,
and your dopamine cells provide an estimate of the expected reward.
Play video starting at :3:47 and follow transcript3:47
Should I marry this person?
Your dopamine cells will give you a gut opinion
that is more trustworthy than reasoning.
Play video starting at :3:55 and follow transcript3:55
Problems with many incommensurate dimensions are the most difficult
to decide.
For example, how do you trade off a sense of humor,
a good dimension, with being messy, a bad dimension?
Or hundreds of other comparisons.
Your reward system reduces all these dimensions down to a common currency,
the transient dopamine signal.
Dopamine is a central part of reinforcement learning,
which occurs when you associate a sensory input with a reward.
Such as Pavlov's dog, in which food odors are are associated with salivation.
Dopamine is released in the brain when an unexpected reward occurs, and
dopamine levels are reduced from baseline, when an expected reward is not received.
Dopamine neurons receive inputs from a part of the brain called the basal
ganglia, which evaluates cortical states and assigns value to them,
and is involved with learning sequences of motor actions to achieve a goal.
Although this form of learning might seem simple,
it has now been shown that reinforcement learning is the basis for
the most powerful artificial intelligence system ever created.
It is not just your cognitive systems, but also the impetus provided
by your emotional systems that make you intelligent.
Go is an ancient game that is highly popular in Asia.
The 19 by 19 Go board is much larger than the 8 by 8 chessboard,
which makes it possible to have several battles raging in different parts of
the board, white against black pieces, vying for territory.
Play video starting at :5:23 and follow transcript5:23
Go is to chess in difficulty, as chess is to checkers.
If chess is a battle, Go is a war.
It has been thought that Go was so
difficult that no computer program could ever play at championship level.
However, this changed when the Korean Go world champion
played a match with AlphaGo,
a program based on reinforcement learning that played itself many millions of times.
It came as a shock to many when AlphaGo won the first three games,
winning the match, and exhibiting an an unexpectedly high level of play.
The three neuromodulatory systems based on serotonin, noradrenaline, and
dopamine interact strongly with the emotional systems in the brain.
Without them, we would not be human.
With them, we are able to form social bonds, evaluate dangerous situations, and
learn new skills.
Play video starting at :6:15 and follow transcript6:15
I often wondered why Spock, on Star Trek, had such a flat affect.
Could it be his neuromodulators were low?
Think about it.
[MUSIC]

We covered a number of key ideas this week. Which key idea did you find to be most valuable
for you?

Don’t just follow your passion—also work to broaden your passions.

You can develop career resiliency by obtaining a second skill, or developing a broad
talent stack of many mediocre skills.

Read, take MOOCs, and take courses and seminars to keep yourself prepared, no
matter what twists or turns your career may take. This is the best way to ensure your
skills don’t become obsolete.

Hobbies help keep your brain fresh and agile, and can sometimes even be useful for
your career.
When facing people who oppose your mindshift, good strategies are to dabble, lead a
double life, and be a contrarian.

General competence and selective ignorance can each be important in career-building.

Feeling like an imposter—that is, feeling very unsure of yourself as you begin a major
mindshift—gives you a valuable beginner’s mindset.

“The Golden rule of career catastrophes” is “It’s never as bad as you think it is at the
time, and there is always a silver lining.”

Your worst traits can sometimes be some of your BEST traits.

Both rational cognition and emotion both combine to make you intelligent.

Key Topics from Week 1

 Slow learners. By using persistence and flexibility, slow learners can see things that
geniuses miss.
 Active learning. Try to actively do whatever you are trying to learn.
 Mastery learning. Whether you learn it quickly or slowly, you can still learn it!
 The value of your past. Seemingly unconnected knowledge from your past can
bring unexpected assets to your work in the present. Remember—it's typical to feel
incompetent when you first try to change.
 Focused and diffuse modes of thinking bring very different insights into
your learning.
 Match passions with opportunities. It’s important to take a strategic as
well as a passion influenced approach to your learning. Work to broaden, not just follow,
your passions.
 The role of the environment around you. Who you hang out with, and
the environment you live and work in, can make a difference in your behavior.
Occasional small disruptions, as with the clinking in a coffee shop, can sometimes
enhance bigger picture learning. Also, complex systems shouldn't just be memorized.
______________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________

Key Topics from Week 2

 A poor memory is valuable. It can help you be more creative and to see
shortcuts that other people can’t figure out.
 Meditation can have different effects. Focused attention types of
meditation help enhance focused mode type thinking, while open monitoring types can
enhance diffuse, imaginative thinking. It’s important to have time each day where your
mind can wander.
  The Pomodoro technique can be a form of working meditation
where you practice your focus on work or studies.
 Procrastination can arise from many factors. To tackle procrastination,
it helps to increase expectancy of success, to increase the value of what you’re working
on, or to decrease impulsiveness (remove distractions!).
 Procedural fluency and deliberate practice can help the hard stuff
become easy.
 Mental tricks can be invaluable in helping you reframe and reduce anxiety and
worry. Putting a label on your feelings is especially valuable in allowing you to reduce
painful emotions.
 Avoid learning styles—instead, use all of your senses that you can to help boost
your learning!
 You can try to learn too much. Make sure you have balance in your learning
and your life.
 Who you hang out with strongly influences who you are. Choose
friends and coworkers who have aspirations that fit in with your goals.
______________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________

Key Topics from Week 3

 Don’t just follow your passion—also work to broaden your

passions.
 Develop career resiliency by obtaining a second skill, or
developing a broad talent stack of many mediocre skills.
 Read, take MOOCs, and take courses and seminars to keep
yourself prepared, no matter what twists or turns your career may take. This is the
best way to ensure your skills don’t become obsolete.
 Hobbies help keep your brain fresh and agile, and can sometimes even
be useful for your career.
 When facing people who oppose your mindshift, good strategies are to dabble, lead
a double life, and be a contrarian.
 General competence and selective ignorancecan each be important in
career-building.
 Feeling like an imposter gives you a valuable beginner’s
mindset.
 “The golden rule of career catastrophes” is “It’s never as bad as you
think it is at the time, and there is always a silver lining.”
 Your worst traits can sometimes be some of your BEST traits.
 Both rational cognition and emotion both combine to make you
intelligent.
______________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________

Key Topics from Week 4

 Exercise, learning, exposure to new environments, and even

video games can help create and nurture new neurons and
synapses that help create a “cognitive reserve” that keeps you healthy as you age. If
you don’t use it, you can lose it—no matter how innate and natural your gifts might seem.
  Good online teaching can sometimes be even better than face-
to-face teaching. Great scripts, good editing, and a creative approach can give you
a terrific learning experience.
 MOOCs are a fantastic way for adults to keep up with a
learning lifestyle. Use some common sense tips like checking Class-Central’s
reviews of a course, and ensuring the course is well-designed, to make sure you choose
the best learning experience for you.
 Mentors can be invaluable—there are both firm and inspiring types.
 Reading is one of the best ways to become the smartest
person in the room.
 With the disruption of the new information economy comes plenty of new opportunity.
Be prepared for a lifetime of learning!

WEEK 4: Adopting a Learning Lifestyle

We know that there are some 1,400 new neurons that are born
everyday in your hippocampus.
There's only a modest decline in your neural birth rate as you age. But
unless your brain continues to encounter new experiences, which often
means learning something new, your new neurons will die off before
they mature and hook into that larger neural network.
They're kind of like vines that languish and die because there's no
trellis. In adults, new neurons allow us to distinguish between similar
experiences and store them as distinct memories. This means that for
new learning, as well as for mental health, it's important to help new
neurons be born, survive, and thrive.
n brain terms if you don't use it, you can lose it,
In brain terms if you don't use it, you can lose it,
no matter how innate and natural your gifts may seem.
Widely admired orator Robert Sobukwe who spoke so
eloquently for the cause of liberation of black South Africans from the rule of
apartheid was subjected to six years of solitary confinement
in the same prison that housed Nelson Mandela on remote Robben Island.
He could communicate with other prisoners only through furtive hand signals.
During this terrible time Sobukwe could feel his powers of speech slipping away.
Those who've spent extended periods at isolated locations with few
opportunities to speak with others often find themselves stumbling
through simple conversations upon their return to civilization.
My husband Phil experienced this when he spent a year at remote Siple Station
in Antarctica.
Hobbies can also help keep us mentally tuned up,
especially when those activities are combined with physical exercise.
If you knit, sew, quilt, do plumbing or carpentry, play games,
use your computer or read, for example,
research shows you're more likely to have stronger cognitive ability as you age.
These findings make sense.
For example, measuring and cutting for
either quilting or carpentry clearly help maintain your spatial abilities.
There's also evidence that the more you keep up a learning lifestyle,
especially as you grow older, the lower your long-term risk of
devastating illnesses like Alzheimer's disease.
Exercise, learning, and exposure to new environments can help create and
nurture new neurons and synapses.
These new synapses and neurons create what's called a cognitive reserve.
When some synapses and neurons naturally disappear as part of the aging process,
you've got others waiting in the wings that can take over the neural pathways and
maintain your mental abilities.
Researchers are uncovering new ways to help our brains maintain their
youthful flexibility even as we age.
You might be surprised to hear that action videos can actually be really helpful here.
Eventually we may well see video games being prescribed by doctors.

As we learned in this final week, new neurons are being born every day
in the hippocampus, the critical area of your brain for learning and
memory. But new learning is needed to provide a trellis that allows
these new neurons to survive, thrive, and grow. Learning can help
keep you physically as well as mentally healthy both in your youth and
your maturity. Without new learning, especially in ways that can take
you outside your comfort zone, you can become inflexible and set in
your ways. That's never a good idea. Of course, one of the best ways
to keep learning is to use MOOCs. We even walked behind the scenes
in MOOC making so you could be a better judge of how good online
learning is created. Metaphors, humor, and great video editing go a
long way to create optimal learning experiences, whether you're
studying subjects as different as calculus or bonsai. And mentors,
whether the type that pumps you up or the type that tolerates no
excuses, can take your learning to an even higher level. Persistence is
a virtue. Don't let setbacks keep you back. Sporadically check your
internal compass by asking yourself what is your mission. We learned
how important it is to use a good online class search engine like Class
Central that allows you to compare ratings. We also learned about
techniques like fast-MOOCing and balancing how many MOOCs you
take. Well-done online learning can actually be better than in-class
learning. The online combination of academia with Silicon Valley and a
little bit of Hollywood can keep you interested and engaged in ways
that regular face-to-face courses have trouble with. With online, you
have more choice to find the best teachers and approaches. Of course,
there are other great ways to keep up with the learning lifestyle. One
of the best ways is to read a book. 20 minutes a day of reading can
help you to be the smartest person in the room. Surviving in the new
information economy isn't necessarily easy. Much disruption lies ahead
in virtually every industry, but with disruption comes plenty of
opportunity. This week, we've given you some powerful tools to help
take advantage of those opportunities

Exercise, learning, exposure to new environments, and even video

games can help create and nurture new neurons and synapses that
help create a “cognitive reserve” that keeps you healthy as you age. If you don’t use it,
you can lose it—no matter how innate and natural your gifts might seem.
Good online teaching can sometimes be even better than face-to-
face teaching. Great scripts, good editing, and a creative approach can give you a
terrific learning experience.

MOOCs are a fantastic way for adults to keep up with a learning

lifestyle. Use some common sense tips like checking Class-Central’s reviews of a
course, and ensuring the course is well-designed, to make sure you choose the best
learning experience for you.

Mentors can be invaluable—there are both firm and inspiring types.

Reading is one of the best ways to become the smartest person in

the room.

With the disruption of the new information economy comes plenty

of new opportunity. Be prepared for a lifetime of learning!

BUILDING YOUR LEADERSHIP SKILLS

What are your expectations for the course?

Before I start taking the course on leadership and management, I hope I could gain
valuable insights into the intricate dynamics of these two crucial aspects of
organizational success. I hope this course encapsulate my evolving understanding of
leadership and management, and how the course content could influenced my
perspective and beneficial for my personal growth, personal development and my ability
to become an effective leader. I expect that this course would emphasize the distinction
between leadership and management and allow me to appreciate the balance required
between the two for an effective leadership role. Hence, I hope that the exploration of
various management and leadership styles broaden my awareness of the diverse
approaches leaders can take and to flawlessly meet those standards. I also hope that
immersing on this course would underscore the significance of clear communication and
empathy as one of the crucial traits an effective leader must possess. I hope that the
insights that I will gain from this course, will undoubtedly influence and create a positive
impact on my future actions as a leader and manager, both personally and
professionally. I am excited to learn, develop and apply the newfound skills and
knowledge that I would acquire to foster positive change and growth in any leadership
role I undertake.