There’s still something about September. Fall is on the way, and school is starting up again.
So I loved receiving an email from the Khan Academy today, saying this…
Because… I’ve been thinking about giving myself some little assignments to correspond with the new school year. After all, there’s always more to learn. Plus, if I can learn anything… well, time to get started.
So I asked myself, how about a 4-month focus (roughly a semester) on reading and studying a few new things? (In my amazing amounts of free time… well, okay, not so much.) And then I might repeat that 4-month focus for the spring.
Which leads me to an aside… There’s a blogger I read sometimes. She reads a long list of books every year—150 books in a slow year. Different kinds: fiction, nonfiction, health, business… That’s 2.43 books a week. I’m not sure I’d get that much out of reading that many books so fast. Of course, she might be a total genius and have an eidetic memory, so maybe this works great for her.
But for me, if there’s much substance to an interesting or useful book, then I like to study it a bit. This takes time and mental effort. So I’m thinking a one-book-a-month project might be just perfect. (This doesn’t count novels, which I’ll be reading just for fun.)
So, in honor of “going back to school,” here’s my “study book” for September: How to Read a Book: The Classic Guide to Intelligent Reading, by Mortimer J. Adler & Charles Van Doren.
A friend recommended this, and the reviews on Amazon are good (4.4 out of 5).
One of the reviews I liked included this:
“Now in my last year of law school, I found myself extremely angry upon completing this book. How invaluable this book would have been if I had read it before reading the hundreds of books that were assigned to me in high school, college, and law school.
“Why didn’t anybody tell me about this marvelous gem?!! But the good news is that I have my entire life ahead of me, and I will begin putting this book to use right away.”
Want to read it with me? It’s in four sections, so I’m thinking maybe one a week. I’ll post a little something about it, starting next week, and please chime in, if you’d like to read it, too.
Resources
Video | You Can Learn Anything
Book | How to Read a Book
