We Learn by Doing

Thursday I spent the afternoon in a First Aid, CPR, and AED class. My office provided it free of charge to those of us willing to take the time to get trained and certified. This is something I try to do every couple of years but had let my certification lapse. One important thing I took away from the course is the importance of practice.

CPR is one of those skills that everyone should know but nobody should ever want to have to use. I have a close friend who had to use it on a work associate. Things worked out and the person survived. My buddy went to visit him in the hospital and apologized for breaking the guy's ribs. The survivor didn't mind as being alive sure beats being dead.

I have practiced CPR on a purpose built dummy but it is always good to get a refresher. Everyone in my class on Thursday had his or her own practice dummy and we all simulated giving CPR at the same time. While it is not the same as doing it on a real person, it is a lot better than simply talking about the procedure.

So what does this have to do with computers and technology? Lots. I am currently going through a book on Reinforcement Learning (a sub-topic of Machine Learning) and there are a lot of examples in it. Rather than simply reading about the process, it is important to work with a computer at the same time I am going through the book. Practicing what I read is really vital to my understanding of the topic. So if you find yourself trying to learn a new technology, don't just read about it, practice using it and you will learn more in the process.