by Michele Mccullough

Created on: February 21, 2009   Last Updated: March 06, 2009

Learning skills are acquired mainly from books

This is definitely not true. While one can learn a lot from books, especially if one is an avid and versatile book reader, one can learn much more from the actual act of doing. While the mind is our most powerful tool, actions are just as powerful in getting something accomplished.The act of doing makes something tangible where the act of reading only partly prepares the mind.

One example would be a doctor. One would have to attend years of college, read thousands of books,take numerous tests and write tons of essays, not to mention the lectures they have to sit in on. However, none of this would even come close to preparing one to stand before a live body that requires surgery. To acquire the skills required, one would also have to spend numerous hours practising on dead corpses or some other form depicting a human body. The ability to intrically weave a scalpel into skin and sever certain veins and other things inside the body can only be acheived by hours of actual doing and no amount of reading can prepare one for it.

Another good example would be visiting a foreign country. One can read up on the language spoken, the places of interest, or the habits of the native people. However, upon arrival, everything learned from books would not be enough to prepare one for the dialect or the sights, sounds, and feel of being in an unfamiliar place. The mind would still need time to adjust to an unfamiliar atmosphere which is something that could not happen just from reading books. The book knowledge could be extremely helpful in learning a plethora of other information about the country, therefore setting one up with knowledge that can be of benefit before actually seeing and experiencing the sights and sounds.

While many skills can be acquired from books, and some are absolutely neccesary to learn from books, many are not. The actual experience of doing something is where the biggest part of learning is mastered. Take a new math. One can learn the steps to achieve the answer to a problem from a book, but until one has done the problem out on paper and arrived at the answer by a process he has learned from the book, one does not really understand the entire process.

So read on America (and everyone) read on! But do and experience everything you have the opportunity to because there's no better learning than doing!

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