The learning methods and training details of Harvard's top students

Chapter 19 Carrying out interest to the end is a compulsory course for excellent students (1)
(Harvard representative: Yuanzhe Li) Without curiosity and pure thirst for knowledge as the driving force, it is impossible to produce those inventions and creations that are of great value to human beings and society.

——Lu Dengting, No.20 Sixth President of Harvard University

【Wonderful Guide】

Biography of Li Yuanzhe

Yuanzhe Li, born in Hsinchu City, Taiwan, graduated from National Taiwan University in 1959, joined the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory at Harvard University in the United States in 1965, did research with Professor Bruce Mahan, and was awarded a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University. In 1968, he was employed by the University of Chicago as an assistant professor in the Department of Chemistry, in 1971 as an associate professor, and in 1973 as a professor. After 1974, he worked as a professor in the Department of Chemistry of the University of California, Berkeley, and at the same time served as a senior researcher at the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory. Elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1979.

Li Yuanzhe is mainly engaged in the research of chemical dynamics, and has made outstanding contributions in chemical kinetics, dynamics, molecular beams and photochemistry.The molecular beam method is a new technology, which was successfully tested in 1960. At first, the cross molecular beam method was only suitable for the reaction of alkali metals. Later, it was jointly researched and created by Li Yuanzhe and Professor Hershbach in 1967, and it was developed into a kind of A versatile and powerful tool for studying chemical reactions.

Li Yuanzhe has made outstanding achievements in the fields of chemical kinetics, dynamics, and laser chemistry. He is currently an academician of Academia Sinica, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy of Sciences, and the German Academy of Sciences in Göttingen.

He has won the Peter Debye Prize in Physical Chemistry, the Lawrence Award from the US Department of Energy, the US National Science Award, and the Faraday Award from the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Li Yuanzhe won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1986.

【Character Story】

Nobel Laureate for Interest Achievement

Li Yuanzhe has been fond of handicrafts since he was a child, sometimes making a tool for several days in a row that he can't say what it is used for.By the time he was in middle school, he turned this interest in crafting into chemistry experiments.Li Yuanzhe and a classmate set up their own laboratory together, and plunged into the laboratory when they came back from school. The content of their experiments was completely determined according to their interests.This stage may be to measure the pH of the soil, and the next stage may be to extract or synthesize a certain compound.But at that time, the money his parents gave him was only enough for him to buy the most basic equipment and reagents for the experiment. If he wanted to do "luxury" experiments, he would have no money to buy chemicals and instruments.

At that time, homework was very tight, and he didn't want to waste time working part-time, so he had to use the idea of ​​raising money to pay for his own breakfast and lunch.In order to buy medicines and equipment for experiments, he had to deduct his breakfast and lunch expenses, and sometimes he even skipped breakfast.But the problem is that the medicine seems to be used all the time, and it disappears after a few times of use.Li Yuanzhe, who had been skipping breakfast, gradually lost weight and began to suffer from stomach problems. His mother discovered the changes in his body in time.

One day, Li Yuanzhe bought medicine excitedly and came back to prepare for the experiment, and found his mother waiting for him at the door of the laboratory.Mom looked at the medicine in his hand, and asked softly: "What's the matter with your stomach feeling uncomfortable these days? Brother said that you often save your breakfast and lunch expenses to buy experimental supplies, right?" Li Yuanzhe I was afraid that my mother would worry, so I quickly denied it.The mother sighed and said: "Silly son, don't lie. Look at the reagent you are holding in your hand. Its price is not affordable for you children." Seeing that his lie was exposed, Li Yuanzhe lowered his head.

The mother stroked her son's hair and said, "It's all our fault for being too careless. It's not worth it to ruin your body like this. In the future, I will double your meal expenses. You save it, and you must remember to eat breakfast."

It is also this almost obsessive interest in chemistry that made Li Yuanzhe continue to delve into the field of chemistry and finally won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

【Harvard view】

interest is the best teacher
Interest is the starting point for a person to seek knowledge and the driving force for seeking truth. It can make people generate infinite power, and can make people concentrate on acquiring knowledge and carrying out creative work.

The great scientist Einstein once said: "Interest is the best teacher." Only when you have a strong interest in learning can you actively explore knowledge.If you are not interested in learning and regard learning as a burden and a chore, you will naturally not have a good learning effect.Only by constantly discovering, cultivating and creating interests can one learn more interestingly and better.

Harvard professor and famous philosopher Nozick became very interested in philosophy when he was in middle school, and has been obsessed with studying philosophy ever since. He applied mainstream philosophical analysis methods to discuss major theories and issues in a free society, which is extremely He successfully realized the organic combination of academic discussion and political concern, and finally became the most outstanding philosopher and thinker in the 20th century.

British drama master Shakespeare was naturally obsessed with drama and was full of strong interest in acting. In a short period of time, he mastered a wealth of drama knowledge.Once, an actor was ill, and the owner of the theater asked him to be a substitute. Shakespeare was overjoyed. Because of his strong interest, he memorized all the lines in less than half a day, and the performance was very good. The previous actors were fine.After acting for a period of time, Shakespeare began to try to write scripts, which were very popular with the audience after being staged. He also started his career in drama literature, and finally became the greatest drama writer of the Renaissance.

Interest can deepen our memory, and good memory will increase our interest in learning, forming a virtuous circle; on the contrary, if we are bored with a certain subject, our memory will definitely be reduced, so that learning will be frustrated, forming a vicious circle.Therefore, a person who is good at learning must also be a person who is good at cultivating interests.

Students who lack interest often lack enthusiasm and initiative in learning.A survey by Harvard psychology experts found that if a student is not interested in a certain course, his grades in this course will generally not be very good.Not only that, students who lack interest often also lack the motivation and perseverance to persevere.Only those who have a strong interest in learning will have a thirst for knowledge, continue to explore, and eventually succeed.

The interest made Nozick think about philosophical issues for most of his life; it made Lomonosov exchange a math book at the cost of 40 days of living in vain; Ke spent 10 years grinding the glass slides for inventing the microscope; Eastman, who invented the Kodak camera, devoted himself to research and forgot to date his girlfriend, and later never married... From these characters, we can easily see The great fascination of interest.

A strong interest in learning can make people have a strong desire to learn, to read and study eagerly and diligently, to devote themselves wholeheartedly, to study attentively, and to think all the time.Only in this way can we make continuous progress and achieve success; even if we encounter difficulties and setbacks, we can overcome them with tenacious perseverance. On the contrary, if we are not interested in anything, then we will become a mediocre person.

[Easy interaction]

Do you want to know whether there is any trouble in the formulation of your learning motivation, learning interest and learning goals?Please take the quiz below to check it out.

When taking the test, please carefully read each question on the questionnaire and compare it with your actual situation.If you think it matches, please tick "√" in the parentheses after the title, and tick "×" if you don't.

1. If others do not urge you, you rarely take the initiative to learn. ( )

2. When you read a book, it takes a long time to lift your spirits. ( )

3. You feel tired and bored when you read a book, and you want to sleep. ( )

4. In addition to the homework assigned by the teacher, you don't want to read more books. ( )

5. If you don't understand something, you don't even want to try to understand it. ( )

6. You often imagine that you don't need to spend too much time, and your grades will surpass others. ( )

7. You are eager to greatly improve your academic performance in a short period of time. ( )

8. You are often troubled by the failure to improve your grades in a short period of time. ( )

9. In order to complete a certain assignment in time, you can forget to eat and sleep, and stay up all night. ( )

10. You give up many activities that interest you in order to do your homework well. ( )

11. You feel that studying is boring and want to find a job. ( )

12. You often think that the basic knowledge in textbooks is nothing to learn, and you can only be motivated by reading advanced theories and tomes. ( )

13. Only work hard on the subjects you like, and let go of the subjects you don't like. ( )

14. You spend much more time on extracurricular reading than on textbooks. ( )

15. You divide your time equally between subjects. ( )

16. Most of the learning goals you set for yourself have to be given up because you can't achieve them. ( )

17. You achieve your learning goals with little effort. ( )

18. You are always overwhelmed with several learning goals at the same time. ( )

19. Feeling powerless with daily study tasks. ( )

20. In order to achieve a big goal, you no longer set yourself a step-by-step small goal. ( )

Test Results:

The above 20 questions can be divided into 4 groups, which respectively test your troubled procedures in four aspects of your desire to learn:

1~5题测查学习动机是不是太弱；6~10题测查学习动机是不是太强；11~15题测查学习兴趣是否存在困扰；16~20题测查学习目标上是否存在困扰。

If you agree with most of the questions in a certain group (5 questions in each group), it roughly means that you have some incorrect understanding of the corresponding learning desire, or have a certain degree of trouble.If this happens, you should ask your parents and teachers to give you corresponding guidance.

【Parent-child total product】

(End of this chapter)