Cramming vs Storing

Cramming Information vs. Storing Information for Easy Retrieval by Bo Landsem Ok, imagine that you graduated from college and you just landed your dream job! Your boss wants you to hire a secretary right away, so you put an ad in the paper and, after a number of interviews, you narrow your choice down to two. They are both perfect for the job and you can't make up your mind which to hire. You tell the applicants that you will hire the person who could file the fastest. You give each an equal stack of files and time how long it takes to file them. Applicant 1 takes each file in her stack, finds the drawer corresponding to the name on the folder, finds the correct section in the drawer, and dutifully places the folder into its correct position. She then repeats this process for each file and, in a short time, completes the task. Applicant 2 takes his stack, opens an empty drawer and simply deposits the entire stack into the drawer! He did indeed "file" the stack and did it in far less time than Applicant 1. Based strictly upon the time requirement, should applicant 2 be awarded the job? Your brain is a lot like a filing cabinet and you are the secretary filing information into it! You get that information from lectures, textbooks, lab experiments, etc., but only you are responsible for how it goes into your mind. Are you like Applicant 1 and use a system that makes retrieval easy? Or do you tend toward Applicant 2 and just toss it all in there and hope you can rummage through it quickly and efficiently enough during a test?! When you know how to organize the information; when you have an efficient filing system in place, it takes very little time to file, and very little time to retrieve! Revisit the essential and most fundamental "filing" technique here on our web site!    Now you're thinking easier!