These slides were used for a meetup event "Boost Learning with Deliberate Practice". It explains what deliberate practice is and how it can be applied to improve our daily learning experience.

1. Boost Learning with
Deliberate Practice
Hou Yifeng

2. Amateur Ping Pong Player

3. Semi-Professional Drummer
Hard Rock Cafe Singapore Rock Festival

4. Professional Software Engineer
● Python Django - API Auth Server
● Ruby on Rails - Leave Management Web App
● React Native - Kopi Order Mobile App
● Ruby on Rails, React - Retro Web App
● React D3.js Scala - Data Visualization Web App
● Java Spring Boot, Angular - Rating Management Web App
● Kotlin Spring Boot, Angular - Electricity Web App
● Java Spring boot, Angular - Port Management Web App
● Java Android - Airline Booking Mobile App
● React Native - Licencing Hybrid Mobile App

5. Time Investment
Ping Pong
Around 15 mins / weekday
Drums
1 hour / weekday
3 hours / Saturday
3 hours / Sunday
Software Engineering
8 hours / weekday
4 hours / weekends

6. Problems of Time Investment
● Time investment is limited
● Time investment does not guarantee progress
What is missing?

7. Deliberate Practice!

8. What is this mysterious Deliberate Practice?
K. Anders Ericsson
Amazon

9. Deliberate Practice in Practice
Ping Pong
Software
Engineering
Drums
Deliberate Practice

10. Agenda
● What is Deliberate Practice?
● How does Deliberate Practice help to boost learning?
● Examples to apply Deliberate Practice
● Where to go from here?

11. What is Deliberate Practice

12. Mozart: Gifted or Well Trained?

13. Experiment by Japanese Psychologist
Ayako Sakakibara
24 children became pitch perfect in one year
Myth of Pitch Perfect is broken!
Link to the study

14. Characteristics of Deliberate Practice
● Become pitch perfect
● Start with easy chords, add 1 new chord at
a time
● 4 to 5 short session every day
● Trainer will tell the children whether they
give correct or wrong answers
● Add new chords when all existing chords
are correctly identified
● Has well-defined, specific goals
● Take baby steps to reach longer-term
goals
● Is focused
● Involves feedback
● Requires getting out of one’s comfort zone

15. Deliberate Practice in a Nutshell
Get outside your comfort zone but do it in a focused way, with clear goals, a plan
for reaching those goals, and a way to monitor your progress. Oh, and figure out a
way to maintain your motivation.
Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise
(2016, Anders Ericsson)

16. How does Deliberate Practice work?

17. How does deliberate practice work?
Adaptability
London Cab Driver Study
Acquiring “the Knowledge” of London's
Layout Drives Structural Brain Changes

18. How does deliberate practice work?
Adaptability: Human’s Tendency to Maintain Homeostasis
There is a growing body of evidence that both the structure and the function of the
brain change in response to various sorts of mental training, in much the same
way as your muscles and cardiovascular system respond to physical training.
Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise
(2016, Anders Ericsson)

19. Mental Representation

20. Mental Representation
A mental representation is a mental structure that corresponds to an object, an
idea, a collection of information, or anything else, concrete or abstract, that the
brain is thinking about
Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise
(2016, Anders Ericsson)

21. Power of Mental Representation
20180724 42708102

22. Summary
Mental
Representation
Specific Goals
Take Baby Steps
Stay Focused
Push out of
comfort zone
Feedback
Adapt
Update

23. Example 1 Ping Pong
How to become faster, better, stronger?

24. Ping Pong Goal 1: Keep the ball on the table
Specific Goals
Take Baby Steps
Stay Focused
Push out of
comfort zone
Feedback
Adapt
Update
Focused Observation
Reflex Upgrade
Muscle Control 101

25. Ping Pong Goal 2: Make the ball hard to return
Specific Goals
Take Baby Steps
Stay Focused
Push out of
comfort zone
Feedback
Adapt
Update
✓ Focused Observation
✓ Reflex Upgrade
✓ Muscle Control 101
Muscle Control 201: Spin

26. Ping Pong Goal 3: Distract opponents
Specific Goals
Take Baby Steps
Stay Focused
Push out of
comfort zone
Feedback
Adapt
Update
✓ Focused Observation
✓ Reflex Upgrade
✓ Muscle Control 101
✓ Muscle Control 201: Spin
Develop Trash Talk Library

27. Example 2 Software Engineer
How to pick up a new tech-stack fast?

28. Tech Stack Web Application: Spring Boot + Angular
Specific Goals
Take Baby Steps
Stay Focused
Push out of
comfort zone
Feedback
Adapt
Update
Language: Java, JS
Architecture: MVC
Dependency Injection 101
TDD: JUnit, Jasmine,
Protractor

29. Tech Stack Mobile Application: Android
Specific Goals
Take Baby Steps
Stay Focused
Push out of
comfort zone
Feedback
Adapt
Update
✓ Language: Java, JS
✓ Architecture: MVC, MVP
✓ Dependency Injection 101
Dependency Injection 201
✓ TDD: JUnit, Jasmine,
Protractor, Espresso

30. Tech Stack Hybrid Application: React Native
Specific Goals
Take Baby Steps
Stay Focused
Push out of
comfort zone
Feedback
Adapt
Update
✓ Language: Java, JS, Bash
✓ Architecture: MVC, MVP, Clean
Architecture
✓ Dependency Injection 101
✓ Dependency Injection 201
✓ TDD: JUnit, Jasmine,
Protractor, Espresso, Detox

31. Where to go from here?
● Read the book
● Pick a field of interest and dive in
with Deliberate Practice
yhou@pivotal.io

32. Shout outs

33. Q&A