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Library/Learning & explaining

🧠

Learning & explaining

Reading an explanation feels like learning and usually isn't. The prompts here are built around the difference. Several of them refuse to explain until you have tried first, some generate questions instead of answers, and others ask you to teach the idea back so the model can catch where your version quietly breaks. They also guard against the two failure modes of asking a model to teach you: analogies that sound illuminating but mislead, and reassurance that you have understood when you have only recognised the words.

36 prompts in 5 groups

🧠Learning & explaining19 categories

🔮Astrology & tarot36
🔍Code review & debugging36
🍳Cooking & food36
💼CV & career36
📊Data & SQL36
🎨Design & UX36
📄Documentation36
✉️Email & messages36
🎁Gifts & occasions36
🧠Learning & explaining36
📝Meetings & notes36
🌱Plants & gardening36
🪶Poetry & wordplay36
🗺️Product & planning36
🔬Research & comparison36
🧪Tests & QA36
⚖️Thinking & decisions36
✈️Travel & places36
✍️Writing & editing36

🔮Astrology & tarot36
🔍Code review & debugging36
🍳Cooking & food36
💼CV & career36
📊Data & SQL36
🎨Design & UX36
📄Documentation36
✉️Email & messages36
🎁Gifts & occasions36
🧠Learning & explaining36
📝Meetings & notes36
🌱Plants & gardening36
🪶Poetry & wordplay36
🗺️Product & planning36
🔬Research & comparison36
🧪Tests & QA36
⚖️Thinking & decisions36
✈️Travel & places36
✍️Writing & editing36

Length

Tag

Explaining a concept

Getting an idea across at the depth you need, with analogies, origins and first principles.

Explain this at three levels of depthLongFirst contact with a concept, when you don't yet know how deep you need to go.
What is the one idea that unlocks this?LongA subject where you have learned the parts but it still hasn't clicked.
Give me an analogy, then tell me where it breaksLongWhen you want an intuition for something abstract without picking up a wrong model.
Why does this exist at all?LongA tool, standard or convention whose design looks arbitrary until you know the history.
Rebuild this concept from first principlesLongSomething you use by rote and want to be able to derive rather than memorise.
Explain in one paragraphShortFirst contact with a topic, when you only have a few minutes.
The one ideaShortA subject where you know the parts but it hasn't clicked.
Analogy, and where it breaksShortYou want intuition without picking up a wrong model.
Explain to a beginnerShortYou need the version you could give a friend with no background.
Why does this exist?ShortA tool or convention whose design looks arbitrary.
The five-minute versionMediumYou have to talk about this tomorrow and have not read up.

Checking your understanding

Quizzes, teach-backs and gap hunts that find what you only think you know.

Test whether I actually understand thisLongAfter reading about something and feeling like you get it.
Find the holes in what I knowLongYou've been working in an area a while and suspect you have blind spots.
I'll explain it, you find where I'm wrongLongThe strongest check there is: say it out loud and see what collapses.
Debug my mental modelLongWhen your predictions about a system keep turning out wrong.
Interview me on this subjectLongPreparing for an interview, a viva, or a conversation where you'll be pressed.
Test me on thisShortYou read about something and feel like you got it.
What am I missing?ShortYou've worked in an area a while and suspect there are blind spots.
Quiz me until I failShortFinding the edge of what you know, fast.
Check my explanationMediumThe strongest test available: say it yourself and see what survives.

Planning and retention

Working out the order to learn a subject in, and making it stick once you have.

Build me a learning roadmap with a real orderLongStarting a large subject and needing a sequence, not a reading list.
Turn this into spaced-repetition cardsLongMaterial you need to retain long-term rather than just understand once.
What do I need to know before this?LongA paper, article or course that keeps losing you for reasons you can't identify.
What do I need first?ShortMaterial that keeps losing you for reasons you can't name.
What is worth remembering here?MediumA long read you will otherwise retain nothing from.

Practice, not reading

Worked examples, exercises and Socratic sessions that make you do the thinking.

Teach me by asking, not tellingLongA concept you want to actually internalise rather than skim.
Work through an example, showing the decisionsLongWhen you understand a technique in the abstract but not how to apply it.
Turn reference docs into a tutorialLongDocumentation that lists every option but never shows you how to start.
Practice problems, answers withheldMediumReading has stopped working and you need to actually do it.
Make me predict firstMediumWhen you want the explanation to stick rather than slide past.

Scrutinising ideas

Where a concept stops working, what people get wrong, and whether a claim holds up.

Distinguish two things I keep confusingLongTwo terms you nod along to but could not reliably tell apart.
What do people usually get wrong about this?LongBefore you teach something, or before you assume your own version is right.
Summarise this paper and tell me if it holds upLongA research paper or long article you need the substance of, plus a sanity check.
What would I have to believe for this to be true?LongEvaluating a claim, a strategy, or an argument you can't immediately fault.
Tell these two apartShortTwo terms you nod along to and could not reliably distinguish.
Where does this stop working?MediumAn idea you've started applying everywhere.

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