My last column stated: "Because most poker authorities don't know how to teach, you have to become an efficient learner. Don't just sit there, waiting for an epiphany. Take an active role in your own development."
My next two columns will tell you how to apply active learning principles to three essential subjects:
1. Poker theory and strategy
2. Other people
3. Yourself
Poker Theory and Strategy
Many poker authorities just tell you their ideas, and they may give you an example or two to clarify them. They don't give you practice and feedback on applying their principles, and, as thousands of research studies have proved,
you cannot develop skills without practice and feedback.
Many recent poker books are stronger instructionally than older ones. Thirty years ago, most books had hardly any quizzes, but recent books often contain them. Unfortunately, many readers don't work hard (or at all) on them, even though they may be a book's most important part. If you can't answer the quiz questions correctly, you obviously don't know how to apply the book's principles. And if you can't apply its principles, you haven't gained much from reading it.
Why don't people work hard on the quizzes? Because, after a lifetime of passive learning, they don't know how to learn actively, and they usually don't want to test themselves. You may have the same attitude. You may prefer to skim through the material, pretend that you have learned it, and then go back to playing poker.
To learn theory and strategy, select books that contain many quizzes, and study until you get 100 percent on them. A few months later, take them again to ensure that you still understand and can apply the principles. Take the next step by applying these principles to actual hands, then discussing them with other people.
Some writers apply active learning principles very well. They give readers quizzes or problems to solve, then provide and explain their answers. In addition to helping you to apply their specific ideas, they teach you how good players think.
CardPlayer.com and several other websites have forums that enable you to apply active learning principles. Thousands of people intensely discuss hands and debate theory. Visit those forums and get involved in those debates. Don't just read what other people have said. Take a position, get feedback on it, and then rethink your position.
Two groups of authors used both quizzes and Internet forums to create active learning. Quizzes and answers take up 85 pages of Miller, Sklansky, and Malmuth's
Small Stakes Hold'em. Ciaffone and Brier's
Middle Limit Hold'em Poker describes the action in several hundred hands and then asks: "What do you do?" They then answer that question and give their reasoning.
Both books stimulated an extraordinary amount of discussion. There have been thousands of posts on Internet forums, and some of the debates became quite heated.
• "They are absolutely right. The best way to play that hand is …"
• "No! No! No! They are utterly wrong. You should …"
• "You're both wrong! They are right about what you should do, but their reasoning is wrong because …"
These debates often became so heated that they turned people off, but discomfort is part of the price of learning. I wish that debaters acted more politely, but even rude remarks can be useful, and these debates certainly helped people to understand and apply strategic principles. Then, Ed Miller and Jim Brier took another huge step: They debated theory in articles in an Internet e-zine. Of course, the forums contained heated arguments about these articles.
That's the learning model you should use. Read something, take a quiz, and try to apply its principles while playing. Go to an Internet forum, describe a hand or take a position, and explain your reasoning. Get feedback from other people. Keep your mind open even when other people are harshly critical, and learn from their reactions. When you're wrong, admit it and change the way you think and play.
Other People
You can't win at poker without understanding your opponents, and you need to learn actively for two reasons:
1. You receive unreliable information because poker is a game of deception. Your opponents will try to confuse you about their cards and the way they think and play.
2. Forces within you cause you to miss or distort information. You may see what you hope, fear, or expect to see. For example, your own biases and first impressions of anyone can cause you to ignore or minimize contrary information. If you have a certain image of someone, you may miss clear signals that you have misjudged him.
Since you can't rely solely on your own perceptions, you need help from others. You may find that Joe and Barbara see Harry differently and more accurately than you do. It happens to me all the time, despite decades of experience as a psychologist. I may be embarrassed by my mistakes, but that embarrassment is trivial and temporary. Improving my understanding of people is much more important.
Two other columns of mine, "Reading and Adjusting to Players" (
Card Player, Vol. 19/No. 21 and Vol. 19/No. 25), described an active learning system for developing these skills:
1. Put people on a range of hands.
2. Make predictions about what they will do.
3. Record your results.
4. Analyze the causes for your good and bad decisions.
5. Discuss steps No. 1-4 with other people.
Note that this system is extremely active. You don't just passively observe. You take positions, make mistakes, and learn from your mistakes. Sometimes you'll be embarrassed or frustrated, but these steps will slowly develop these critically important abilities.
Conclusions
Our game is ruthlessly competitive, and the competition is getting much tougher. After an enormous influx of new players and extremely soft games, many games are getting harder to beat - for at least two reasons:
• The government wants to destroy online poker, and its actions will dramatically reduce the supply of new players.
• Because they play so many hands and can use learning tools that did not exist until recently, some of your opponents have very steep learning curves. It once took many years to become a top player. Now, some very young players - including several
Card Player columnists - are almost unbelievably good.
The competition is intensifying so rapidly that you can't sit still. To stay ahead of your opponents, you must learn more efficiently than they do. If they have steeper learning curves than you do, your win rate will slowly erode, and you can easily become a loser.
My first two columns in this series discussed ways to learn efficiently about theory, strategy, and other players. My next column will focus on your most important self-development task: learning about yourself.
Dr. Schoonmaker ([email protected]) coaches only on psychology issues, such as controlling impulses, coping with losing streaks, going on tilt, and planning your self-development.
