Fans pick 83 books like Make It Stick

This book is a creative and accurate description of how to use scientifically developed principles to help yourself learn effectively. The author vividly shows that he "eats his own dogfood" and reports his compelling personal experiences that buttress the science. Moreover, the book is well written and tightly organized. If you want to help yourself to learn more effectively, this is the first book I would consult.

This book transformed my understanding of human cognition. I love how Daniel Kahneman delves into the dual systems that drive our thoughts—intuitive and deliberate.

This book helped me recognize cognitive biases and informed how I develop AI technologies that align with human behavior. It reinforced the importance of designing AI that complements our natural thinking patterns.

I loved this book because we all want to achieve greatness, and it clearly identifies practices, strategies, and habits that can take a good team and make them great. It’s a reminder for me to be disciplined as a person, control myself with disciplined thoughts, and exhibit disciplined actions.

I like how Jim Collins emphasizes strategic focus, disciplined decision-making, and the importance of sustained excellence for long-term success. His "Hedgehog Concept" is a great reminder for me to reflect on what I’m deeply passionate about, what I can be the best at, and what drives my economic engine.

I loved this book so much that I cited Dweck and the growth mindset in Pause because every human needs to know about this mind-blowing concept. As a coach, I help my clients understand that a growth mindset is critical to doing anything differently. To be more confident, you have to show up differently. 

This book helped me get off auto-pilot mode or thinking things can’t be done. I learned that I had a lot of fixed mindset, which put a limit on everything I did! Because of this book, I now challenge my assumptions, get curious about what I thought couldn’t be changed or about someone, and learn how to be a more critical thinker about how I showed up–not just about the things I was doing–but the way I did them. 

The author immersed himself in the world of memory experts and describes how he went from (metaphorical) memory rags to memory riches – eventually winning a prestigious memory contest. This book takes the mystery out of how to learn vast bodies of information; Foer describes learning devices that anyone can use to put their memory on steroids.

I've bought this book at least a half-dozen times, giving it as a gift to friends who have kids in middle school or who are interested in how principles of learning can be applied in clever ways. This book is elegant in concept and design, and is one of a series of books Holt wrote that use similar applications of the science of learning to teach readers a set of interesting facts in a way that is almost effortless and a lot of fun.

It’s impossible, as a parent, not to marvel at the miracle of learning that occurs in very young children. Indeed, parents have experienced this sense of awe for time immemorial, and some have gone so far as to venture explanations for how it works. John Dewey, the American philosopher and psychologist, argued at the dawn of the twentieth century that children are like young scientists as they go about their day, subtly testing the things and people around them to see how they work. We now know, in no small part due to the work of researchers including The Scientist in the Crib author Alison Gopnik, that Dewey was right. Children are compelled to experiment; what’s more, they make the most of the limited data they produce with a powerful logic invisible to the untrained eye. Parents—but also anyone with a sense of wonder—will find answers to deep mysteries in… show more.

I've added this one by Stephen Covey to my Favorites because its insights impacted me. Though some of its terms may show their age, the timeless wisdom within resonates powerfully.

Covey's message about personal responsibility and the power of choice seems even more relevant today amidst a landscape of growing self-entitlement. His words ring true: "We are free to choose our actions, but we are not free to choose the consequences." This stark reminder amplifies the book's significance and enduring relevance. I

found it an essential read for my personal growth and character.

There is a cottage industry of historical and analytical books attempting to explain where, exactly, our educational norms, structures, and strictures came from. Many of these are terrific, but Lagemann’s An Elusive Science is the best of the bunch for exploring how nineteenth and twentieth-century scientific research influenced modern educational practice. The author is the source of a line oft-quoted in ed circles: “I have often argued to students, only in part to be perverse, that one cannot understand the history of education in the United States during the twentieth century unless one realizes that Edward L. Thorndike won and John Dewey lost.” This is the book that explicates and explores this almost primordial dichotomy, and how different philosophies of science became aligned with complementary philosophies of educational practice. A piercing, impeccably researched, enjoyable read. 

The Sane Positivist, by Geraldine Jonçich Clifford (née Jonçich), an expansive, out-of-print volume from 1968, was our favorite discovery from my book's research phase. Written in a stylish, old-fashioned present tense, the book is a biography of E. L. Thorndike, a figure who can credibly claim as much influence over the US’s (and much of the world’s) educational path as any other single human being. Even if E. L. Thorndike weren’t an educationist of historic significance, he would still belong in the animal behavior research pantheon, thanks to his immensely important work cataloguing the learning powers of animals (usually, cats he observed escaping from cages).

The author documents this early work and Thorndike’s subsequent leap (which I consider misguided) from animals in cages to humans in classrooms, while giving a deeply sourced and keenly observed account of his personal development. The figure she describes is as complex as… show more.