Just-in-case revisited

Just-in-time learning means learning something just when you need it. The alternative is just-in-case, learning something in case you need it. I discussed this in an earlier post, and today I'd like to add a little to that discussion.

There are some things you need to know (or at least be familiar with) before you have a chance to use them. Here's a variation on that idea: some things you need to have practiced before you need them in order to overcome an effort barrier.

Suppose you tell yourself that you'll learn to use Photoshop or GIMP when you need to. Then you need to edit a photo. Faced with the prospect of learning either of these software packages, you might decide that the photo in question looks good enough after all.

There are things that in principle you could learn just-in-time, though in practice this is not psychologically feasible. The mental activation energy" is too high. Some things you need to practice before hand, not because you couldn't look them up when needed, but because they would be too daunting to learn when needed.

Related post: Bicycle skills

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