# Just-in-case vs. Just-in-time Learning Created: [[2024_06_01]] 10:22 Tags: [[Advice]] [[Blog]] The learning strategies that you use in the real world vs. the ones that are taught in school are fundamentally different in their purpose and usage. The trouble is that we are only ever taught one of them in school so many people have a misconception of how to learn things for their "real-world" experiences. Let's dive into their differences. ## Just-in-case Learning Just in case learning is the learning strategy that you are taught in school. It's philosophy might be: "to learn things that *might* be useful later, just in case you need them in the future". This strategy is the reason why we have the kids in the back of the class raising their hand and saying, "why do we need to learn any of this?". For some fundamental things that most people should know, this might totally be warranted. But that learning style becomes less and less useful to the student over time. The most likely scenario is that they come out of school and mostly have no clue what to do in their actual job. Has there schooling fundamentally failed them? Sort of yes and sort of no, it is just a different sort of learning style. ## Just-in-time Learning Just in time learning is the sort of learning strategy you employ when starting a new job. You are learning new things on a need-to-know basis rather than trying to learn absolutely everything about the entire field you are in. This is the sort of learning strategy that we are never really taught in school, and that is a failure of the education system. Especially in a time where we need to [[Sea of Information|sail the sea of information]], just in time learning ends up being the strategy that we need out of people. So why is it the educational institutions focus so heavily on just-in-case learning? Perhaps it is because of tradition, or because the teachers themselves rarely have to leave their ivory towers. But in any case, there would be great benefit to the well being of students to be taught just-in-time learning strategies and not only just-in-case ones. ## References - [[Just-in-Case Versus Just-in-Time]]