Re:Ask HN: How to develop logical skills?
by latentflip on Sunday December 12, 2010 @03:16PM
(#1997889)
The best tip I've been given for practice is to actually sit with a piece of paper and write out your thought process whilst solving these little problems.
It's feels a bit laborious at first, but I find it makes for much more effective practice than getting to the answer in a roundabout way, and not really knowing how you get there.
As in hackerblues' comment, sitting and explicitly writing: "If I write a 5 in this cell then the column will contain two 5s. Therefore, this cell can't contain a 5." is more effective than bumbling around and just getting it right, particularly when practicing with simple examples.
It's feels a bit laborious at first, but I find it makes for much more effective practice than getting to the answer in a roundabout way, and not really knowing how you get there.
As in hackerblues' comment, sitting and explicitly writing: "If I write a 5 in this cell then the column will contain two 5s. Therefore, this cell can't contain a 5." is more effective than bumbling around and just getting it right, particularly when practicing with simple examples.