No one really said anything about shortcuts. Building maps of knowledge that have logical progressions and connections is so much more fulfilling than rote memorization. I can either memorize that the Iron Age came after the Bronze Age or I can weave a story with as many details as I can find and understand the inner workings of how the transition from the Bronze Age to the Iron Age happened.

You can also identify patterns within domains, which is a pretty common way to begin tackling problems or questions that you don’t really know but can start making an educated guess about.