Use Interlibrary loans to freely extend your reading access
One of the most powerful but least-used tools that we modern Americans have at our disposal is the Inter-Library Loan.
If your local library does not carry a book, you can request the book through their interlibrary loan program. They will search other libraries in the country for you, and when they find that book in Florida or Texas they request the loan from that library. When it arrives, they notify you your request is in.
Most libraries have limits on interlibrary loans, like a few at a time, or if you fail to pick it up you pay a fine, or they won't fulfill requests until your own fines are paid up.
Still, it's an excellent way to use America's library system as your own local library.
I like to poke around Amazone.com for interesting-looking books. Most of the time my local library does not have it. I simply enter the book title, author, year published, and ISBN number and they do the work.
Interlibrary loans are often abbreviated as ILL.
Introduce Yourself to New Subjects by Googling it
When you approach a new topic that you know little to nothing about, one of the best ways to introduce yourself to it independently is to simply Google it. Search for the term in Firefox browser, right-click on interesting results and open them in new tabs.
You'll soon have ten or twenty interesting and varied sources on that subject.
Take 15-30 minutes and simply skim over the subject material. You are guaranteed you will walk away with a much greater understanding of the topic than if you just tried finding and reading one single source.
You will also discover some nicer sources that do offer more in-depth study materials. Or you might discover you are not as interested in the topic as you originally thought.
Lynda.com CD/DVD s are great for learning software
If you want or need to learn a specific software as fast as possible, the best way is to get a Lynda.com CD or DVD.
Perhaps you are struggling with learning software in your regular class because your teacher is lame. Perhaps you didn't pay attention to the teacher and now you need to cram. Perhaps you got a job where you swore you knew a software that you don't.
Or perhaps you just want to learn a specific software or technology like Photoshop, Excel, 3D Max, HTML, blogging, etc. and you want to learn it as fast as possible and on your own schedule.
These video tutorials are great because they show the software and have an expert explaining everything about it. If it goes too fast, you simply slide the video player back (it uses Quicktime to play the movies).
You can go to her site and view a few sample videos to get the gist of her format. You should purchase the CD/DVDs from her site directly. You can sometimes find used CD/DVDs on eBay, which are usually fine. You can also find the video files on bitTorrent sites.
I advise the best way to learn using this method is still to take some notes while watching the videos. Treat it like you are sitting in a class. Of course you're sitting in your underwear at home, but taking notes really does commit the knowledge to memory faster and better.
