I think that Reason has an edge over plugin hosts like FL Studio in terms of learning how to produce quickly, mainly revolving around the fact that it isn't a plugin host. My reasoning:

1)Pretty much every tool you need to know in order to be able to produce is hardwired in there, so you're automatically learning the right stuff.
2) Because it's a closed system you won't get distracted by random plugins and the random crashes they can cause. This may seem trivial, but you can literally waste years collecting and trying out random plugins, or trying to make your setup stable and crash-free.
3) The other advantage to learning on a non-plugin platform like Reason is that you can download song files from the web (i.e. Reasonstation and the Propellerheads site) and they'll work on your machine, so you can learn directly from what others have done. Plugin hosts will require you to have the same plugins as the original producer for the song file to work (which odds are you won't have), so by using them as a beginner you miss out on a huge learning opportunity.

When you've got your basic production chops down in Reason, you can switch to a plugin host and customise your working environment to suit your personal workflow and production priorities.

As far as production advice goes, raid the Sound On Sound, Future Music and Computer Music magazine archives (www.soundonsound.com etc.). There's a tonne of good articles online in there (especially in the case of SOS and FM).

Paying www.musictheory.net a visit might be worthwhile too, just to get an introduction to the topic.