There’s a definite misconception that the more you study, the more you’ll know about a topic- but that’s not entirely true if you’re not studying the right way. Many students study for hours on end, only to blank out on a test, or just remember a concept for 12 hours during the time of their test. Typically cramming and memorizing is what students turn to when it’s time for a test, simply because they think it is the fastest way to learn new concepts. Although memorization might work temporally, it runs a high risk of blanking out on a test. Instead, genuinely learning topics by studying the right way will help you remember the topics long after the test, and therefore have much more confidence when writing. Here’s 10 tips to help you study for your next test:
1. Take Breaks
Wait, what? You thought you needed to study as much as you can right? Wrong. Many students actually over-study topics and that creates burn out. Studies show that taking a 45 minute break between 1-2 hour study sessions is the most effective. Why? Because it allows you to come back refreshed each time when you come back from your break. Of course, a 6 hour study session with 3 hours of brakes won’t cover as many topics, but you will remember the topics longer – so that’s why it’s important start your studying early!
2. Plan Ahead
All students have been there – the night before a test or exam and calculating the lowest grade they need to get to pass the course. It’s scary to say the least! But, typically if the student had started studying weeks, or even months earlier, they tend to not have this problem. Let’s say you have 5 chapters on a test, taking 5 weeks to study is not unrealistic. Allowing 1 week per chapter to fully learn the material, and a couple of days to review it at the end will surely make you have confidence walking into the exam room.
3. Use Colours To Your Advantage
Post-it-notes, highlighters, coloured paper, coloured pens.. All can help you score higher on your tests. Why? Colours are known to affect our mind in different ways. They affect our feelings, attention and behavior. This in tune affects our memory. The same way red and yellow makes us hungry (McDonald’s definitely knew this), the color green makes us concentrate (and it’s a colour we can actually never get tired of looking at – ever! Cool, right?) Other colours that help us with studying is blue for our productivity and orange to boost our moods! Plus, it’s much easier to organize your chapters or subjects with different colours – you can even write in red the subjects you have difficulty remembering and come back to them. So grab your highlighters and get studying!
4.Write It Out
Now-a-days where teachers allow laptops in the classroom, it is possible that we can go whole courses and subjects without even writing anything on paper, except our tests. Although there can be some organizational benefits to having everything stored in files on your laptop, we lose the benefits that triggers your learning when you write things down. It helps you remember, and expands the way you can learn. For example, you can draw pictures to make you remember, or easily add graphs, charts and checklists – something that is a little harder to do on a computer.
5. Teach A Friend
If you can teach a concept, that means you know it relatively well, right? Not only does teaching a subject to a friend encourage you to learn the concept beforehand, it will also strengthen your knowledge in it. If your friend has questions that you’ve never thought of, you both can discover the answers together. And guess what? That exact concept could easily be a question on the test!
6. Get A Friend To Teach You
The best part about getting a friend to teach you is that you learn a new way of thinking of the material. Everyone learns differently and explains concepts differently, so when you let a friend teach you, you openly accept their way of learning, which may be much more simple than yours – or vice versa! Either way, you both can openly learn from each other and think about the concept in a different way. Even comparing and joining notes is a great way to learn outside of the way you initially learned the concept.
7. Learn The Power Of Group Studying
Sometimes studying alone just doesn’t work. You end up looking at your phone, or even another book. Your mind wanders to literally do ANYTHING but study that material. So, studying in a group is your best solution to stay focused. Not only does it help your focus, but it also will have similar benefits of studying / learning with a friend. It not only works on your studying skills, but also your people skills.
8. Remember The 12 Hour Rule
There is proof that cramming actually does not help you, and that’s the 12 hour rule. It is said that your memory can only properly absorb new information within a 12 hour processing window. So, if you’re cramming new information less than 12 hours before a test or an exam, chances are you’re going blank out. Instead, it’s important to have all your information covered 12 hours before your test or exam, so you can spend the next 12 hours reviewing it. Doesn’t it just sound more peaceful this way anyways?
9. Review Before Bed
This goes hand and hand with the 12 hour rule. You can actually make a process out of this. If you take each chapter or concept, and study it one day, the following day you can study the next chapter, and then before you sleep review the previous chapter. Your mind will have the 12 hours to process the new information you studied the day before, and then when you review it beforehand, you will be able to brush up on what information you did not retain. This process works very well for final exams, where there is a lot of information that seems overwhelming – we promise it isn’t 🙂
10. Take Care Of Your Body
It’s obvious your brain function is representative of your physical and mental state. If you are suffering from a lot of stress about your exams, or you feel sick and tired then your studying is not going to be even close to optimal. It’s important to eat the right foods (fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds are ideal for brain function) and remember to drink a lot of water. Getting the recommended 8 hours of sleep can work as one of the best study tactics – since your brain will not work without the proper amount of sleep (that’s right – no all-nighters!). And, if you find that you hit a mental block, doing some jumping jacks or light stretching/yoga us the best way to get your neurons flowing again so you can actually concentrate on what you’re studying. If you take care of your body, it will take care of you!
