Faria Sana highlighted many books as a teenager. She also took notes while she read. She says that she often “copied words or changed the words around,” but this didn’t really help. Sana says, “It was a way to improve my handwriting.” She found that college was getting harder, so she began to improve her study skills. She is now a psychology professor at Athabasca University in Alberta, Canada. She studies how to improve student learning.
It’s always beneficial to have good study skills. It’s more important than ever during this COVID-19 epidemic. Sana points out that many students are worried about their family members or friends getting sick. Some students feel more generalized stress. In many countries, the learning formats are different. Some schools have returned to in-person classes but with new rules about masks and spacing. Some schools offer staggered classes with students attending school part-time. Others have online courses only for a time.
These conditions may distract you from your lesson. Students will also have to work harder without the teacher or parent watching over their shoulders. They will be required to study and manage their time more independently. Sana says that these skills were never taught to many students. Sana says that it’s like telling them to “just swim” to learn how to swim. Some tips work for every subject. Don’t just cram. Test yourself instead of simply rereading the material. Certain classes benefit from other tactics. You can use graphs or mix up your study methods. Here are 10 ways to improve your study habits.
1. Study in small groups
Nate Kornell, a former student, “definitely crammed” for big exams. He is a psychology professor at Williams College, Williamstown, Mass. He still believes it’s good to study the night before a big exam. Research shows that it is not a good idea to do all of your studying in one day. Space out your study sessions.
In a 2009 experiment, students learned vocabulary words using flash cards. Some students studied the words over four days in separate sessions, while others studied them in smaller batches over several days. Both groups spent roughly the same time, but the first group learned the words more quickly.
Kornell compares the memory of a person to a bucket with a small leak. If you try to add water while the bucket is still full, it will not be much. If you wait too long between sessions of study, some material will fade from your memory. You can then re-learn the material and gain more knowledge in your next session. You’ll remember better next time.
2. Practice, practice, practice!
Musicians practice instruments. Athletes work on their sports skills. Learning should be treated the same way.
Katherine Rawson says that practising is the best way to learn to remember things. She is a psychologist from Kent State University, Ohio. In a 2013 study, the students were given practice tests for several weeks. In the end, the students scored, on average, more than one full letter grade higher than those who had studied normally.
In an earlier study, students were asked to read and then take a recall test. Some students took only one test, and a week later, the second group remembered more material.
3. Reread your books and notes, but don’t just do it.
Cynthia Nebel, a teenager, studied by reading textbooks, worksheets, and notebooks. This psychologist from Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tenn., recalls that she did this “over and over and again.” Now, we know that it’s a common mistake.
In a 2009 study, college students were asked to read a passage twice. Some students read the text twice, while others only did it once. After the reading, both groups took a test. Aimee McDaniel and Mark Callender found that the test results were not very different between these two groups. She now attends Wheaton College in Illinois. He is a professor at Washington University, St. Louis.
McDaniel says that students tend to reread materials superficially. He is also the co-author of the 2014 book Make it Stick: The Science of successful learning. He says that rereading is similar to looking up the solution to a problem rather than solving it yourself. It seems to make sense. You won’t know for sure if you really understand something until you do it.
Henry Roediger is one of McDaniel’s co-authors for Make It Stick. Roediger, like McDaniel, is a Washington University professor. In a 2010 study, Roediger, along with two colleagues, compared the test results of students rereading material to those from two other groups. One group asked questions about the materials. The other group responded to questions that were asked by someone else. The group that answered the queries performed the best. The worst performers were those who reread the material.
4. Test yourself
The 2010 study supports one of Nebel’s favourite study habits. Her mom quizzed Nebel on the material before big tests. She says, “Now I understand that retrieval practice was.” Nebel quizzed her knowledge as she grew older. She might, for example, cover the definitions of words in her notebook. She then tried to remember what each term was.
In an August 2020 article in Learning and Instruction, Rawson and other researchers showed that retrieval practice could help almost everyone. This study included college students who had an attention problem called ADHD. Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder is the name of this disorder. In general, retrieval was equally helpful to students with ADHD as well as those without.
Sana suggests creating a deck every time you acquire new information. She suggests that friends can quiz each other over the phone by putting questions and answers on opposite sides of the card.
Nebel suggests that you “try to ask yourself questions the same way as the teacher does.”
She says, “But really grill yourself as well as your friends.” Here’s why. She was a member of a group that asked each student to create ONE quiz question per class period. The students would then respond to a question posed by another student. The preliminary data shows that the students performed worse in tests than they did when the teacher asked the daily quiz question. Nebel’s group is still analyzing the data. She believes that the questions asked by students were too simple.
Teachers often dig deeper, she notes. They don’t ask for simple definitions. Teachers usually ask their students to compare or contrast different ideas. This requires some critical thinking.
5. You can make mistakes as long as they are not repeated.
Test your memory. It doesn’t matter how long you spend trying each time. This finding is based on a study conducted by Kornell in 2016. Kornell says it is important to move on to the next step: check to see if your assumptions are correct. Focus on the mistakes you made.
He says that if you don’t know the answer, you are wasting time. Checking the answers will make your time spent studying more effective. Then, you can focus on the areas where you most need help.
Stuart Firestein argues that mistakes are not always bad. He is a biologist at Columbia University in New York City and wrote a book about it. The book is called Failed: Why Science Is So Successful. He argues that mistakes are the key to learning.
6. Mix it up
It can be helpful to vary your self-testing. Do not focus solely on one concept, and do not limit yourself to one concept. Psychologists call this interleaving.
You will also find that your questions are usually mixed up. Interleaving is also a good way to learn. Sana explains that if you repeat a concept, “your attention will decrease because you’ll know what comes next.“ You can now spread out the concepts by mixing up your practice. You can also observe how concepts are different, form trends, or fit together.
Imagine, for example, that you are learning about different shapes and their volume in math. You could work on many problems involving the volume of a wedge. You could then answer more sets of questions, with each one focusing on a different shape. You could also determine the volume of both a cone and a wedge. Then, you could find the volume of a half cone or a spheroid. You can then mix them more. Mix in some addition or division practice.
Rawson and other researchers had college students test each approach. In Memory & Cognitive , they reported that those who interleaved the practice questions performed better than groups that practised one by one.
Sana and other researchers had shown a year before that interleaving could help both students with strong and weak working memories. Working memory allows you to remember where you are during an activity, such as when following a recipe.
7. Use images
Nebel advises you to pay attention to the diagrams and graphs that are included in your course materials. Those pictures will help you remember the material. If there are no pictures, then creating them could be very, very useful.
McDaniel: “I believe that these visual representations can help you to create a more complete mental model.“ Then, he and Dung Bui from Washington University had their students listen to a presentation on car brakes. The diagrams were given to one group, and they were instructed to add notes to them. A second group received a note-taking outline. The third group took only notes. Students who were good at creating mental models for what they read benefited from the outline. In these tests, they found that visual aids were helpful to all students.
Even goofy pictures might help. Nikol Rummel, a psychologist from Ruhr University Bochum (Germany), is an expert in the field. In 2003, she gave information on five scientists who studied the intelligence of college students and cartoons to them. The text about Alfred Binet, for example, was accompanied by a cartoon of a racecar driver. The driver wore a hat to protect his head. The students who were shown the illustrations did better in a test compared to those who only got the text.
8. Find examples
Abstract concepts are often difficult to grasp. Nebel says that it is easier to visualize something if you can give a concrete example.
Acids are the main cause of sour food. This concept may be difficult to recall on its own. If you imagine a lemon, or vinegar for that matter, it is easier to remember and understand the relationship between acids and sour. These examples may also help you identify the acidity of other foods.
It is helpful to have two or more examples to help you apply the information in new situations. Nebel and other researchers reviewed this research in July 2019. The Journal of Food Science Education reports describes how students can improve study skills.
9. Dig deeper
If you don’t go further, it’s difficult to remember all the facts and figures. Why are things the way they are? What caused them? Why are they important? Psychologists call it elaboration. Nebel says that it’s about taking the material from class and “asking many how-and-why questions“ about it. Please don’t accept the facts as they are.
The use of elaboration allows you to combine new information and other things that you already know. She says that it also creates in your mind a larger network of related things. This larger network helps you to remember and learn things.
McDaniel says that you might be asked to recall a series of facts about men. For example, “The man who was hungry got in the car.“ The strong man helped the woman. The brave man entered the house.“ In one of his 1980s studies, students found it difficult to remember the statements. Researchers explained the actions of each man. Students remembered much better when asked to explain why a man had done something.
McDaniel explains that “good understanding produces a really good memory.“ Ask more questions if the information seems random. Be sure to be able to explain the material. He says to try to explain it to another person. Many of his students call home and explain to their parents what they are learning.
10. Plan and follow through
Students know that they should spread out their study sessions, quiz themselves, and practice other skills. Many students know they should space out their study periods, quiz themselves and practice other good skills. They often fail to plan. When Rawson was still a student, she used a calendar on paper to prepare. She entered the dates for each exam. She recalls that for the next four to five days, she wrote down time to study. Set aside a specific time and location to do your schoolwork and study. This may seem strange at first. Kornell says that it will become normal by the second week. Nebel suggests putting your phone in another place while you are working. Sana suggests setting a timer of 25 minutes. During that time, you should focus on your studies without any distractions. Take a break for 5 or 10 minutes when the timer sounds. Exercise. Check your phone. Drink some water, whatever. McDaniel says, “If you’ve got a plan for studying, stick with it.“ He and Gilles Einstein, a psychologist at Furman University, Greenville, S.C., recently examined why students do not use good study techniques. Students report that many of them know what these skills are. They don’t always plan how they will put these skills into action. Students may make plans, but then something exciting comes up. They say that studying should be a priority. The team’s report was published in Perspectives on Psychological Science on the 23rd of July.
Bonus: Take care of yourself
Stick to a routine. Get enough sleep, not only the night before a test but over weeks or even months. Nebel says that these things are very, very important for learning. She also says that exercise is important. Don’t worry if it seems like too much, she adds. Try adding one new skill every week or two if a lot of it seems unfamiliar. You can also space out your sessions of study and retrieval practice for the first couple of months. You can improve your skills as you gain more experience. Ask for help if you are stuck.
If you have trouble following the above advice (you can’t track time, or you find it difficult to sit down and concentrate on your work), then you might be suffering from an undiagnosed disorder, like ADHD. Consult your doctor to find out. The good news is that it may be treatable.
It is difficult to do schoolwork in the midst of a pandemic. Remember that your classmates and teachers are also facing challenges. They have the same fears, worries and questions as you. You should be willing to give them some leeway. Be kind to yourself. Kornell says, “We are all in this together.”
