Welcome to jealousiner blog: What is the best way to concentrate in your studies?

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Student | Spead-Reader | Education-Junkie

9.6k Views • Krishaan is a Most Viewed Writer in Study Habits.

Studying is not a 'one size fits all' skill. It needs to be tailor-made. Based on the individual, the subject and the exam. Here's what I believe to be a fairly comprehensive plan on making sure you study more effectively:

State your objective. Why are you studying? Is it for an exam, self-fulfilment or both? Whatever you objective is, make it S.M.A.R.T. By doing this, you have a benchmark that you want to beat. For an exam, say you want to average 90% when you do 3 practice exams in the weeks before your final, that's easier to measure and attain than throwing a hail mary.

2. What type of exam is it that you're studying for? If it's fact-intensive, you can use techniques such as spaced-repetition. If it's about how you argue multiple points, use self-explanation or re-teaching. Lastly, if it's method based, use re-teaching and doing. Based on your exam, you should adjust your studying-technique and study-schedule accordingly.

3. "A study conducted by Specific Diagnostic Studies found that 29 percent of all students in elementary and secondary schools are visual learners, 34 percent learn through auditory means, and 37 percent learn best through kinesthetic/tactile modes." The study can be found here. This study allows us to realise that people have different ways to learn. Take advantage of this by using multiple methods e.g. videos, reading notes, self-explaining etc...

4. On the topic of studying techniques, here is a photo which illustrates some different methods:

Now to look at external factors:

Try to constantly use the same place for studying. If your study-area resembles your exam-room, even better! De-cluttering that area is key as well.
Take advantage of our short attention spans by using the Pomodoro Technique. When you take a break every 25 minutes, you allow your brain to recollect information. It would be a good idea to go for a walk or do some dynamic stretching during your 5 minute breaks - This would be beneficial for both your health and studying.
Stay hydrated, eat well and exercise. By taking care of yourself, you can optimise your brain's performance. You also get the added benefits of looking and feeling good.
Psychology is key. Even if you don't like the subject, ask yourself questions about it and make sure you're curious. Malcolm Knowles' theory on adult-learning exemplifies how important your attitude is, when trying to retain information.
Lastly, have fun. When learning is enjoyable, it's normally more effective.

The PQRST Method of Studying

an assignment by scanning it. Read the chapter outline at the beginning of the chapter. Pay attention to the headings of the sections and subsections. Read the summary. The point is to get an idea of the main topics and sections of the chapter.
(Numbers 2, 3, and 4 are done at the same time)
QUESTION yourself by making questions of the headings of each section and subsection.
As you READ the assignment, look for the answers to the questions you have made.
SELF-RECITATION requires that you try to remember the main points of each section and that you say them out loud (if possible) to yourself.
You TEST yourself after you have finished the entire chapter. How many of the main ideas from the chapter can you remember?

Now you are really starting to store your studies into long-term memory!
If you're looking to be a more efficient reader, try the SQ3R Method. It's designed to help you read faster and retain more. SQ3R stands for the steps in reading:

Survey, Question, Read, Recite & Review:
Survey:
Before reading, survey the material. Glance through the topic headings and try to get an overview of the reading. Skim the sections and read the final summary paragraph to get an idea of where the chapter is going. Only spend a few minutes surveying the reading to get a background knowledge, an initial orientation that will help you to organize the material as you read it. It eases you into the reading assignment

Question
Look at the first heading in the chapter. Turn it into a question. Ask questions to be answered in your reading. This step requires conscious effort, but is worth it as it leads to active reading, the best way to retain written material. Asking questions focuses your concentration on what you need to learn or get out of your reading.

Read
Read the first section of your reading assignment to answer your question. Actively search for the answer to your question. If you finish the section and haven't answered the question, reread it. Read reflectively. Consider what the author is trying to say, and think about how you can use that information.

Recite
Once you've read an initial section, look away and try to recite the answer to your question, using your own words and examples. If you can do this, it means that you understand the material. If you can't, glance over the section again. Once you have the answers to your questions, write them down.

Review
After reading the entire assignment, test your memory by asking yourself the questions that you've identified. Review your notes for an overview of the chapter. Consider how it fits with what you know from the course, experience, and other classes. What is the material's significance? What are the implications or applications of this material? What questions are you left with?

How many of the steps you follow is up to you. As you become more efficient you may find that you can read more - and retain more - with less effort. Regardless, if an assignment is important, be sure to take notes so that you don't have to reread it later. Some additional tips to study in terms of relevance is also mentioned in this answer:

* Mudrā is a symbolic or ritual gesture in Hinduism and Buddhism Created the well-known & most voted study method

Upvoted by Ben Y. Zhao, Professor of CS at UCSB

Ahmad is a Most Viewed Writer in Study Habits.

This is my personal research on how to study over two years. I succeeded to get a distinction in 8000 students from many colleges. I did not spend more than two months in my college.

There are two important concepts worth sharing before I describe my study method. The first concept is about memory graph and the second one is about concentration span.

1. The Human Memory Graph
The concept is when you read something, your memory of what you read or heard is almost alive. If we represent this with graph it is horizontally at 100%, and it slowly declines over time. When you review it after one day, memory connections are strengthened. Now its declination is very slow as compared to without review. This speed decreases with every review of the thing you want to remember. It is explained in the graph below.

(picture source : Link)
Instead of memorizing, try setting a review plan without any tension and be relaxed. Read with concentration, and then leave it. Read again in the evening, then again the next day, and then again the next week. Test yourself on the 15th day, and then review after one month. You'll notice that your memory, of what you heard, read, or listened, will not decline so easy now plus you remember most of it including subtle details related to or within the material.

2. The Human Attention Span

picture source :
As it's clear from this graph, the human attention span is at 30% after 45 minutes. Mostly, that is the length of one class for schools below university level. In universities it is increased to one hour or more. You can improve your attention span by increasing the time slowly, but it is better to take a short break (~5 minutes) after about an hour of focused study. The short break will allow you to regain about 90% of your attention span.

Another important thing regarding memory is reading a topic from many sources. It has two benefits, less boredom and many different aspects of the same scenario. Later one increases latency

Another important consideration is the productive hours. It may be different for few people but mostly early morning is the most productive time.
Remember to keep the room temperature a little warm. It will help in focusing.

After a lot of study about how to study, I devised a plan, which was refined over time according to the results. Now here is a refined plan, in which are inherent many researches and experiences I have come across during or after that 2 year study period. I have always been interested in education, human evolution and psychology.
When you want to be confident about some topic or field of study first read about "How this field came into existence, its origin and the input and output to world from this i.e main purpose", end results, its uses, how it works and why you are into it and then dive in by following below tips.

Planning and managing your study

Define a Study Schedule; I scheduled 11 hours for study per day. It is the first step to success. I was studying, and interested in it, so I was giving most of my time to studying. You may schedule less than 11 hours of course. It just shows my dedication towards academics and the dreams I had after graduation. I was in a poor family. I knew that without hard-work, I would not be able to reach the level of success I was striving for. After getting a winning position in exam results of thousands of participants from many cities of my province, I was able to continue my education for free with the help of Govt. I also received a scholarship from the government, grand cash prize and special training plus trips which added to my motivation. Yes, I also got a Talent Award (2009) from Chief Minister of my province.
Humans can concentrate for 40 minutes on a subject, or maximum 1 hour. Do change your study material/subject after every 40 minutes or 1 hour. But later on you can increase this time slowly to 2 hours. I did this.
Start on your daily schedule by learning new things, learning new things at start gives you hope and makes you motivated.
Don’t start one subject or module after the other. Take a break of 5 to ten minutes. During your break time eat some chocolate, fruits, and vitamins. Get out of your seat and get your blood flowing by walking around or doing a few sit-ups, push-ups, or jumping jacks. Even better, step outside to get a breath of fresh air and enjoy nature. This is a right click and refresh for you on your desktop to start another application.
Study each subject three times a day, design your schedule such that every subject has 3 shifts per day. Take notes in the first shift, and rehearse them in second shift and so on. Notes taken should not be an exact copy of the book text.
Re-allocate time for your modules in your schedule after every (maximum of) two weeks. Or test yourself after one week and review your schedule; focus on areas you need work in. It should be based on the results of your self-testing of course.
Test yourself sometime in the middle of a study schedule in a day or after morning review session as we usually do in exams i.e. review before paper.
Remember to review topics of this day you have studied, at the end of study time table.
Second day, start with looking at the topics of the last day. But never do an exam at the start of study time. After you review the previous day's materials, move on to learning new things. Later chapters in books mostly have references from former ones. Increase difficulty slowly from start to end. A basic rule in all of our lives.
Do some statistics on important and less important subjects or difficult and easy subjects and divide time with statistics methods. For example by first assigning the difficulty level to each subject like 40% and 60% etc.
If studying something which could be easily implemented in home or lab, don’t miss it. I, when studying biology, had tried to produce a new family of a tree though it was just a try and nothing resulted. I have been programming to simulate the physics concepts which helped a lot.

Subject specific study techniques

For math subjects, try to solve a question, if you fail, just do it with your hands by looking at some help book. After you finish copying by hands, you will infer what was missing. This is called learning with hands not mind. This is because some time an answer tells you about the solution in math.
For physics subjects, start with writing the topics equation, prove it on paper same as stated above in (math method), then start with the theory. Attach equation with the topic.
For English, write difficult words on the note book. Learn them first.
For theory subjects, read a lot on the same topic from different sources, read the topic on book, leave it. Now read it on Wikipedia and leave it. Learn it on some other book. This is easy and very useful method. Don't try to learn from your book only this will bore you and you won’t remember well.

Exam Tips

End preparing for exams about one week before. Design your exams timetable so that your intense preparation ends about one week before the first day of paper. This will help in
Tension free preparation. Inside your heart you know I have one week, as a backup.
One week extra preparation. The last EXTRA week is now more valuable than one month. Everything you will do in this week will be extra and very motivational for you.
If there is 2, 3 days break between papers, don't stick with one subject. As mentioned above it kills productive study and focus. Change study module for the sake of attaining mind focus and refreshment, at least.
Review your notes the day before paper. This will give you an overview of all topics plus strengthening the memory connections for those topics.
After paper is over, don’t throw the question paper into dust bin, thinking that it’s gone now. It can help your mind settle down. Read and examine how much you did correctly.
Keep calculating marks you obtained in each paper and adding to total. It will motivate you, like we do in scoring games.
Don’t forget the one and only solution for refreshment and energy of mind, the exercise and healthy foods in exams.

Miscellaneous facts

Don't listen to love music or such type of songs. Listen to some good motivational music like "barr.steve.
Do take some time for spirituality or loneliness, for many reasons it’s important.
Play some sports or exercise, not too much.
Eat different things in daily life and especially in break times.
Listen to news for some time. If learning English, listen to BBC.
Play with children, they are also learning, observe them and their interest.
Do spend some time with family and share your status.
If possible, do have some time to teach someone. It will be best, if you can teach what you are learning yourself.
For your tasks apart from study, make a to-do list. It’s very important to lessen the distraction and burden from your mind.
Understanding the problem, half solves it.
Imagine your success every day, imagine the future. You are investing on your future.
Spread knowledge.

* If you note I have written number 1 for no love music, in the details, I mean we should have zero distraction outside and inside of ourselves to create a creative state of mind, give all your attention to study when you study!
Do one thing at a time. Don’t have another part of your mind allocated for the mobile phone beside, or an open Facebook tab.

Do the exercises before reading the material
This is the big one. Most people read the textbook or attend a lecture, and then try to do the exercises afterwards. I find it's much more effective to try the exercises first.
Typically one of two things happen:

You come up with an answer. If this isn't the same answer you find in the textbook, then working out why they are different will probably give you important insights into the problem.

You don't come up with an answer. The problems you couldn't solve will now be stewing in the back of your mind. The material that covers these topics will seem really interesting when it gets covered and the solutions to the problems will jump out.

If you can't get traction on a problem quickly then move onto the next one. Just attempt the problem for long enough to get the key issues into your subconscious, and then move onto the next one.

Intuitively you might expect that doing the exercises first would take more time, but that isn't what I found. By making a quick attempt at the questions, you get them nestled into your subconscious, which means that you will likely solve them more quickly after learning the material.

Don't accept boredom
If you are bored then you aren't learning and you need to change something. Never accept boredom. Boredom is your brain's way of telling you you are doing something wrong.

If material is boring because you don't understand it, go back and learn whatever you needed to understand first.
If you are reading a bad book, find a better book that covers the same material.
If you are in a lecture from a bad lecturer, try to find a better source to learn from. Make sure someone is taking notes of what is covered, and occupy your time in the classroom reading something you'll learn from (don't be too obvious though).
If the subject seems inherently boring, then learn more about how what you are learning can be usefully applied to solve important problems. If it can't then maybe you should be studying something else.

If you are trying to study and didn't try the exercises first, then that's probably why you are bored - go do that.

Don't cram for tests
If you are going to do well in a test then you need to be relaxed. In the days before a test you should do nothing more stressful than a couple of hours gently reviewing your notes to assure yourself you know your stuff. Go for a walk. Eat ice cream. Listen to music. Sleep.
[An exception can possibly be made for tests that require lots of memorizing but little intelligent thought.]

Have a backup plan
If you care too much about doing well in a test, then you will get stressed and do worse in it. Always have a backup plan for what you will do if you fail, and develop that plan enough that you can imagine it is something you would want to do. That way, if you are part way through the exam, and you think "I'm failing", you'll just think "that's not so bad really", you'll stay calm, and you'll ace it.

There are many methods out there but here are some that works for me:

1. Use Metaphors/Analogies
- Its a good idea to use metaphors/analogies to understand difficult concepts. This is also handy for recalling concepts that you find hard to retain. Everything can be described as a Metaphor. It might take some time to come up with one but if you stick with it, you will do yourself a world of good.

2. Draw stuff
- I'm not gonna get into the theory behind how this works but its known that using a combination of text and diagrams enhances your learning. You will find this presented to you in every Head First series book. So instead of writing paragraphs of text I tend to draw them in say boxes, circles etc. and connect them to together to give me a mind-map of view of a concept. There are many other ways to go about doing this..
3. The 5 year old method
- The idea is to take concepts you find difficult to understnd and attempt to explain it like you would do to a 5 year old.What this means is you are forced to break the concept into smaller bits using simple words until you completely understand whats going on. From there onwards you reconstruct it.
4. Teach
- If you can confidently teach someone and they can understand it, it is a sign that you are reaching a level of mastery. So strive to teach!
4. Everything is a Question
- When taking notes I find it highly effective to phrase the title in the form of a question (and yes always give a title to the text to your notes). So instead of just writing about say 'Inheritance in Object Oriented Programming' and jamming eveything into a parapgrah I would break it into questions such as 'What does inheritance solve in OOP'? or 'Why is inheritance necessary in OOP?' and other questions like 'What conditions need to be met to implement inheritance'? etc. Having questions gives you sharper focus and makes you think. And it also makes it a lot easier to power study (skim through, refer to certain portions of your notes etc.)
5. Multiple Sources
- Sometimes its not enough to know 'just enough'. You might not completely understand a topic or concept.You may understand some of it but not enough to say confidently teach. In order to get around this I usually read/view/talk to multiple sources, one author may explain something better than another. Its vital to refer to different sources to strengthen your understanding.
6. Support Circle
- You will never be great at something until you work with people who are better than you. In order to get better you need to surround yourself with better. One of My favourite quotes is 'birds of a feather flock together, pigeons and eagles don't hang together' - What this essentially mean is in order for you to improve your skill you need to seek support from people who do it better than you. You should study their habits and absorb as much as you can, then apply it.

Cut out sources of distraction. For me, I have weaned away from smartphones and have gone back to dumb phones. I have realized that between my phone and I, only one of us could be smart ;-). Phones are useful for urgent communication, but smartphones also make us ADHD with constant notifications. The same for Facebook and Twitter. They force us to be on "realtime" and hinder with our thought process that requires careful deliberation & assimilation of new content. So, quit them. Quora is the only social network I actively use now. At Quora there is a strong incentive to go for the long form writing.
Avoid the temptation of opening emails more than twice a day. Also, take a break constantly. Human mind wanders off in about 40 minutes of intense mind work.
Take it in steps. Try to concentrate for 10 minutes at a stretch and keep increasing it.
Focus on interesting topics. If you find too hard concentrating, maybe that is not where your passion and interest lies. Of course, there are times when we have to read things that are not merely interesting.
Find quieter places to study. When we were studying NP-Completeness in gradschool (among the hardest courses I have ever had), my study partner and I would find various nook & corner of the university to study without being disturbed by any of our friends. Allocate specific blocks of time in the day, where you will disconnect from rest of the world.

Books: Read reviews on amazon and get the best book on the subject. Also know what prerequisite knowledge is required to learn from that book.

Work schedule: If you are going to self-study, more than anything you need discipline and self control. Plan at night all that you are going to study the next day. Work in blocks of time.

Study method: Read analytically, not passively. Before learning something, write on a paper all that you know about the subject and ask yourself questions about all the stuff you want to know about the study material. After reading every section, close the book and summarize all that you understand in your own words. Don't paraphrase. Form a mental image of the concept you've read and make sure everything makes sense. After you end your study session, sit back and relax for 15 minutes. Close your eyes and think about what you've read.

Testing and revision: Test all that you've learnt on daily/weekly basis and keep review sheets/flash cards handy.

Other resources: You can refer to wikipedia or join free online courses on

When studying, try to match the studying environment with the test-taking environment. Environmental objects and details can work as cues to retrieving information when the place you're trying to retrieve data at is similar to the place you first learned it. Try to match lighting, noise level, people around, and other aspects. Actually studying at school does wonders.

Learn the material from a variety of perspectives. This isn't always easy when you're studying independently, but it can still be done. There are plenty of sources to look at when you're learning about something -- be sure to switch it up every once in a while. Listen to others lecture on the topic, read literature about the topic, apply what you've learned to your own life, and study in small groups with others. All of these methods introduce you to a new person's perspective on the data, and it's not uncommon to hear something and think, "Wow, I never thought about it like that!"

Free up your working memory. Your brain has a very limited amount of processing allocated to what you are working on right now. In order to get the most out of it, you need to be able to focus all of it on the task at hand. Your brain processes anxiety in working memory. If you're anxious for something, try to relax. See.

Reduce distractions. Not only do they take up needed space in your working memory, but they throw off your train of thought and help in procrastination. Distractions can be internal or external -- reduce them both, if you can.

Practice spaced studying rather than massed studying. In other words, don't cram. The more often you see information, the more readily you can retrieve it. Also, cramming creates anxiety if you've waited until right before you need to know something to learn it. If you're not one known to study much, start small. At the very least, look over and read your notes. Once you've become accustomed to a small amount of studying, it becomes much easier to gradually study more and more.

Be aware of the various levels of cognitive processing. Memorization is one of the shallowest levels of processing, and shallow levels are the hardest to retrieve. Do your best to practice deep-level processing, which will help in recall later. What this means to most is this: summarize. Summarization requires more than just memorization or understanding; it requires the ability to break down and reconstruct the information at will. If you can successfully summarize what you've read or seen in your own words, it's very beneficial to the learning process. Studies show that when you generate your own examples for data, you are able to recall that information more readily.

Use mnemonics and other study techniques. These techniques commonly take advantage of already-strong cognitive links by associating new information with old information. Examples of these techniques include the pegword technique, the method of loci, and acronyms.

Don't teach. Argue. A great way to be sure you absolutely know some material is to teach it. It provides motivation, a clear expression of your thoughts, and new perspectives offered during Q&A periods. However, I say you should argue. Especially in controversial topics -- if you find someone that's at least half-way read in that wants to discuss the matter with you, go for it. It's an intellectual battle that stresses your ability to deliver concise facts relating to specific sections of the topic.

Take responsibility for the material you learn. Research shows that people with an internal locus of control are more successful in life. You want to be that person, right? Take responsibility. Also, monitor your progress and try to improve before it's too late. You'll avoid unnecessary stress and anxiety.

Adapt to the learning environment, rather than expecting it to adapt to you. Some people say the ability to adapt is a major part of intelligence. Whether or not you agree, there are studies that show that people that are able to adapt to their surroundings are more successful.

Get a good night's sleep. One of the many functions that REM sleep performs is the consolidation of newly-learned information into long-term memory. The most pronounced REM sleep starts to occur after 5-8 hours of being asleep.

Individuals have different ways to develop their concentration because of differences in the neural patterns for learning in each human being. Many if not most of us on Quora are visual learners; communicating online is a primarily visual medium and we connect with one another using our eyes for receptive information as we keyboard our thoughts to communicate expressive information which is intended to be consumed visually, as text.

Not everybody is a visual learner. While meditation can help many to increase their focal depth and to concentrate for longer periods of time, some people also need other methods to supplement, complement or replace meditation.

For example, I have been known as a teaching analyst who can reach and teach students whose parents were told "nobody can or has ever been able to teach them." Let me give you a few examples to illustrate the point that development of concentration is individually determined:

One child diagnosed with pervasive development disorder and ADHD could not sit still. He literally had to be upside-down and rocking back and forth rhythmically to focus on anything at all. So we went upside-down together, each of us seated on one of those swivel, rocking chairs that bend and twist. We put our feet up on the desktop, each of us held one side of the book, and he DID focus because he was in control of his movements and I kept up with him, rocking back and forth while upside-down as we worked on decoding phonics. In this way, over a year, his phonetic knowledge increased many grade levels and so did his comprehension. You could say we developed his concentration by allowing him to learn in the only way he could: upside-down and rocking rhythmically. I had a feeling it had something to do with him being in the womb and bonding with me, but that was just my instinct. See Fetal Health: Is it important to talk to your baby while it is still in the womb? All I can say with absolute certainty is that he needed to be in charge of both his movement and his positioning in order to develop his concentration and to be able to learn. And he needed to do it with someone who cared about him.

In my own case, in college I had a professor who required us to memorize a tremendous amount of material at a time when I found memorizing to be particularly difficult. I found that when I walked rhythmically, far, and fast, when I focused on each flashcard while walking and glancing at the flashcards, I was able to retain the information better than while just sitting at my desk in the library. The reason for this? The various parts of my brain which were used while walking and learning, together, functioned better for focus and memory than the parts of my brain used while merely remaining seated. Right now there's a graduate student I know who is doing research on the subject of the neurological impacts of repetitious exercise and learning. Her thesis is that there is a positive correlation between learning (concentration) and repetitive exercise, and she designed studies to test that thesis. I hope her studies receive funding.

When people take notes with pen and paper, their hands/forearms rub the paper and their arms move back and forth on the paper. Many people find that taking notes while attending lectures increases their concentration and retentive memory. Why is that? Because the information is placed not only through the orbital nerves connecting to the brain, but also through the tactile, through the movement, using other pathways in addition to the visual and aural. I am not a neurologist but have read enough generally and experienced enough with students and myself over time to be convinced that using multiple modalities for learning in some people is most efficacious in developing concentration.

There is a child who cannot process information she hears. She needs to receive her entire curriculum visually. Because she is in a classroom where teachers speak to her, she is miscategorized as someone who is daydreaming or 'off task' and may be suspected to have ADHD/inattentive. Auditory processing disorder is something she was born with, but to develop her concentration, she only needs to be taught visually. This means providing examples, teaching receptive Sign, and not giving directions aurally.

For young students without unusually impactful learning disabilities, the best way to develop concentration is to practice. Play the card game 'concentration' where all 52 cards are placed face down, and two cards are picked up. The one with the most pairs, wins. There are many games and puzzles on the market which develop concentration.

Turn off the monitors and allow the brain a rest from visual inputs so other modalities such as time for reasoning without visual stimulation can occur.

It is my experience that when one sense (the visual) is overstimulated, the other senses responsible for neural input do not get a chance to develop completely or in a patterned and integrated manner. That is why I like Montessori so much. See the Answers by Lynn Wright for an introduction to Montessori by someone smart and articulate. If I lived anywhere near her new school with young children, they would be attending it because of the superior experiential manner in which concentration is developed by those teaching the lessons devised first by Dr. Maria Montessori.

First of all, thinking that there are talented and genius students as opposed to less talented and dumb students is a limiting belief.

There's nothing stopping you from getting the top grades apart from actually getting work done. Sure, some people with certain traits (high IQ, higher motivation and enjoyment in a particular subject, previous experience in said subject) may happen to do it faster.

If you actually put the work, however, you too can master your assignments and ace every exam. There are a lot of great questions on Quora that show how to study effectively:
Study Habits and Techniques for Studying

Studying begins when a student first reads the material. Therefore, practice these active reading strategies to engage your child with the text as he is reading it. The more a student interacts with the material, the more likely he is to remember it.

1.    Before reading, look at titles, headlines, and pictures.
Most people already know this strategy, yet few people use it regularly. It only takes a student a few minutes to get a general overview of the chapter, but this tool can be invaluable in sorting main ideas from details.

2.    Read a paragraph in its entirety before highlighting or taking notes.
If the student is highlighting in the book, ask him to highlight 2 or 3 details that support the bolded headlines. Writing a few key words on the side of the paragraph will help jog his memory when reviewing the information for a test. Another way to remember what was read is by taking notes either in a notebook or on the computer or even orally explaining it out loud to someone.

3.    Keep track of questions for a later time.
If the student has a question while reading, encourage him to draw a large question mark over it or by using a post it note so that he can ask a teacher or research it on his own at a later time.

4.    Follow through.
Continue with each paragraph until the assignment is completed. The student may complain that this takes longer than just reading, but will soon learns that this process saves him studying time before an exam.

It is also imperative for the disorganized student to keep up with homework and daily assignments. If he stays current with his work, he will be more likely to notice material that he is missing or recognize questions he has about the subject matter. This makes studying for a test more systematic and orderly.

Studying for a Test:

1.    Study in advance.
Always start studying for a test FIVE days in advance and for a quiz – THREE days in advance. When the student starts far enough ahead of time to prepare for an exam, he has the time to see what material is missing or confusing.

2.    Schedule study time daily.
Schedule your student’s studying time on a daily calendar and write down what will be studied each night. Stick to the plan! Do not write the words “study” in the assignment book. Specify exactly which amount of material needs to be covered each night. Plan to finish studying all the material at least TWO days before the test, so that the night before the test can be devoted to problem areas and a general review.

3.    Make a study guide.
As the student puts together a study guide, he also is putting small chunks of information systematically into his brain. An auditory or kinesthetic learner can talk out loud as he creates his study guide.

4.    Put together a study group.
For older students, it is a good idea to study the information with others. It gives students the opportunity to make sure each student understands the material and has studied in a comprehensive manner. Students can quiz each other on information and create outlines for possible essay questions.

5.    Think positively!
Try to imagine yourself getting an A+ on the exam. Imagine getting questions you know the answers to, expressing yourself clearly and concisely, and feeling good about yourself and your performance. Think about how good you will feel inside when the test is over and all your preparation has paid off.

Although some great answers here, however I would like to add mine. I struggled a lot for months with this problem and tried many things. Finally, this whole process helped me. It may or may not work for you. I would really recommend to give it a try. Skip whatever you want or customize the whole process.

1. Preparation

Take a shower(preferably cold), try to feel the water on your skin, listen to the sound of water, smell the soap. Conclusion- Bring yourself to the present moment. Don't think, just be. It will take a while, but it gets better with practice.

After this shower, meditate ( or take a walk outside, if its early morning or evening) for 15-20 mins. Try to keep yourself in the moment. Don't worry about how much you have to study. Just be in the moment. I believe meditation is must for any one. Find the technique which works. Every meditation technique leads to the same goal.

Arrange your desk, get things you will need around. Ex. pen, papers, sticky notes, clip-board, books. etc. Every thing you can think of.

Now, on one notepad (I always keep this with me) create a to do list. The aim should be whatever you are going to finish in next 45 mins. No matter, how much you have to get done, but just take care of next 45 mins right now. A sample list of mine.

     Aim - Finish lesson of data structure - Tree
     - Definition of Tree
     - What is binary tree
     - Types of binary tree
     - Operations of binary tree
     - Types of Tree traversal
                  * in order
                  * post order

Make sure you don't stuff this list. Just something, which you think you will be able to finish this list in 45 mins.

you can make this TO-DO list on your phone or computer, however I find my phone too distracting and I prefer to keep it on silent away from me. Computer I have to use, so I use stuff like - StayFocusd extension, and block everything that could distract me. Facebook, twitter etc.
Also, the feeling of crossing the item on your list by your hand with a pen gives me more motivation and pleasure than anything else. I believe this depend on individual preferences. There are some good to-do list apps available which are really nice like any do (Good day. Every day.)
Use a timer extension on browser, or alarm on phone or your watch or anything which can give periodic alarms cycles for

- Study/work time - 45 mins
- Break - 5-7 mins (make sure no more than 7 mins)

2. Implementation

Once everything in place, start your timer, and start working.
Now, the biggest problem is we lose focus, everyone does. So, every time I lose focus I put a big red cross on the side of my to-do list. Every single time! Be honest with yourself. The idea is to keep the no. of cross as small as possible. Mine were reduced to 3-4 from 15-20 initially. If you are having too much problem, and getting too distracted for longer period of time, you can customize your alarm to remind you to focus in every 15 mins.(DONT USE IT IF YOU ARE DOING WELL)
Don’t get discouraged, if it doesn't work, it takes a while. The meditation, will power and zeal to finish your small list in 45 mins and to reduce no. of cross will keep you driven.

3. During break

1. Stretch (must)
2. Move around in your room
3. Drink water (Don't drink too much that you have to use bathroom too frequently)
4. Use bathroom
5. Snacks like nuts or juice. etc

4. Add ons

Music - Often I prefer music without lyrics which help me concentrate better especially when I am programming. songza Listen to Music Curated by Music Experts has a list for every activity you do, they have special lists for studying and working which includes lists like - Classical for studying, master composers like Mozart and Beethoven

Books - There are some great resources and concepts for staying focused, I think two books which are worth mentioning

Peaceful warrior - Amazon.com: Way of the Peaceful Warrior: A Book That Changes Lives (9781932073201): Dan Millman: Books

Flow - the psychology of optimal experience - Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience: Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi: 9780061339202: Amazon.com: Books

This books have some good insights on the science of focus.

5. Conclusion

Nothing mentioned above would work, if you don't have the enthusiasm and will to overcome the initial obstacles of trying any technique. I have struggled with this. but this worked. I have all As right now in my master's studies and I am enjoying my work and life. A small sense of accomplishment pushes you for more.

All the best :)

Written Jun 13, 2013 • View Upvotes

Vineet Raj, In search of 'Algorithm' of life

14k Views

Your focus should be on the efficiency of study time and not just on increasing your work time. You can slog for hours and still couldn't be able to understand anything. Because your mind is thinking it's doing it's job, but in reality you are not focused at all. I have suffered from this problem too often thinking that increasing my study time will help me. But I just ended up frustrating myself. Then I realized that problem is lying in my method of study. Then, I found a course on www.coursera.com called 'LEARNING HOW TO LEARN'. The instructors Barbara Oakley & Dr. Terrance Sejnowski have given a really wonderful guide to study effectively. You can Google the course and also there is book by Barbara Oakley called 'A MIND FOR NUMBERS' if you are interested you can read that.
This method worked for me. Hope it helps you too...:)

Updated Sep 16 • View Upvotes

George Ramos, teaching since 1993

3.1k Views

I've posted this before, but here you go:

Courtesy of the Marshall Memo:

2. When Students Study On Their Own, What Works and What Doesn’t?

In this extraordinarily thorough fifty-four-page monograph in Psychological Science in the Public Interest, John Dunlosky and Katherine Rawson (Kent State University), Elizabeth Marsh (Duke University), Mitchell Nathan (University of Wisconsin/Madison), and Daniel Willingham (University of Virginia) report on their review of the effectiveness of ten different study techniques that students use for independent study. Each is a plausible method for improving achievement and several are very common – but only two are highly effective and three moderately effective. Here is the authors’ overall assessment of each one, with details on how generalizable the technique proved to be in research studies:
1. Re-reading – Going over text material two or more times after an initial reading is one of the most widely used study techniques.
• Overall assessment – Low utility
• Impact in different learning conditions – One key variable is the amount of time between initial reading and rereading, with a longer lag-time producing better learning.
• Impact with different students – Almost all studies of rereading have been done on college students, so we don’t know much about K-12 applications.
• Impact with different learning materials – Researchers have looked at the effect of rereading across a variety of school materials.
• Impact with different ways of measuring student learning – Studies have not shown robust learning gains in various kinds of assessments.
• Effects in representative educational contexts – Rigorous research on this technique in different classroom settings is virtually non-existent.
• Implementation issues – Students need no training to use this strategy except knowing to wait a little while after initial reading before rereading.
2. Highlighting and underlining – Marking potentially important portions of to-be-learned materials while reading; this technique is widely used by students at all levels.
• Overall assessment – Low utility
• Impact in different learning conditions – Research has found this technique to be unproductive in a wide variety of classroom settings.
• Impact with different students – Studies have found highlighting and underlining to be ineffective with students from the primary grades to Air Force basic trainees. The problem is that students often don’t highlight the most important material or over-highlight so they can’t see the forest for the trees.
• Impact with different learning materials – With difficult material, highlighting and underlining may actually hurt students’ performance on higher-level tasks that require inferential thinking.
• Impact with different ways of measuring student learning – Research shows weak results.
• Effects in representative educational contexts – Several studies found that when teachers highlighted important parts of texts, students did better on assessments, but this did not put highlighting into the front ranks of effectiveness.
• Implementation issues – Students often highlight in ways that are not helpful to learning, and the time spent highlighting is time not spent on more-effective techniques. Extensive training can improve students’ skill at highlighting the most important material, but this is time-consuming and detracts from other approaches that would be more productive.
3. Summarization – Writing summaries of to-be-learned material, capturing the gist and not unimportant or repetitive material:
• Overall assessment – Low utility
• Impact in different learning conditions – The key question is whether students have the material in front of them while they summarize or put the text aside and test their memory. The research is mixed on both conditions.
• Impact with different students – Most of the research has been on college students; younger students have difficulty writing accurate summaries and this makes the technique less effective for them.
• Impact with different learning materials – Most studies have looked at students’ summarizing of prose passages, and more research is needed on other types of materials.
• Impact with different ways of measuring student learning – The research here is mixed, with some studies showing benefits to long-term learning and others showing students performing worse.
• Effects in representative educational contexts – The concern here is whether students have learned to accurately summarize material.
• Implementation issues – This technique is relatively easy for students who know how to summarize, but for those who don’t, extensive training is required.
4. Keyword mnemonic – Using keywords and mental imagery (visualizing the material to be learned in your “mind’s eye”) to associate and remember material; this time-honored technique has been studied since the late 1800s. An example: to learn the French word la dent (tooth), the student thinks of an English word that will be helpful (dentist) and forms a mental image of a dentist holding a large molar with a pair of pliers.
• Overall assessment – Low utility
• Impact in different learning conditions – Researchers have found that this technique is widely used and appears to help students remember the studied material. However, other techniques work better.
• Impact with different students – Studies have covered numerous ages and types of students using this approach.
• Impact with different learning materials – Researchers have looked at numerous subject areas and types of materials, and many don’t lend themselves to the easy association of la dent with dentist.
• Impact with different ways of measuring student learning – Although using keywords and mental imagery appears to work with short-term memory and transfer, the research suggests that it doesn’t produce durable learning – in fact, it leads to “accelerated forgetting.” This is probably because there are so many steps students have to take and multiple opportunities for errors in retrieval.
• Effects in representative educational contexts – The research is mixed in studies in different types of classrooms, but overall it’s not positive.
• Implementation issues – Developing keywords involves skill and time (which is why the keywords are often supplied by the teacher), and research suggests that students’ time is better spent on more-productive study techniques.
5. Using imagery for learning text – Attempting to form mental images of text materials while reading or listening:
• Overall assessment – Low utility
• Impact in different learning conditions – Studies have found that using imagery works better when students are listening to a teacher reading a passage aloud than when they are reading it silently.
• Impact with different students – Research has been done on different age students, and the results have been mixed, with benefits depending on the type of material and whether students are good at forming mental images.
• Impact with different learning materials – This technique works best with learning material that is “image-friendly” and not so well with more-abstract subject matter.
• Impact with different ways of measuring student learning – Using imagery is helpful with free-recall or short-answer tests but ineffective with tests with comprehension, inference, and application questions; there isn’t research on long-term retention.
• Effects in representative educational contexts – Research is thin in this area, but the authors say that using imagery is a “relatively inert strategy.”
• Implementation issues – Students need to learn how to form images as they read, and researchers haven’t established how much time this would take.
6. Elaborative interrogation – While studying, asking oneself why a fact or concept is true and coming up with an explanation:
• Overall assessment – Moderate utility
• Impact in different learning conditions – This technique works best with lists of facts, but there are questions about how well it works with longer or more complex material.
• Impact with different students – Studies have shown it works from university students down to the upper-elementary level but not as well in the primary grades; it’s also less effective with students who have low levels of prior knowledge in the domain.
• Impact with different learning materials – The technique seems to work with many different types of factual material.
• Impact with different ways of measuring student learning – Short-term memory of facts is improved, but research needs to be done on whether this technique works with long-term retention.
• Effects in representative educational contexts – Research is lacking in this area.
• Implementation issues – Students need only minimal training to use this technique – for example, prompting themselves to ask “Why is this true?” every 150 words in a textbook passage.
7. Self-exploration – Explaining how new information is related to known information, or explaining steps taken during problem-solving – for example, a student asking him- or herself, “What parts of this page are new to me? What does this statement mean? Is there anything I still don’t understand?”
• Overall assessment – Moderate utility
• Impact in different learning conditions – This technique does well across a range of school conditions.
• Impact with different students – Research has found this technique to be effective among younger and older students, but more study is needed on its utility with different achievement levels.
• Impact with different learning materials – This technique has been effective with a wide range of materials.
• Impact with different ways of measuring student learning – Studies have shown it to be effective across an impressive range of learning outcomes including memory, comprehension, and transfer.
• Effects in representative educational contexts – More research is needed here.
• Implementation issues – Although students don’t need a lot of training to use this technique, it is relatively time-consuming for students to implement well.
8. Interleaved practice – Implementing a schedule of practice that mixes different kinds of problems or materials within a single study session. The opposite of this, which students use most often, is studying each topic in a block and then moving on to the next one – for example, looking at a series of paintings by one artist, then a series of paintings by another artist. The authors say the interleaved technique has great promise but research on it is less robust than it is for most of the other techniques.
• Overall assessment – Moderate utility
• Impact in different learning conditions – Interleaved practice is often used in conjunction with distributed practice, but its efficacy is not dependent on the spacing between study sessions. It’s most effective when students have attained a level of mastery with each skill so they can move from one to another with some facility.
• Impact with different students – Most of the research has been done on college students, but a few studies have looked at interleaving with upper-elementary students.
• Impact with different learning materials – Researchers have studied interleaving with students learning about artists’ painting styles, mathematics, and other subjects and found different impact in different areas. It is highly effective in mathematics and less effective with learning foreign-language vocabulary.
• Impact with different ways of measuring student learning – An intriguing fact is that when studying, students using blocked practice do better than students doing interleaved practice, but on tests, students who used interleaved practice do significantly better. This may be because interleaved practice helps students compare different types of problems and get better at shifting from one to the other. Interleaved practice may also make greater demands on long-term memory and strengthen those neural links.
• Effects in representative educational contexts – A few studies have found that motivated students can learn to use interleaving quite quickly.
• Implementation issues – Interleaving may take slightly more study time than blocked practice, but the time is well spent, say the authors. They recommend that when teachers present a new skill or topic, they should have students practice that one first, then do a mixed practice with skills from previous units – ongoing, cumulative, interleaved practice throughout the year.
9. Practice testing – Self-testing or taking practice tests on to-be-learned material. “Testing is likely viewed by many students as an undesirable necessity of education,” say the authors, “and we suspect that most students would prefer to take as few tests as possible… This view of testing is… unfortunate, because it overshadows the fact that testing also improves learning.” What does this look like? Students working on their own to test themselves on the target material, either with actual or virtual flashcards, completing practice problems, or doing practice tests – all in a low-stakes environment.
• Overall assessment – High utility
• Impact in different learning conditions – Researchers have most often used cued recall (students write down as much as they can remember about a passage without looking back), but other formats have been studied.
• Impact with different students – Students of various ages have been studied, but the research is thinner on different student achievement levels and amounts of prior knowledge.
• Impact with different learning materials – Studies have affirmed the efficacy of practice testing with a variety of materials.
• Impact with different ways of measuring student learning – Research has shown practice testing produces robust learning gains on a variety of short-term and long-term tests and applying information in new settings.
• Effects in representative educational contexts – Practice testing has been studied in a wide variety of classrooms with positive results.
• Implementation issues – Practice testing is not particularly time-consuming and requires minimal training. The Cornell note-taking method, for example, is quick to learn (students take notes on half of each page and leave a blank column to jot down key terms and questions shortly after taking the notes for self-testing later). Of course feedback on the practice testing is important – either students checking themselves or the teacher providing correctives where necessary.
10. Distributed practice – Implementing a schedule of practice that spreads out study activities over time, versus being massed in a short period of time. “Although cramming is better than not studying at all in the short term,” say the authors, “given the same amount of time for study, would students be better off spreading out their study of content? The answer to this question is a resounding ‘yes.’”
• Overall assessment – High utility
• Impact in different learning conditions – Studies have shown that the key variable is how much time passes between practice/retrieval sessions. For example, to remember something for one week, sessions should be 12 to 24 hours apart. To remember something for five years, sessions should be 6 to 12 months apart. Another variable is how deeply students are processing the information in each practice/retrieval session.
• Impact with different students – Researchers have documented the effect of distributed practice on a wide range of ages and student characteristics, but there isn’t good research on different learner characteristics (for example, prior knowledge and motivation).
• Impact with different learning materials – Studies have tested the impact of distributed practice on a wide variety of learning materials. It does well with most assessments but less well with complex tasks like airplane control.
• Impact with different ways of measuring student learning – The results of distributed practice are strong with all kinds of assessments and strongest with assessments conducted after some time has passed.
• Effects in representative educational contexts – Researchers have seen positive results from distributed practice in many types of classrooms.
• Implementation issues – One factor that makes it more difficult to get students using distributed practice is that textbooks tend to bunch topics together and not return to them. Another factor is “procrastination scallop” – the tendency of students to increase study time just before an exam rather than spreading it out over the semester. Distributed practice doesn’t use more time than other study techniques, but students need to be convinced of its efficacy and have a little training on how to do it. Teachers can also help students distribute practice by giving frequent, short tests.
“It is obvious that many students are not using effective learning techniques but could use more-effective techniques without much effort,” conclude the authors, “so teachers should be encouraged to more consistently (and explicitly) train students to use learning techniques as they are engaged in pursuing various instructional and learning goals.”

“Improving Students’ Learning with Effective Learning Techniques: Promising Directions from Cognitive and Educational Psychology” by John Dunlosky, Katherine Rawson, Elizabeth Marsh, Mitchell Nathan, and Daniel Willingham inPsychological Science in the Public Interest, January 2013 (Vol. 14, #1, p. 4-58),
http://psi.sagepub.com/content/1...

Written Nov 28, 2013 • View Upvotes

Arti Gupta, B.E. Information Systems, MBA in Marketing & Technology

28.2k Views • Arti is a Most Viewed Writer in Studies and Studying.

IDEA 1 - Finding your Zone

I am sure you would have faced a situation when you lost count of time immersed in something. It is called "being in the zone". Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi has worked extensively on how to be in zone?

According to his work, being in the zone is a factor of skill and challenge.

If challenge and skill both are low, a person shows no interest in the task.

If challenge is high and skill is low, there is anxiety

If challenge is low and skill is high, a person is relaxed and gets distracted.

If challenge is high in line with high skill, a person performs in the zone.

Assess your situation when you study, how would you rate your skill and challenge at hand? Tweak with the level of challenge to get focus.

IDEA 2 - Goal setting and achievement using commitment, reward, and punishment

Set a goal for 2 hours and promise yourself that you would not get up before achieving your goal.
You can announce this goal to people at home. Announcing to people helps to get commitment.
Reward yourself every time you are able to achieve a stretched goal. Give yourself a treat, something you would not do normally.
Decide a punishment for yourself if you fail to achieve your goal. For ex - Give your iPad to your sibling, tell him/her your goal. Tell them to delete all your games if you fail to achieve your goal.

Hope that helps.

Written Sep 6 • View Upvotes • Asked to answer by Sharon Jose

Bob Ashley, gov2.0, public administration, local government, classical guitar, sailing, c...

123.3k Views • Upvoted by Vignesh Natarajan, CS grad student at Arizona State University

I graduated from university, first in my class, with a near perfect grade-point average. I'm not particularly smart. I know how to study, however. Here's a few things I did to propel my academic performance ahead of my peers.

1) Immersion through multiple, different sources. Don't rely solely on repeated encounters with the assigned text(s). Get a bunch of input from different sources. The basics will be redundant, helping to solidify your learning foundation, but because the delivery of info is varied, you're much more apt to remain an attentive audience.You're looking for "resonant" descriptions that leave an imprint on you, like that oh-so-special teacher you had in grade three. This is important because so many textbooks suck at delivery, but not all in the same ways. A particular (or peculiar) diagram in a book you found on your own at the library could be the answer to your dream of an intelligible exposition/illustration of Concept 'X'.

2) MInd maps. Sketch, doodle, devise insane visual or auditory or tactile correlations. A series of dry interrelated concepts could become a banana tree whose hanging fruit are yellow trucks, high heels, jewels, and oak saw horses. Absurdity makes abstractions memorable.

3) Frequent re-visits. Like with your sick friend, or mom, frequent, but brief touchdowns signal the importance you place on the nearness of your inter-relationship, in this case, with knowledge.

4) Sit in the room where you'll be examined...ahead of the scheduled exam time, with your material. Connect details of the material with the room's character, its blinds, paint chips, ceiling tiles, light switches, colour, ambience. Entering the examination room ought to be a metaphorical return to the cozy comfort of the womb. Your material, will "be" the room and it will feel "warm" because you took the time to make it so...ahead of time. You've prepared your relation within the environment for your very best performance.

5) If in university, pick courses as early as possible, and start doing light, but frequent readings on the subject every day through the summer, before fall semester starts. You might even find a favorite author! Your relaxed familiarity with the upcoming material, on day one, class one, will deliver you huge momentum to help carry you throughout the term. You're on your bike, accelerating well before the foot of that big hill you're about to ascend. Get a running start.

Written Jun 29, 2014 • View Upvotes

Mayeesha Tahsin

1.4k Views • Mayeesha has 3 endorsements in Studies and Studying.

I don't believe the philosophy of goodwill hunting style intrinsic motivation coming fast to everyone.

You should look at self determination theory, to have intrinsic motivation in any task we've to have 3 components : Competence, autonomy, and relatedness. If you are still bad in physics, obviously your motivation would be low. If you feel too constricted by regulations, your motivation will suffer. If you can't connect why the heck you are learning physics, it's unlikely you'd be able to motivate yourself.

I suggest creating feedback loops for yourself, and gamify the material. You could give yourself rewards for each time you complete something in physics, you can try to talk and collaborate with more people to get the feel of social relatedness, you should just suck up the academic regulation part, and you should be raising your competence level to gain more motivation.

I think with most people they usually do tasks for external reasons, and that's the most natural way for doing most of the things in life. In order to break it out of it you're better off getting towards the right side of the motivational spectrum :

The first part is Amotivation, zero motivation in doing the subject, the second part is extrinsic motivation, where you'd be doing it somewhat for other people, and somewhat for your own reasons, the last part is internal motivation, and expecting everyone will be doing things for intrinsic motivation is very unrealistic. I'm sure by increasing competence, autonomy and relatedness anyone can move towards intrinsic motivation where you do things for it's sake, but for most people it'd be long way to go.

Written Jun 5, 2014 • View Upvotes

Thomas Hukahu, Taught for more than a decade in Papua New Guinea - particularly Secondary Sc...

30.1k Views

Simply put, REPETITION IS THE MOTHER OF ALL LEARNING … The more you go over something using the right “methods”, you will master your topic better.
Note that I said “methods” – no one method is the best, depending on which subject you are learning.
Below is something I wrote for students on preparing for exams. I have edited it to answer the question asked.

THE MIND IS A POWERFUL TOOL
Psychologists like David Waitley say the mind is a powerful thing. (Thank God for that.)
When you set your mind on achieving something and are ready to pay the price for it, your psyche affects your body and it adjusts itself to go where you want to go.
Adopt that mindset. Aim to do well in whatever you are studying. Do not leave anything to chance.

STUDY WITH PEN AND PAPER
Most of us do not have photographic memory and therefore we have to study with pen and paper. Attempting to memorise details from notes is not as effective as writing brief notes on a piece of paper - or in another notebook used solely for revision.

SUMMARISE NOTES
Summarise chunks of notes into bits that you can easily remember. In summarising you are applying a number of skills: reading, comprehending, analysing, re-organising and writing.
The more skills that you apply, the better your mind will retain facts. That skill is useful in subjects like Language, History, Social Science and Biology where a lot of reading is required.

DRAW DIAGRAMS
Draw diagrams to summarise concepts also, as “a picture paints a thousand words”. In Science, a good diagram can summarise the concepts of photosynthesis or water cycle and impress the concepts in your mind.
Try colouring what you draw. An expert said the brain remembers diagrams better in colour.

FOR MATHS, PHYSICS, ENGINEERING
In subjects that involve a lot of calculations like mathematics, physics, chemistry, accounting, economics and engineering, you must do as many exercises – possibly spend one hour a day for each of them.
My Indian Grade 12 Maths teacher gave me the secret to mastering Maths. She said: “If you continue the one hour of practice every day, when exam time comes, your hand will already be solving the problem even before you are conscious of what you are doing.”
She told us to spend one hour a day on Maths.
When I first heard that I was shocked because I was used to spending twenty minutes or less, depending on my mood. I could spend more than one hour reading books, but not doing Maths.
That little tip helped me … it worked wonders and pulled up my marks in other subjects in Science that required a lot of Maths skills.
If you want to be really on top of what you are doing, consider spending more than one hour a day on Maths. (But note that you must not rob yourself of the time you should be giving to other subjects too.)

FOR MUSIC AND SPORTS
In these two areas, “Repetition is the mother of all learning” is the key.
Those who master skills in Music or a Sport usually spend more time refining skills than their other course or team mates.
There is no substitute for more practice.
Additional point: Special techniques as learned from and guided by coaches/masters will also greatly advance the learner.
Learning a special technique can help a learner reach his/her goals faster.

IN WORKING WITH BOOKS, QUIETNESS AND OTHER BITS
For most academic subjects which require revising from textbooks, find a desk to work on - not your bed. Be prepared ... if you have to shower and shave to be mentally alert, do those.
And find a quiet place to do your studies e.g. in the library.
And, do not study with your headphones on with your favourite song playing ... that will distract you.

Updated Jan 2, 2014 • View Upvotes

Kieran Antonio, From the PSLE to the IGCSE and now onto the IB

1.4k Views

Sometimes, simplicity is the best solution.

Let me just share my story about how I arrived at the techniques that finally allowed me to study effectively for the first time in my life leading up to my IGCSE exams.

Since I was about 11, I had been trying to find the answer to this question by devising and trying new wacky and complex ways to study effectively for the exams leading up to my Primary School leaving exam. However, I tripped up every time including for that crucial end of Primary education exam as well. Every method I had tried fell short and I constantly did poorly.

However, with about 3 months left to spare before my IGCSEs (end of Secondary education exam) when I was 15, I realised I did not know enough to do even averagely well. The bad part was that I was still lazy and now desired studying in a very simple way just to save energy. I was fed up with weird and complex ways such as having millions of post it notes all over the place, everything in varying colours, fonts, shapes and sizes, odd mind maps, flow charts and diagrams bursting out of nowhere going to who-knows-where etc...you get the idea. Perhaps beauty and complexity was not related to effectiveness?

Then, just out of sheer laziness, I started studying in a new way because it seemed simple to implement and follow. I did not think it would take me far or give me great results, I just expected it to get me by. However, it did quite the opposite. Perhaps laziness does have its perks.

I used this method and managed to get 7A*s and 2As for what I did. I am not saying this to boast but rather just to show you that it worked for me (someone who had never done great in exams and desired a simple approach).

For my study process, it just involved two simple parts where everything else hinged upon. Many people like to overthink different ways of studying for your exam but for me simplicity is what worked best, based on hard work. Also, try not to listen to music when studying as it tends to distract you and prevents information being absorbed, the same goes for multi-tasking.

What are the two simple parts to how I studied?

1. Note taking.

Your brain is not going to remember every bit of information so don't even try to walk into the exam hall thinking you're an expert because 'you remember everything from class'. You may think you do, but you probably don't, unless you're a genius, which I by the way am not.

When you are in class, Listen!

I am not saying take down detailed notes in class or write down every word the teacher says...

No. Just listen, listen, listen to what the teacher has to say and take down very brief summary notes of what is most important such as a key concept or an equation for example. Your exercise book should not be filled with more than a page and a half every lesson. Anymore than that, and you probably have not been absorbing or listening to what is going on as much as you should.

When you are at home, Write!

Once you get home, everyday, review your work and what exactly you have learnt in class, refer back to the textbook or whatever you did that day and refresh yourself on what you learnt. From that, and referring back to the syllabus (to see what you must learn and what topics you are unsure of), textbook and your school notebook every now and then to grab the key takeaways, write or type up a document of what you should know for that topic based on what you learnt that day.

Do this everyday and it should not take more than half an hour. Leave it to the last minute, and you are going to be swamped with 101 topics from 101 subjects and its just not going to work at all. Do not carry on with your notes if there is something you are unsure about, only move on if you understand everything you write. If you are writing page 3 of your notes, you should understand Pages 1 & 2 inside out. If not, stop, re-read the chapter and seek help from your teacher.

Regarding the notes, they absolutely do not have to be colourful, in your face mind maps or exquisitely designed flow charts (Depends on what works for you though).

As for myself, I am not sorry to admit that mine was simply a word document built on sub-headings, bullet points, short explanations and diagrams. That's it. I used limited colour, a very small amount of shapes, and virtually no smart art or word art whatsoever. And yet, it worked well.

I just filled my document with the core content of what needed to be known and put it into visible easy to read point form. This allowed me to easily refer back to it if I forgot or did not clearly understand something. The biggest problem I have with exquisite mind maps and notes is that it is difficult to pinpoint something and refer back to it quickly when I needed to, it also is extremely time consuming which for a set of revision notes, in my opinion, is unnecessary, but again, whatever works best for you. Remember, your notes is not a graphic design project.

2. Practice Papers

I am not an advocate of too many textbook questions, they are usually too simple and are nothing like what appears in the exam, so only do textbook questions to test your really fundamental understanding of the topic at the beginning, but bear in mind, simply acing textbook questions is not going to get you very far in the exam.

In terms of practice papers, try not to wait till the last minute and cram 3 per day. That is just unsustainable and bloody tiring. Same as with your notes, try and do your practice papers over a pro-longed period of time, 2-3 papers a week of alternating subjects worked well for me, however I increased that frequency to 3-4 per week in the final month of the exam just to make sure I left no stone unturned.

You may ask how are there enough practice papers to keep this going? Simple. Find the exam papers and answer keys online then print them all out starting from a few years back such as 2008.

When you do your practice papers, have a copy of the answer sheet too. The point of this is because what you may begin to notice is that the questions they ask tend to repeat and be pretty similar across the years, therefore, their answers will also tend to be very similar too, the answer sheet will expose first hand to these 'model' answers that will come up and again and again and will also show you exactly what answers the exam board wants to specific questions, hence, even if you go into the exam and have a familiar question but you don't fully understand the concept, you should know the model answer and therefore could just put it down and have a high probability of getting it right simply because you've done your background work. This also puts you at an advantage above the people who may understand the concept but lack the ability to articulate it in the way the exam board wants you to do so.

After finishing every paper and learning from your mistakes, file it away somewhere so when you refer back to it or refresh yourself before the exam, it will be easily accessible.

Once you have completed refreshing yourself with the work you have done, do no work at all up to the day of the exam. Enjoy yourself and do what you want, you have worked hard. There is nothing to fear.

The above content was mostly for content and word-based subjects such as Biology, Chemistry, Literature etc... rather than a number based topic such as Maths. After all, you cannot really take good quality notes for a subject like that.

Therefore, I came up with a logical step by step study method that I'll share with you meant just for Maths which somehow got me an A* and an A even though I have never in my life been great at it:

Get a copy of the syllabus to get a clear view of the exact topics and their components that you will be tested on. Make a little mark beside the topics you do not think you are very confident in.
Get your textbook again and focus on those topics you are not too sure about. Do about 10-15 beginner/intermediate questions ensuring your foundation is there. Then move on to complete all the hard questions in that topic to ensure you can handle the tougher stuff. You will probably run into difficulties along the way and that is when you seek help from your teacher.
Once you have finished the topics you are not confident in and have become comfortable with them, move onto all the other topics you feel neutral and confident in. Do about 5-7 of the beginner/intermediate questions in those topics just to make sure your foundation is still very much intact. Once again, move on to do all the 'hard' questions even if you think they are easy. This will ensure you are comfortable with those topics and can handle the harder questions there too. Do not be complacent and skip topics as that is where you will lose easy marks.
Find and print out all the past year exam papers from all the different time zones along with their respective answer keys.
Start work on the past year exam papers under timed conditions. Do all the questions that you know how to do. Leave out the questions you do not know how to do. Once the paper is done use the mark scheme to mark yourself and to fill in the questions that you did not know how to do and learn from and understand your mistakes. If unsure, seek the help of a teacher. Never move onto another paper without understanding every single question and every single method used in the previous paper. This part is very important as it gives you an idea of the types of questions the exam board likes to ask and also shows you how the questions have evolved over the years. The answer key shows you the answers and methods the markers like to see and also gives you an idea of how the answers required have evolved over the years. Knowledge of these will give you a big advantage on the day of the exam.
Once all the papers are completed, go through each of the papers to review what you have done and to ensure you remember and understand why you have done what you have done for each question. Just make a little mark on the question if you do not understand why you did something and then seek help from a teacher. Only move onto the next question when you fully understand why you have done what you have done for the previous one.
Spend the remaining time before the Maths exam; relaxing and having a good time. Do no work at all. No more maths. No more school material. Behave like you are on holiday. Go out with friends, exercise, start a business, get a job, do whatever makes you happy. Most importantly, get tonnes of sleep as there is no better preparation for a Maths exam than to be well rested and have a clear, quick mind. This part is absolutely fine to do and actually good because you have spent the past time working hard and understanding everything, therefore if you were truly diligent about it, everything should make sense to you and there is no point going over stuff you have already completed hence, you are prepared for the exam.
On the day of the exam, remain calm but focused and alert. Understand and have the confidence that you have put in the hard work and that the results you aimed for will follow as a result of that. After you finish the paper, check your answers thoroughly. There is nothing worse than coming to terms with the reality of careless mistakes undoing what you have spent the past time practicing.

Finally,

For any exam, try to enjoy the journey! I struggle with this immensely too, possibly because I do not see myself as an academic guy, but I try to find a source of enjoyment somewhere inside the world of exams and grades. Make sure you exercise and have a good time in between as well as it will help to clear your mind and study more efficiently. Try to do the same, it definitely helps.

Hope the answer has been helpful and all the best for whatever you are studying for!

Written Jan 11 • View Upvotes

Rory Mulvey, Director/ Student Enrichment Services Ltd, Dublin, Ireland.

3.1k Views

Always work against the Clock
Each time you study, clearly specify the work you intend to complete and set yourself a given period of time in which to complete it.
Don't become a "clockwatcher" - they sit in the room quite happily, just so long as they spend sufficient time "at the books"
You must learn to work against the clock. By specifying clearly what work is to be completed, and by what time, you should provide the necessary motivation to complete a worthwhile session.

Goal Setting
Keep a notebook and write down just a few things that you feel you could achieve this week - something important but not too difficult. Perhaps there is a verb or two that could be learnt; perhaps you could watch a video of the novel you are studying; or maybe something as simple as learning four French words a night (you will be amazed at how quickly it can build up!) Never set yourself things that you feel you can't do.
Goals must be very specific. Don't set goals like "I'm going to improve at Maths". It could be "I'm going to improve my Maths mark by 4% by the next test." Don't say, "I'm going to do more study" - be specific - how much? and when exactly?
By writing down simple tasks, and by setting a completion date, you will be amazed at how you stop just drifting from one day to the next. There is also a real sense of achievement when you work your way down the list.
Buy yourself a "goals notebook" and use each page for one week. Set a small number of goals for the first few weeks so that you get the satisfaction of completing them, you can always increase the number as you go on. Every Sunday, check what you have achieved. You are not limited to school topics. You could set personal fitness goals, skills goals, behaviour goals - anything at all! Once you do this you stop drifting and start achieving!
All goals should be "SMART"

S pecific (not something vague)

M easurable

A chievable

R ecorded (written down)

T imed (have a time limit)

Written Feb 12, 2014 • View Upvotes

Jorge Sicaeros, Mexican and engineer

2.2k Views

I have found that using flashcards really flattened my learning curve. There are several studies that show that through scheduled repetition you retain a lot more information than just reading the same thing over and over. Sadly it doesn't work for everything, but if history is your main concern it will work just fine.
About flashcards:
A free and outstanding option is Anki (or Ankidroid), you can download from here: Anki - powerful, intelligent flashcards. The way it works is simple, you create or download a deck of cards, each one containing a question and on the "back" of the card an answer, e.g. if your studying about WWII you can write on one side "D day" and on the back the date of d day, strategies or any other fact. You should read the guide featured in the site I provided, it clearly explains how flashcards work.

Written Jan 7, 2015 • View Upvotes

Samyak Datta, CS Undergraduate, Classic Rock and Fantasy Fiction l0v3r

2.9k Views

Most of the answers provide an exhaustive list of effective studying techniques to be used. I would like to add one technique which I have discovered to be quite productive through personal experience. It's called the the "Feynman Technique" after the Nobel laureate Richard Feynman.

The whole concept behind the Feynman technique is that : "If you really understand something, you should be able to explain it to a layman using simple examples and analogies".

As depicted in the video, the crucial step in this technique is to make detailed notes on any topic as if you are teaching the concept to someone who doesn't understand it at all!

Written Dec 14, 2012 • View Upvotes

Joanna Jast, life-long learner; Udemy instructor: Study skills, Study Habits, Productivity

1.4k Views • Joanna is a Most Viewed Writer in Study Habits.

Even though to some extend 'the most effective' would depend on your individual situation, here are a few important aspects of effective learning:

First of all: there are two main aspects of studying:
1) Study techniques (skills)
2) study habits

1) For best study techniques, I;d recommend
- learning how to read textbooks and extract knowledge from other sources effectively and efficiently:
Fast and forever - an unauthorised guide to quickly learning and remembering anything anywhere

- learning how to read textbooks
How to read a textbook

- learning how to take notes
How to take notes

- mastering the art of learning through making connections and processing for meaning
- mastering the art of spaced repetition and using emotions to enhance the learning process:
4 essential elements of effective learning

2) For best study habits I'd recommend:

- establishing a study routine
How to implement a study routine

- creating a distraction-free environment
Top 4 distractions for modern students (and how to deal with them)

- managing procrastination
Choose your weapon smartly - powerful procrastination killers for every occasion

- creating exercise routine

- creating good sleep habits

I hope it helps

Written May 24, 2015 • View Upvotes

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