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The way you studied in high school is expired, and it’s usually up and dead by the first midterm. Rereading and highlighting your chapter worked great while your tests were on two week spans of material, but not so much when suddenly it’s six chapters and a stack of slides.
Here are ten things that actually work, plus a few things I’d skip
Close the book and write down what you remember. It’s unpleasant, but pulling things out of your brain is exactly what the exam will do, so practice that rather than staring at the page. Do this after every section, rather than waiting until the night before.
This one is a biggie. By the end of your chapter, half the page is yellow, and you don’t really remember anything, because highlighting only asks you to recognize important-sounding sentences. Instead, write a question in the margin and answer it later, if you want to write anything at all.
The traditional start-time is three nights before your exam, and forty minutes a day for a week beats out a five hour cramming session, anyway, and you’ll find what things are confusing while there’s still someone who can explain it to you. If you could only change one thing on this list, change this.
Pre-written decks are great for vocab or things like drug names, but for anything where you need to understand a concept, writing the card is half the battle. Keep it simple with one question per card, and an app like Anki will keep track of when you need to review each one, so you don’t have to.
Not even face down on the desk, but in another room. Even a silent phone that you never look at steals some of your attention, and every time you look, you spend a few minutes getting back into whatever you were doing.
If you’re studying for a class like math, chem, econ, or stats, underlining a worked example and nodding along won’t tell you much. Instead, cover up the solution and work the problem yourself, then check your work. Old exams are your best friend for practice, so use them if your professor offers any, and if not, ask the TA for more practice questions.
Bring a question from lecture. Ten minutes there can save you two hours staring at a section in the textbook that makes no sense. A professor who knows your name is more likely to cut you some slack when you inevitably fail an exam, and to write you a nice recommendation letter later.
To a roommate, or to the wall. If you get stuck partway through a sentence, you’ve found the point where your understanding starts to fray. It’s fast, a little embarassing, but much more effective than going over your notes for the tenth time.
All-nighters are a myth. You waste most of the time cramming, and when you do go to the exam, you’re groggy and slow. Be in bed at a reasonable hour the night before any big test or exam, even if that means stopping your review earlier than you’d like.
Tutoring centers and writing labs are already paid for with your tuition, and almost nobody uses them, so there’s rarely a wait.
Rewriting your notes in a nice format is usually just a way to feel busy. Color-coded notebooks are pretty but do almost nothing for your grades. Music with lyrics is a trap while you’re trying to read, because part of your brain will always be focused on the words.
Study groups are a good way to skip learning new material entirely. They’re worth it for review, once you’ve actually tried doing the problems on your own.
Pomodoro method is fine, but don’t treat those breaks as sacred if you’re in the middle of working through a difficult problem set. Take the breaks when your focus flags, rather than when the clock says so.
Two hours outside of class for every credit hour is a good rule of thumb, so about six hours for a 3-credit class. It varies depending on how difficult the class is, but how much you actually retain when you go back over the notes is more important to think about, since time spent is easily fooled.
You can if you want, but it’s not a good idea. You’ll find yourself getting sleepy, and your brain will start to associate your bed with studying, which can lead to issues falling asleep later. A desk, the library, or a kitchen table are all much better options.
You’re probably studying wrong. Rereading and highlighting are both busywork that don’t actually test your knowledge. Try switching to practicing problems and/or self-quizzing for two weeks and see if your next quiz score improves. If not, a campus learning center can look at your study habits and see what’s going on.
Two weeks before for tough classes, using the short study sessions. A week is the absolute minimum, though.
Go through the syllabus and prioritize whichever assignments are worth the most points, and email your professor about anything you can’t complete on time, before the deadline, not after. Most are much more likely to give you extension if you ask politely.
Start with two of these, probably the phone and the practice problems, and work your way up to the rest.
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