With the demands of school life evolving as years pass by, students indeed have to pick up their productivity. Achieving good grades alone is not enough. Now, extra-curricular activities, student organization, and part-time jobs would be eating away your study time.
So how do you make the most out of the little time you get for actual learning? Of course, academic services such as EssayHelp can be a big boon for completing assignments. However, you need to rely on learning strategies to perform well on exams and retain what you study.
So without any further ado, we will get into the seven best learning strategies that have proven effective time after time.
1. Spaced Learning
Your lack of long periods of time for studying might be a blessing in disguise. The only thing is to not wait until the last minute to cram before the exam. When you do this, you might be memorizing the material. But it will soon vanish from your mind.
Instead, you can split the study sessions into multiple intervals. This way, you will be brushing up on what you learned in the previous session every time. This repetitive training has proved to be tremendously helpful in retaining long-term memory. Ensure that you have set aside small blocks of time every day to review what you studied, and it will help to concrete the concepts in your mind. If the thought of writing your essay makes you want to pull your hair out, don’t despair. There are plenty of options available for write my essay cheap services that can help relieve some of the stress and anxiety associated with finishing essays on time.
2. The Protégé Effect
Scientists have dubbed the protégé effect as a way for students to score higher on tests by teaching other students. This is certainly not a new approach. Students have always sought tutoring from peers to help each other out. The idea is that in order for you to teach, you first need a thorough understanding of the subject.
You think about the subject in your own words and break it down to explain to others. This deconstructing and reconstructing of ideas will reinforce them in your mind. If you do not want one-on-one sessions with another student, you can apply the same concept in group study sessions, too. Even if you do not have a study buddy, imagine that you are teaching the subject to another student and explain it out loud.
3. Retrieval Practice
It is likely that you have already been doing retrieval practice at some level. It is the act of trying to recall the information you studied without referring to it. Once you have tried your best to repeat what you learned, you can cross-check your notes and see if you got them right.
Now, evidently, it is not a new concept. However, studies prove that retrieval practice is more effective than you think. In fact, retrieving information has proven to be more effective than reviewing lectures, study guides, and revising. If you combine recalling with other strategies, you are likely to see better results.
4. The Pomodoro Technique
According to psychologists, an average student’s attention span ranges from 10 to 15 minutes. However, students are used to longer study sessions that eventually take away their focus with time. When students try to replicate the same study intervals later, their attention span diminishes after a certain point. Now, as we all know, when the distraction kicks in, it isn’t easy to control.
Pomodoro technique proposes that you use a timer to break down your sessions. Typically, you can do four 20-minute sessions with five minutes break in between. After four sessions, you take a long break of half an hour or so. But today, most Pomodoro apps also give you the option to set your own timers. Students can plan their study sessions based on their attention spans, and the quick breaks will encourage them to get back to learning as well.
5. Building Connections
Mind-maps and flow charts have been taking a front seat in learning strategies recently. By visually outlining the information, students can process new information faster. They help to build a narrative to connect different aspects of a concept and understand them better.
Flow charts are also an effective way for students to take notes during a lecture. It helps to simplify complex subjects, boost creative thinking, and makes information easier to consume.
6. The Memory Palace Technique
The technique of Memory Palace dates back to the ancient Roman period. In simple words, it is to build your own palace and associate a piece of information with the place’s detail. Consider that you are taking a route through the palace, or any place for that matter. This will help you to recall the items in a specific order.
When you need to recollect what you studied, you will be thinking of these details. Which object or place did you attach it to. The scene will be vivid in your mind. There is no right way to do this. You can pick any place, any route, and any object to relate your thoughts to. Associating locations with mental concepts is one of the most powerful memory combinations that can be highly beneficial to remember them.
7. Trust Your Learning Style
How a student learns depends on their individual cognitive style. Our educational system might not recognize the impact of this individual style on education. How students fare in exams is also influenced by whether the teaching materials cater to the idiosyncrasies.
Consequently, for students to perform to their best, they first need to recognize their learning habits and styles. What works for your classmate might not work for you. Acknowledging and understanding this will help you find a method that works best for you.
Final Thoughts
We recommend that you note where your strength lies and what your weaknesses are. If time management is an issue, the Pomodoro technique should work in your favor. If you have trouble recalling what you studied, you can try any strategy we mentioned above till you find the right one for you.