A popular study strategy with a number of variations, this might be the best. Don't wait until graduate school. Learn how to study while it can do you some good.
Survey: Take a few minutes, look at the contents page of the chapter you are about to read. Then look at the pages you are about to read. Check the captions of the pictures and watch how the headings fit.
Question: As you skim the reading, say or write out questions about the material. Ask the questions! We retain information more effectively when we read to answer questions than when we simply read.
Read Actively: Take the view that the author is sitting with you, actually talking to you. In the same way that you should pay close attention to your guest, the speaker, pay close attention to what you are reading.
Record: Read with a pencil in your hand, not a highlighter. Too many people use their highlighters to change the color of their textbooks, thus losing the effect of highlighting. Instead, use your pencil to mark the margins or underline as needed. Also, use your pencil to talk/write back to the author. Since s/he is talking to you, talk back! If something in the text prompts you to say something, write it down! If a question comes into your mind, write it down. Memory is enhanced by using more of your brain.
Recite: Study to the point where you can SAY something intelligent about whatever it is that you are studying. The more parts of your brain you can involve in your studies, the better. Reading involves some of your brain; you think about it and it involves more brains. Then you put together some thoughts and express them in sentences, as if you are teaching someone else. Thus, you use even more brains. The more brains you use, the better.
Review: Look at your notes again. See the way they go together. Look for the bigger picture. Look for the holes in your notes; what did you miss? what must be coming next? how does this relate to other topics?
Reflect: Think about your studies. How do they apply to the rest of your life and the world?
You will do well on almost any topic when you have basic answers to questions similar to these:
Who? - Who are the people involved in the research? To whom does the phenomenon apply?
What? - What is the thing you are talking about? What is the definition? To what does it relate? (If you can not explain a topic or concept so that it makes any sense to someone else, you still don't understand it)
Where? - Where in the world did the thing come from? Where does the process occur in the body? Where would you need to go to find this thing?
When? - When in history did this take place? When would you expect to see such an occurrence? In any kind of process, when does this step take place? If there are exceptions to a rule, when do you find them?
Why? - Why is this so? Why does this thing exist? Why do people differ in their theories about this?
How? - How does the process work? How do you make the concept work for you (i.e. take advantage of the situation for your benefit?)
The authors have probably spent decades studying or teaching the material you are about to read. They have been taught by the best teachers and have read what the best and brightest minds have to say about the topic. From this, they have found a certain organization of the material that puts it all into an appropriate framework. Further, memory research consistently finds that whether, and how we organize our thoughts and things to be remembered makes a big difference in memory performance. Use the table of contents to see the organization of the material. It is a road map as you read and study. Then, use it to review, testing yourself over the material you have read.
Authors often give you two (or more) terms or concepts within the same paragraph or page. Then they explain them. The author wants you to see a distinction between them. Distinctions are the beginning of knowing the language of a discipline and the basis of further understanding. Start here and build!
A current movement in education is to emphasize learning, and being able to do new things (performance). Use the objectives as they appear in the syllabus or study guide. They are likely the basis of the tests you will take. Notice the verbs, "Define" is not the same as "explain" or "give an example." In the course objective says "List advantages and disadvantages of ......", then study by actually listing advantages and disadvantages.
The process of creating soup involves heating some flavorful thing in water, to extract the flavor. One then simmers this to cook off the water and concentrate the flavor. Boil off enough water and you have a small amount of very concentrated stock. This stuff is easier to carry around or store than a large pot of boiling soup. Studying is basically the same process. The textbook is like soup, ready to eat. If you want to store (that is, to remember) or carry the thought, it is more efficient to condense it. When you read, think about what you are reading until you determine its essence. This is how scholars of old studied, building their own notebooks. What does it all boil down to?
Memory research says that we learn things to different degrees depending on the features to which we pay attention. If all you do is look at something, this is the way you will remember it. You may entirely miss other relevant features of the reading. However, when we focus on the meaning of something, it will be the meaning we remember when it is needed. In a testing situation, you may only remember having seen something on a page and wish that you could read about it from the image of the page in your mind. Instead, study for the meanings and relationships in the writing. That is the manner in which you will probably be asked to respond in an exam.
Scholars have studied in groups for thousands of years, it works! You discuss, debate, clarify and organize the material to be learned through a collaborative process. The important part is that you all learn. Go ahead!; divide the labor then teach each other. This is not the same as a group class project or a group grade. The real world will not let your partner answer for you.
A test is an opportunity to subject oneself to a trial, in order to prove what you know or are able to do, or to estimate your level on a particular scale. Instructors test you, keen thinking students anticipate this. Test yourself under conditions that will actually prove what you know. Consider the manner of exams you will soon take. Your study group colleagues may be your best practice examiners. The traditions of higher education have always placed high value on examinations as stepping stones to completion of your goals. This has not changed.
Bold, underlined and highlighted or italicized text takes extra effort by the publisher and author. Someone felt that it was worth it. Further, if more than one term is thus identified within the same paragraph or page, they probably have some kind of relationship with each other; figure out what that relationship is.
Use them for vocabulary building, then build them into visual (or concept) maps, discovering the organization present within. Be sure to go in both directions, you will be asked to know definitions and recognize terms. Quiz yourself, then let someone else quiz you-- there’s the real test.
Treat yourself well when you accomplish your
goals. Identify what you need to do, then break your study
activities into manageable segments. Plan to give yourself a reward when,
and only when, you reach each study goal.
People achieve more when their goals are 1. specific, 2. self-set, 3. reasonably challenging and 4. have a time limit.
1. Thus, you should make specific goals: Not just work hard...but, solve the odd-numbered problems for this week's math assignment.
2. Self-set goals are what you give yourself, not what are assigned by your teacher, parents or neighbors.
3. Reasonably challenging goals are difficult enough to require some hard work (there's that phrase again) but not too hard. If goals are too difficult, no sensible person even tries to succeed; if the goals are too easily met, people let them slide and often do not put forth enough effort to even begin.
4. Giving yourself a deadline improves the chances that you will make the needed efforts. Who hasn't heard this one "I work better under pressure"?
